Adventures in the Desert

So... sometimes, people do things that are blog worthy, just after I have written a post about a particular subject.

In this case, Melissa decided to spend her past-curfew, evening hours cooking chocolate chip cookies. Yes. Cooking them. As in, in a skillet, on the stove, she made cookies for us. (See, we do do useful things during our "non-ministry" time... just give me a few minutes -- or maybe days -- to figure out how making cookies helps to spread the kingdom... lol.)

Luckily for me, she blogged about it herself, which gave me time to write about other things.

Totally unrelated picture of a mosque along the road between here and Nairobi.

The Backbone of Justice

Looking at the situations that humans have created across the globe, it can become easily overwhelming to try and sort out any type of potential solution. But, there are ways to break down the situation into smaller, more manageable chunks.

Justice has a backbone, and every vertebrae must be in place in order to create a solution that can stand on its own. The vertebrae are:

SUSTAINABILITY: “Simplify; simplify; simplify.” – David Thoreau
If there are not enough resources on the planet for every person on the planet to live the way that you are living. It is unjust for you to live that way.

ACTION: “Washing one's hands of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless means to side with the powerful, not to be neutral.” – Paulo Freire

RESPONSIBILITY: Our daily actions and choices have consequences that go far beyond us. We ought to be living in a way that owns those consequences.

COMMUNITY: In order to impact other lives in a way that is long term positive, we have to be touching other lives.

GENEROSITY: If we give only what we have to spare, there will never be any hope for an equal distribution of the world’s resources.

MERCY: If we give only to those who “deserve it,” all that we are doing is feeding into systemic injustice that will