Ildephonse, Orphans, & Goats

Days 7 & 8 (Wednesday/Thursday) Many people who had murdered others in the 1994 genocide fled over the border to the Congo to escape prosecution. There they banded together, and until 2007, they would sneak from their camps in the Congo over the border into Rwanda and raid villages, killing and raping and ravaging many innocent lives. One of these lives was a toddler named Jeannette. Congolese soldiers raided her village and killed her parents. They chopped her legs off below the knees, swiping at an angle so the legs don't hit the ground evenly when she stands on the stumps that are left. How is she connected with us? In 2010, Brookwood's VBS and Challenge Week (teen program) and The Well all raised money to build some houses in Kiryamo, Rwanda. One of the houses we helped fund was an orphan dorm, a building right by the church that houses 8orphans. Jeannette now lives in this dorm, cared for by a grown-up, school uniforms paid, and fed every single day. Last year when we visited Kiryamo, we saw the beginning of the construction. We couldn't wait to go back and see the finished product, and especially meet the children who live there now.  So...Wednesday and Thursday...the culmination of our trip to Rwanda began with our journey up the northern mountain to the region of Bukonya. Riding for two hours on bench seats in the back of an SUV up curvy, steep, bumpy mountain roads can lead to a few bumps and bruises. One might even be tempted to complain a little, except for one thing- every few minutes, we would pass a man or two pushing a rickety bicycle. On top of the bicycle would be huge loads of something being taken to market- we saw everything from lumber to potatoes, boat parts to sacks of fertilizer. Huge loads perched precariously on the bike's seats or handlebars. The farmer, dripping with sweat, hunched down to push harder, moved slowly through the mountain roads with his load, up and down the winding hills under the hot sun. At one point I asked Manu where these men were going. I assumed there was a village somewhere close that I must have just missed seeing, or one that was off the road we were on. Surely, I thought, there was one close by. "They are going to Musanze," he said. Musanze? The city at the base of the mountain? We had been driving over 30 minutes when I asked him that question, when we just passed the man slowly pushing the bike on foot. It had taken us over half an hour by car to go from Musanze to where we were. We passed many more men in the next two hours, all carrying or pushing heavy loads of cargo. All going to Musanze. It would take them well into the night to reach the city, but they did what they had to do. There is no other way.  Any complaints those of us had about the bumpy roads disappeared.  We were met at the Bukonya coffee cooperative washing station by a group of native tribal dancers. They persuaded some of us to dance with them, and even got Kris to put on the tribal warrior wig and do the dance with them. We climbed to the top of the  washing station and met with the top ten producing coffee farmers in the cooperative. Each was formally introduced to us, and we presented them with goats that we had brought for them. They all expressed such gratitude and explained to us how the coffee farming has changed their lives- one elder named Justin told us that he put all 9 of his kids through college by farming the coffee! Before we left, we decided to stop by the house that LOTH had built a few years ago for a good Samaritan. Good Samaritans are those who agree to take in and raise orphans, kind of like an informal foster care system. The good Samaritan who lives in this house we visited is named Justine. As we walked up the pathway, we saw that she was sitting on a mat on the ground in front of her home. She greeted us warmly, but we soon learned she was very sick. She had had to have a tooth pulled just that morning, and was in terrible pain. She had been sick for weeks because of the infection, and had not been able to work or find food for the children. Praise God's timing that we had come and could get her some help! One of the little girls that was in the home gasped and clutched at Katie's hands when she saw we had come and could help. Again- what a perspective that gave me as my own kids' faces flashed before my eyes. The next day, Thursday, we went to Kiryamo parish- Pastor Ildephonse's region. I wish everyone at The Well could meet this man and his wife. Well over 6 feet tall, his quiet smile and gentle demeanor make him instantly likeable. Last year we got to meet with him and his wife and see the house that Brookwood's children and teens built for him, plus see the start of the orphan dorm that we helped to fund.  We couldn't wait to see the finished dorm and meet the orphans now living in it! We walked down the steep path, and we heard the sweet, pure sound of little kids singing. As we rounded the corner and came into view,  some of the kids broke out from the group and started dancing. The dancing was lovely! A tiny little girl off to the side inched closer and closer to the bigger girls, trying to mimic the dancer's moves. She reminded me of my own daughter who watches KidStuf at our church each week and copies the dancers who are on stage. As the dancing ended, some adult choirs sang for us, and then we were invited into the church. There, as we walked in, sat the 8 orphans who lived in the dorm (I recognized Jeannette, who grinned shyly at me, as well as the tiny girl who had been dancing). We walked in and sat at the front of the church in chairs that had been prepared for us, facing the rest of the church. Most of us were crying already because of the sheer moment. The orphans slowly stood up and filed out of their seats to stand in front of us. They sang a song to us, singing "You are welcome, you are welcome, you are welcome here." More choirs then sang for us. The interpreter explained that they were singing thanks to us for coming from so far away to show God's love, and thanking God for sending us.  We had tears in our eyes as the unworthiness of being the subject of songs like these washed over us. Then, one of the orphans stood up to speak. He had written a letter of thanks to us. He asked us to please pray for his other friends who were also orphans but who still had no place to sleep at night. I just wanted to get my arms around him and hold him. After a little more singing and a time of worship and prayer, we were able to go into the classrooms to help teach. They want so desperately to be good in English. Two years ago the government mandated that all schools teach only in English- all books, all curriculum, be solely English. This has made it really difficult for those who don't already know the language, and children and adults alike soak it up when they hear it spoken. From there, Kris and I spent a FUN time rounding up the goats that were grazing on the mountainside so we could take the naming pictures. Seriously, people, if nothing else, it's worth the cost of the trip to watch Kris chase and wrangle goats on the side of a mountain! Those 8 goats were given to the orphans that live in the dorm. They get the dignity of owning them and then will turn around and present the village with the babies the goats produce. Those of you who bought goats ROCK- they really do SO MUCH GOOD!!! We then headed to the orphan dorm. In the front room of the dorm (used for them to sit and study) we had a banquet of chicken, sun-roasted peanuts, freshly picked fruit, boiled eggs, rice and beans, and fried bananas. Pastor's wife presented Kris a hat she had woven herself just for him. They explained that when you come to Rwanda once, you are guests; come twice, you are real friends; come three times, you are family. We presented them with the school supplies for the teachers. That was so much fun showing and explaining everything to them, and the teachers got really excited about using these resources. The dresses and shorts were brought out next, and again, everyone was so grateful. We wrapped up our trip by spending time with the orphans in the dorm. We got to see their rooms (boys in one room, girls in the other). We held them and laughed with them and loved on them. They were really excited about their goats, and they asked over and over for their pictures to be taken so they could see what they looked like. The youngest of them was little Janet, who turned out to be the one who had danced with the big girls earlier in the day. She is 5 and lives in the dorm. She's still a little scared of her goat, but they assured me she'll get used to it. Another orphan who lives in the dorm, if you'll remember, is Jeannette. She gets around really well- she has big plastic men's crocks that she uses to scoot around- and, she handled her goat REALLY well! Oh, how I loved these kids. I could have sat among them all day. We asked the adult who watches over them what the biggest need is, besides the funding for food, clothes, and schooling (which is around $400/month for all 8). She said without batting an eye, "electricity." Know why? They need to study at night. There is no other light around that area of the village, so it is pitch black. It gets dark there a little after 6. And they need to study at night. Perspective... We got out the frisbees and the bat and ball Karen had brought, and watched them play and play and play.  We finally had to tear ourselves away from the kids and the laughter and the joy that is Pastor Ildephonse's Kiryamo parish. How comforting to me, though, that we would remain connected. Every cup of coffee we brew at The Well will help them. Every coin dropped in the tip jar at the well will go straight to the orphan dorm. We will begin raising money for goats and the school and who knows what else God places on our hearts... And we will pray for them. For the money to keep coming in for the food, for the orphans who giggle just like my kids do, for Pastor Ildephonse to have wisdom in leading the children, for LOTH to find resources in ministering to these people, and for more hands and feet to go with us next year.  Drink Coffee. Do Good. 

Isaac

Day 6 (Tuesday) "Orphan: someone who has no living parents, a term usually used to define a minor child" When I lost my mom to cancer, I was in my twenties. I was happily married, still had my dad, and had a strong bond with my two sisters who lived in town close to me. My support system also consisted of my church, extended family, coworkers, and close friends. Love encircled me on every side, and prayers for me to recover from my loss lifted me up consistently. I was a young adult who hadn't lived with my mom or depended on her for maternal nurturing for a number of years. And yet, when she died, I immediately felt the sharp unfairness of what it would mean to live a life without a mom. The unconditional love that isn't exactly blind but is definitely biased in favor of her child; the protective canopy of fierce maternal instinct; the keeper of memories and traditions; the spiritual mentor; the listening, the holding, the love... the love. A hole in my life shredded open the instant she died. In some ways, having babies myself only helped to define the loss even more clearly. I hold my kids maybe a little more tightly because I know how precious a mother's arms are. I became obssessive about organizing photos and describing them so my kids would always know about their childhoods because I know how precious a mother's memories are. I say "I love you" a hundred times a day because I know how precious a mother's words are. I pray for my family in a never-ending stream-of-consciousness in my head because I know how precious a mother's prayers are. I know all this because I've lost it all. All that is in the back of my mind every time I think about the orphans we help in Rwanda. These babies, kids, and teens who have no mom to rock them to sleep, to sing songs to them, to tell them how cute they were when they were little, to stand up for them in a confrontation, to mentor their spiritual relationship... If it hurts me this much as an adult, nine years into not having a mom...oh, these poor kids. The tragedy would doom them, and me, to a life of despair, if not for one thing: My Jesus saves. The day that we met Isaac, this Truth came to life before our eyes. On a sunny afternoon we walked onto the campus of Wisdom School, a top scoring school in Rwanda that takes orphans and rich kids alike. Isaac fell into the first category. Our team gathered into the headmaster's front office, and we heard about the vision of the school. 264/852 students there are orphans. The headmaster of the school, Elie, is a genocide survivor. A psychology major, Elie felt called to "give a stone in the rebuilding of our country." He said he knew that the U.S. and other countries would help with reconciliation and rebuilding, but he also knew these would be temporary means to an end. The Rwandans, he said firmly, would have to be responsible for their own future. He began investigating, canvassing the homes of the area, interviewing people. All kids in the north where he was working fit into four groups: orphans from genocide, orphans because parents were in prison for genocide crimes, AIDS kids, and kids with parents and no issues. Each group had its own set of stigmas and issues. While many organizations worked to reconcile Hutu and Tutsi adults after the genocide, Elie realized that if these four groups of kids couldn't begin to work together and learn to love each other, the future of Rwanda would come to a stand-still. Eventually, he formed the Wisdom School. All over the grounds are landscaped pathways between buildings. Lining each side of these pathways are small white signs with sayings on them. "Respect the Ten Commandments," "obey rules," "study hard," and "always forgive" are just a few. The school seeks out kids who are heads of household to try to help. Just in Elie's area alone there were 1500 kids aged 12 and under who were the head of household (meaning they were the sole provider of the children younger than them in the household). Isaac, an orphan, is a student at the Wisdom School, and he was the purpose of our visit to the school that afternoon. Some LOTH folks have taken him under their wing, and though a native to the rural Bukonya mountain community, he now lives with a couple from Arizona who live in Rwanda right now. He attends Wisdom School and is getting a great education. That afternoon we came to see how he was, encourage him, and bring him gifts of a brand-new soccer ball and hat from his favorite team, sent to him by Rob from LOTH. He stood by the wall, his little face a mixture of shyness and delight at the unexpected visitors. His grades were good, he told us. His favorite thing about school? The Bible study he has started and now leads with some other fellow preteens at the school. Dimples spring up as he talks about the Bible study group. What else does he like? Football (soccer, to us Americans). On that note, Karen pulls the surprise gifts out of her bag- the ball and the hat. Isaac's reaction was immediate and priceless. The reserved little boy who had stood at attention with his back against the wall LEPT towards Karen, eyes shining, a grin splitting his face. The red hat went on his head, the ball was examined, and he looked like a kid at Christmas. We asked him how we could pray for him. His answer: pray for the Bible study, for the lady he lives with who is having a baby soon, and for US to have safe travels. The prayer requests of an innocent heart who loves Jesus included me. I was humbled and in love with this child and reminded once again that we are all in this together. Praise God that His love reaches far and wide and is more than sufficient for all those who have shredded, gaping holes in their lives. Psalm 18 says, "He reached down from on high and took hold of me...He brought me out into a spacious place. He rescued me because He delighted in me." When I'm back at home in America and my heart breaks for the orphans I've come to know personally - the ones I've held and rocked, the ones I've sang and danced with...when I wonder if anyone put them to sleep, talked them through a spiritual crisis, stood up for them and made them feel special...I'll remember Isaac and the fact that a relationship with Jesus rescues, satisfies, and is sufficient.

Genocide Museum to Musanze

Days 5 Monday Kigali, the capital city of Rwanda, bustles and zooms along like most urban centers of business and development. Digital billboards line the streets, banks and hotels and office strip malls are jammed next to each other, and everywhere - EVERYWHERE - there are people. Rwandans walking, running, riding "taxi motos" (motor scooter taxis) - all of them busy. Their traffic mostly ignores the white painted lines on the road, using those lane guides as mere suggestions for how to drive. In Kigali, the old traditions of Rwanda and the new influences of the West walk side by side, and the result is a stark contrast of what Rwanda is at its heart and what it is striving toward in its future. Women wearing everything from really nice dress suits and heels to the traditional Rwandan clothing- a brightly colored mixture of layered fabrics that meet and are tied at the waist- crowd the busy sidewalks. Suit-wearing men carrying briefcases and cell phones hurry past weary farmers in sweat-stained clothes who are pushing bicycles laden with sugar cane or sacks of potatoes to sell at the market. Rich and poor, city and mountain, traditional and progressive- they all swirl together in Kigali. If we were to just visit Kigali and not venture further into Rwanda, this would be an extremely limited view of what the country has to offer. That's why we were so excited when it was time to leave Kigali and start our journey north, to a region called Musanze. First though, before leaving Kigali, we got the opportunity to visit the Cupping Lab and export site for ALL RWANDAN COFFEE!!! This was a huge opportunity, since it's an extremely secure place and not many are granted access. All coffee beans that are exported from Rwanda go through this one location. This ensures consistent standards and accountability. The cupping staff take a sample of the beans, roast them, and then cup them (a process much like wine tasting, where the coffee is slurped and tasted and rated for quality). It is a really strict test of quality, and it made us feel SO PROUD as we spent a few hours learning everything the coffee beans go through before they can be exported to the U.S. The last thing we did before leaving Kigali was to visit the Genocide Museum. After the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, the motto became "Never Again." The genocide killed 1 million people in 100 days in a country that is so small it is roughly 10,000 sq miles. By contrast, the WW2 Holocaust killed 6 million Jews in 12 years in 22 different countries. Now, OF COURSE the Holocaust was a horrific tragedy, so just imagine the landscape of the tiny country of Rwanda as 10,000 bodies A DAY were killed, mostly by machetes wielded by ordinary citizens, and dumped in front yards, on sidewalks, in ditches, in strip mall parking lots, churches, school classrooms...10,000 a day for 100 days. When we visited the Genocide Museum, the flame in the lamp at the front, standing tall on a pole over a rectangular pool, stood burning. The lamp burns every year from April 4 (when the genocide began) to July 17, when the conquering army (the RPF) was able to end the genocide. It burns every day that the genocide was going on. It was June 11 when we visited the museum. To see the lamp still burning and to think about how far away from April 4 we already were...the 100 days must have seemed like an eternity of nightmares for those living through it. Kris and I didn't go through the museum this year. We went last year, and the intensity of it is enough to last many years, maybe a lifetime, I don't know. We've experienced it once. It taught us lessons, gave us a new perspective on many things, and let us into the world of the victims so we could pay our respects. The knowledge of what humans can do to each other, what we are capable of...it just becomes so real when you see it presented in that light. It's been one year since we went through it, and I'm still processing things I learned and saw. The rest of our team went inside, and we waited for them in a beautiful outdoor cafe built in the midst of the museum's gardens. We were given a few hours to sit and reflect while our team went through the museum, and the quiet, peaceful surroundings of the banana trees and fountains encouraged and refreshed me. I got briefly excited, too, when the menu showed chocolate shakes, but it turned out to be a scoop of ice cream dropped into a glass of chocolate milk. So, I stirred it really fast and frothed it up and made the best of things! One by one, the team came out of the museum. We sat in the cafe for a while later...processing and discussing...and then it was time to travel to Musanze. *(This next part might seem just political, but it's really important to understand the lives of those we go to visit on Wednesday and Thursday). Musanze is a region formerly known as Ruhengeri. After the genocide, the government had most of the districts renamed to encourage a fresh outlook and new start for the country. Ruhengeri / Musanze was one of the worst battles when the army (the RPF) came to stop the genocide. It's near Uganda, and when the RPF took the distric many of the genocide perpetrators fled across the border. For years after, bands of these genocide perpetrators would sneak back into Rwanda on raids that killed or raped or maimed thousands more Rwandans in the area until Rwandan President Kagame's army finally got control of the border and put an end to the raids. In these areas we saw a lot more disabled children and many, many orphans. Tomorrow and Wednesday we get to visit the regions in the mountains, Bukonya and Kiryamo. After the intense air of the Genocide Museum, playing with the kids and worshiping in Pastor Ildephonse's church will be freeing.

Sunday at St. Ettienne's

Day 4 Sunday This was our last day in the capital of Kigali. Being Sunday, it was our day of rest. We began the day by attending church at St. Ettienne's Cathedral. Unbeknownst to us, today was the dedication of the church's new parking lot. They had been raising money for over a year, and they had an all-out dedication service for it. We sat in white plastic lawn chairs on the parking lot under huge tents and had a three and a half hour service. Sitting among the congregation of St. Ettienne's, I had the same reaction this year that I did last year. The congregation of that church is extremely wealthy; foreigners, expats, diplomats, and the upper crust of the community attend this church. To go from yesterday's mountain communities that welcomed us into their church which had no electricity and only a few windows, whose congregation applauded and cheered when some of their families were given goats, whose little kids wore soiled and torn tshirts and hadn't bathed in months...to go from that to a community in the same region, just a car ride away, that spent $50,000 on a new parking lot and showed up to church in their fancy clothes, impeccable hair, and shiny cars...the disparity of the two extremes in Rwanda startled me. I judged those rich Rwandan Christians; in my heart I disapproved and I condemned and I judged. I thought, "How can you Rwandans sit there in all that wealth and enjoy your privileged excess when all around you there is extreme poverty and need?"  And then, of course, you know what comes next. It washed over me in a wave of sickness that it happens exactly like that in our own community back home. I think we're just better at segregating the poverty and keeping it out of sight from our normal daily routine. Which, in many ways, is even worse. The ghetto urban poverty, the destitute families in rural areas, the homeless... We have them too, but yet I show up at Brookwood every Sunday freshly showered in clean clothes with a stomach full of hot food. I didn't have to walk or take the bus to church. My church will have a floor, not red dirt or clay or gravel.  We will have air conditioning. My kids will be taken care of by people who were background-checked, and we will be taught to worship God with state of the art technology that will instantly engage and affect all of us. We will discuss and sometimes even argue about where to eat lunch, because we don't want to have to wait in line somewhere, heaven forbid. It's so easy to forget that the rest of the world is not living on this same plane of comfort. God created me and He placed me in America...He is the one who created me to be a middle-class white American, so I don't feel guilty about my privileged place in this world. I just need to not lose sight of the responsibility that comes with this extreme privilege.  I need to remember that I live in a country where I will probably never be homeless, even if I run into really bad financial times. My kids will never know hunger, and even if I were to make poor decisions or unforeseen circumstances took our money, my kids would still have food and shelter. They will never know the fear of wondering where they will sleep the next night. I live in a country that will help me provide for myself if I work hard enough for it. Blessed, blessed, blessed. My prayer tonight is that I raise my children to see this privileged life for the blessing that it is, and to concentrate on how to use our resources wisely in helping others. I thank God, too, for being at a church that focuses on ministries that help both our local community (2nd Saturday, The Hub, Purchased, Yellow House, Sewing Ministry, etc) and foreign missions too.  So, with a grateful heart, we spent the rest of the day packing and cleaning up, preparing to leave the guest house in the morning.  We will visit a coffee cupping lab in the morning (so important in the process because this is part of what gives the farmers their dignity, when the cupping lab rates and reviews their crops). Then to the genocide museum, and then the long drive to Musanze, a district on the border of Uganda. Please pray for those in our team who will visit the Genocide Museum tomorrow. Kris and I will not go back into it- I don't know if I ever will again...it's so emotional that it's a one-time-only visit for us. But it's necessary to experience it at least once in order to understand what the reconciliation effort entails that is going on in Rwanda (and that Land of a Thousand Hills aids in). It's an impact event, a life-changing visit. You come out of that museum a changed person, so please pray for them tomorrow. We have to finish packing, so for now, enjoy your Sunday...may it be full of realized blessings!

Links

http://www.kigalimemorialcentre.org/old/centre/other/nymata.html http://prisonfellowshiprwanda.blogspot.com/2010/10/reconciliation-village-remarkable.html

Ruli Mountain: Coffee, Worship, and Goats

Day Three (Saturday) What a wonderful, wonderful day today was!!! All of us from The Well kept thinking to ourselves that we wished all of you out there were here with us to be able to see what we were seeing. We started off our day by heading up Ruli Mountain. This mountain produces much of Land of a Thousand Hills' coffee, and there is a washing station located on the mountain as well. Washing stations are where all the farmers bring their coffee cherries. There the cherries are weighed, and the farmers are paid. From there the cherries are sorted, de-pulped (to get the two coffee beans out of each cherry), sorted in the floating current, fermented to get all the residue off of them, hand-sorted to determine the grade (A1, A2, A3, A4), dried on drying racks for a few weeks, and then bagged up to ship to Atlanta to LOTH. We got to see the whole process. Get this: for one average cup of coffee, it takes 500 HAND-PICKED cherries that go through that entire process. Enjoy that next cup of coffee a little bit more. Savor it. It went through a lot of hard work and close inspection to make it to your cup! When we get back, we'll be creating a photo book that shows pictures of what each step looks like at Ruli Mountain's washing station from start to finish. While we were there we got to meet with Alex, the manager of the station, and Amay, the head of fermentation. Amay was an orphan whose nearest relatives had mismanaged all his assets, and LOTH gave him a chance to work for them. Ever since he's lived at the station, showing tremendous work ethic. Both Alex's and Amay's faces lit up as all this was explained to us and they were introduced to us. They are developing a growing sense of pride and dignity in WHO THEY ARE- they no longer just exist, now they have purpose, they see that they have self-worth, that they have gifts and talents. It was a great thing to see! After the washing station, we got to go to Mbilima Village, high high up on Ruli Mountain. We had met with them last year as they were just beginning to form a partnership with LOTH, committing their crops to LOTH's washing station. These men (and some women too) are known all over for having the best coffee crops around. The reason they decided to commit to LOTH and not to another washing station that's a lot closer is actually quite simple. We came to see them. Last year, LOTH's visit was the first time in 50 years that outsiders had come to their village. They couldn't believe we had come such a long way to just visit with them. And just like last year, the pride on the farmers' faces was incredible to see. They rushed us straight down behind their village to see their plantation. They explained details to us like how many trees they had, how many acres, when the crops grew the best, and how they decided to space the trees apart. These farmers were in their element, and would have kept us there among the coffee trees all day if we would have let them. We picked some coffee cherries, tasted them (not bad, by the way), and told the farmers over and over how impressed we were with their crops. Two men in particular (I put a pic of them on Facebook) are the top two producers in Mbilima. If you've ever drunk coffee or espresso at The Well, you've probably benefitted from the cherries they grew, tended, and picked with their own hands. They are so, so proud of the fact that their life's work is something so valuable that it gets a bunch of foreign visitors to travel to the other side of the world and up a VERY LONG AND BUMPY mountain ride just to come say thank you and that we're of them. I think about how my gifts and talents are affirmed often through feedback from students, promotions, and just American culture in general. We reward and motivate by nature because that is normally what our workforce is striving for- rewards and motivation to do a good job. What if you did what you were good at, and never ever heard from a single soul that they appreciated what you did? Never heard that you were good at it, never heard that it meant something to someone somewhere? Today these farmers were loved on, appreciated, and even given LOTH shirts to as appreciation for their work ethic and excellent quality of work. Our last stop of the day (by this time it was night) was to stop in at Pastor Fidel's church. Oh my goodness. As we turned onto the dirt pathway that led up to the church, we could already hear the music. Fidel, anticipating our visit, had called a special worship service. The villagers had gathered in their Sunday best, and were already inside the church building singing and dancing. And I mean DANCING! The pastor met us in the front of the yard and asked for us come inside. We did, and as the sun set outside we threw our backpacks onto the small wooden benches, joined the crowd, and danced our hearts out in worship to God. The pastor then thanked us for coming, and they brought in crates and crates of glass Fanta sodas to let us all celebrate together. And as the last speeches were being made, a renegade baby goat escaped and ran into the back door of the church, bleating its little heart out. The goats we had delivered had arrived! With that, we went into the courtyard, and there were the goats! The pastor read the names of those in his congregation who would be receiving them, and they were SO surprised and grateful! The pastor earnestly spoke to us then, not in the usual formal speech of thanksgiving (which would have been sincere in itself), but this talk was more personal than formal. He said that these goats may not seem like a big thing to us, but it will make a big difference for their community. He said the way they do it is as the goats have babies, the people who today receive the goats commit to bringing the babies to the church and letting the pastor then give those new goats to someone else. So the gift keeps on giving. His earnest thanks was something I wish I had gotten on video, but goats were still escaping off the truck, little kids were trying to play with my iPad, and the man was so sincere that I felt it would have ruined the moment. So you'll just have to take my word for it- those of you who bought goats- you changed a community and greatly encouraged a sweet pastor who needed that today. Praise God who is so all-powerful that he uses people in Shreveport to partner with a village on Ruli Mountain, Rwanda. He is truly a God who sees all, knows all, and takes care of us all. With that, I am going to bed. I can't wait to worship Him tomorrow at a church service alongside my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ in Rwanda.

Learning We Were the Students

Day Two (Friday)
One of the frustrations about a trip like this is that it can never be fully communicated to those back home. I can upload photos to Facebook, post quick statuses to update people on what's going on, and blog to give the details about our mission trip. But the very air of Rwanda...the genocide history combined with the joy combined with the hope combined with the tragic loss combined with the children combined with the breathtaking beauty...words and pictures alone will not do it justice. But I'll do my best to write about it, because what we are already learning on this trip is a story that needs to be told. (It's a little hard to understand the rest of our trip's story, though, if you don't know the history of the Rwandan genocide. Please read the first few entries on this blog that detail the genocide history.)

We headed out this morning to see Pastor Deo Gashagaza, a man whom I greatly admire. He founded a ministry that reaches out to prisoners in Rwanda, mainly those who murdered and raped others during the genocide. Although his family was from Rwanda, he had not grown up here, and he had been separated from his sister his entire life. He had always wished to see her, so after the genocide he moved back to Rwanda to try to find her. He described coming back and seeing Rwanda 1 year after the genocide like this (I typed it as he was saying it).
"I couldn't believe my eyes. Everywhere, there were bones. Dogs and animals were running around with bones, and they were bones of people. And I couldn't help but think...my sister is one of these dead. I wanted to leave Rwanda. I couldn't stay here any longer. I couldn't understand WHY... Why would God let this happen? Why 1 million people? So I was going to leave. But my mom, she told me to pray. Now, I had always grown up Roman Catholic, and my priests and bishops always talked about hearing the Voice of God telling them to do this and do that. And I thought, I've never heard the Voice of God, never in my whole life. But I want to. I want to know why 1 million people. So, I fasted and prayed for 3 days, asking God the question WHY."
 Pastor Deo went on to say that God didn't answer his question. The first two days he heard nothing. But then, on the third day, he said he clearly heard the Voice of God, "burning like a fire in my heart." God told Deo to go into the prisons and tell the prisoners in there that they deserved forgiveness, and to show them how to get forgiveness. Deo didn't want to, but the Voice of God was too strong. He went and asked for permission to go into the prison, but even the guards said they didn't enter into the prison cells because of the danger. They finally said to him, "Fine, go, but you go if you want to die in there." He went. When the prisoners saw them, they were angered that he (obviously a Tutsi because of his tall stature) had survived the genocide, and planned to kill him immediately. However, as they discussed in a group how to kill him, one of them suggested they let him preach first, then kill him after. He said that was the most nervous he had ever been in preaching a sermon! But at the end, they were weeping. They asked him to come back the next week. And from there, the prison ministry began to grow. He was able to convince them that they deserved forgiveness, and he began to guide them in how to seek forgiveness from God and from others.

Deo looked at those of us sitting around the table, and he began to openly cry. He said,"Thank you for coming. Anyone can send money or gifts. But you came to hear, to listen, to encourage me. This shows love. God told me one day I would have a big family. You, those who make this long journey to get here and just come. You are my family." This is the second time in 24 hours we heard this sentiment expressed. When Manu, the Land of a Thousand Hills Director of Community of Trade in Rwanda picked us up from the airport yesterday, he said the same kind of thing. Manu said that it shows so much love to them that we took such a long journey just to come see them, and he thanked us repeatedly for giving them this gift of a visit. How sweet of God to affirm this trip for us!

 One of Pastor Deo's projects is a concept called Reconciliation Village. He found that it was actually much harder to convince the genocide attackers that they could receive forgiveness than it usually was to get the victims to forgive. As people were released from prison, it was difficult for them to assimilate back into a community they had helped to ravage. There were also many victims who had lost their entire family and/or houses. The idea for Reconciliation Village was that the perpetrators and victims would work hand-in-hand to make the bricks, clear the land, and build the houses together for them to live in. An entire community made up of those that Deo had helped to reconcile was born. Hearing second-hand that this idea works is one thing, and to be honest, the cynical side of me found it very hard to believe before going there last year that these people had honestly forgiven and reconciled something so horrific as the crimes that had happened. But at RV, they met with us in the center of their 58-house village. The murderers spoke of what they had done, and these men then took their seat on the skinny wooden bench right next to survivors that lost entire families at the hand of these actual murderers. We were given the chance to dialogue with them, and two conversations in particular struck me.  One was when Chrissie asked about how it is possible to truly reconcile. One of the men responded by saying, "You have to reconcile yourself with the Lord first. Otherwise it is all impossible. After that, you must reconcile with yourself. Then you are free to go to the other person and ask for forgiveness or offer forgiveness." That confirms it - true forgiveness like this is only possible through a relationship with Jesus. The other conversation that moved me was when a woman spoke to us about surviving the genocide. She hid in the fields for over 3 months, and now lives in a house next to a man who killed over 40 men in the area. She said that the man who killed all 7 members of her family came to her for forgiveness, telling her in detail how he had killed all of them. She said she could not offer forgiveness at first. That for a long time she experienced much trauma, she couldn't eat or sleep. She asked him to show her where the bodies were, and she took the bones and had them buried at the mass grave at Nyamata church. At the memorial at Nyamata, she cried out to God to help her heart to forgive. She said she prayed about it for several days, and at the end of her time of prayer she knew God had helped her to forgive. She called the man and met with him face-to-face and told him she forgave him for killing her whole family. She said then she could eat, then she could sleep, then she could laugh. It freed her. The  man began calling her to help her with things that she needed, and now they live nearby each other in Reconciliation Village, helping each other.

I think about the number of times I've savored bitterness in my heart towards someone, and the many instances of holding a grudge over things far less important than the torture and murder of those I love. I can't think of the last time I've spent days...DAYS...in prayer, begging God to help me reconcile with a fellow man. And these people not only forgave, they RECONCILED. They now live together in community...one of them said to us, "We don't need the police, we take care of each other. We help each other. Our kids all go to school together. We eat together, pray together, build together, share everything. The women started a basket-weaving co-op and the men own a farming co-op." 

Chad asked them how they felt about the fact that so many other countries are coming to hear their stories, and they smiled. They said "We are so pleased to receive you...we think of us as teachers, and you as primary students...A lesson to learn is that if you are every day called a killer, that's who you are and that is your life. But if you are forgiven, that's who you become, and that is your life."

I remember that last year when we went, we listened to a murderer, an old man, talk about all his killings, and then sit down next to the woman that lost all her family at the hands of that man. The woman held her new baby in her lap, and when the murderer sat down next to her, the baby reached for him. The old man grinned and reached for the baby, and the woman smiled and let the baby climb into the man's lap. As someone else spoke next, I was transfixed on this trio...the woman whose entire family was murdered was sitting next to the murderer, and her baby was playing with the man's face and hair while she gently smiled. They lived next to each other, and he helped her with things she needed help with. That was a true picture of reconciliation, one that will always stay with me.
 
We left Reconciliation Village shaken and ready, I think, to do a lot of soul-searching. From there we went to the Nyamata Genocide Memorial. Nyamata Church had been a Roman Catholic Church in the Nyamata area. Whenever tensions had arisen in the past, Tutsis had always been able to claim sanctuary inside the church walls. They might be murdered outside, but inside the walls the killers would not dare attack since the church was so sacred. So when the genocide began on April 6, 1994, many Tutsis in the area fled to the church to seek sanctuary. Over 2,000 of them, mostly women, children, and the elderly, packed in to the small brick church. They huddled inside and waited. Many brought blankets and some food, thinking they might have to wait out a few days of violence before returning home. However, the attackers, who were tipped off on the radio that thousands were hiding in the church, didn't care about church sanctity, and they saw the crowd of women and children as an easy target they could dispose of quickly. They attacked the tightly packed crowd with grenades and guns. Then they went in with machetes to torture and eventually kill those who had not yet died. Every single person in the church that day, over 2,000 of them, was killed. Those tasked with keeping the memory of the genocide alive set up the church as a memorial. The blankets and clothes of every victim were kept inside, piles and piles of them on the pews, altar, and stage of the church. Bullet holes still perforate the room, so much so that no other artificial light is needed as thousands of tiny sunlit pinholes stream in from above. Pictures are not allowed inside, and the air is so thick with the intensity of the tragedy that it's a moment that has to be experienced to be understood. I had read about it, seen journalists' photos of the site, and researched it extensively before seeing it. Nothing-NOTHING-could have prepared me for it. But suffice it to say that it is necessary to go through that experience before beginning to minister to the people of Rwanda. We have to understand, at least on some surface level, what it is that they are recovering from. We cannot learn from their reconciliation if we can't understand just how far they really had to travel to reach that state of forgiveness. Seeing little tiny sandals, an old man's pipe and hat, a woman's purse and blanket, and many more items the victims had with them that day all lined up on the altar in Nyamata church takes me one step closer to understanding a little of what they have been through. We almost all collapsed right then and there from the depression and the intensity of the horror that the memorial brings with it. But we had one more thing planned for today, and it was such a wonderful way to end the day. We were going to minister to Pastor Deo's Street Kids!

A short time after Deo started the Prison Fellowship, he was asked by some women who had been raped during the genocide (almost every Tutsi female survivor experienced sexual assault) why he was helping the genocide perpetrators and not helping the victims. As a result of that and God's leadership, he has one branch of his ministry that helps these HIV rape victims, and another branch that helps the street kids of Kigali. There are currently almost 100 children who are either completely homeless or live in a single-parent home where there is no one able to provide food or guidance. Deo feeds these kids 3 times a week and gives them Bible lessons, guidance, and hope. He seeks to help them grow into Christian adults through job placement and education. They absolutely adore him and his wife, and as we watched him with the kids, it is obvious they are his world. They had been practicing their singing for us, and as we came around the corner into the back courtyard where they were waiting for us, their sweet, beautiful voices rose to a deafening level, they were so eager to sing for us! It was a total worship experience. They worshiped God with their music, singing about God's goodness and faithfulness and love. The older teens (now mentors to the younger ones) talked to us about how they had been on the streets since the age of 4 or 5, been drug addicts, in and out of prison, and then they found Deo. He saved them, they each say. No, says Deo, shaking his head with a smile and pointing upwards. God saved you. God is good. The kids wait for their meal (one of only three that most will get all week) until they have all sung for us and talked to us and welcomed us. Then they walk quietly to the sidewalk where they will sit to be served. 100 children who are literally starving, and they worship God first with smiles on their faces, and then act with the best manners possible. Wow. We help serve them food, and then- best part- we get to play. Katie talks to the teenage girls about music and they do her hair. Jamie and Chrissie dance and play games with the younger ones. The older boys sing and rap and dance for us. We break out the bottles of bubbles and the kids go crazy. And then...the hugs begin. They stare into my eyes and hug and hug and hug me. And they say over and over "I love you! Thank you for coming!" I tell them they are beautiful, and their smiles light up their eyes. Ten of them hold my hands at once, and another ten try to crawl into my lap.

Now, I know that I can send Pastor Deo money to help feed these children. We probably will be setting up something to help his Street Kids ministry when we get back to the states. He desperately needs financial support to get these 3 meals per week for 100 kids. I know the money is important. But the love that happened between our team and those kids today CANNOT be bought. It can't be sent in a package. It can't be emailed or wired over. I held them. I touched their faces, I laughed with them, I danced with them. I watched Kris dance with them, which is a priceless memory right there. I was Jesus' hands and feet today as I touched their faces and danced with them. Praise God for sending me...for sending all of us...on this trip. And we haven't even gone to our villages yet!!! Can't wait to blog about tomorrow!!!

I ended the day with a freezing cold shower that abruptly cut off right as the shampoo got lathered up all nice and soapy in my hair. I had to use bottled water to get the rest of it rinsed out. The smell of OFF insect repellant saturates my bedroom, and the armed guard stands watch just outside my window. And I cannot explain how happy...how joyful...these entire circumstances make me right now. Why did God choose US to come here? I have no idea. I pray He makes it clear this week why He chose to bless us with this incredible experience. Thank you, thank all of you, for the prayers and support for this trip. So amazing. I know they still have much to teach me, and I can't wait to keep learning!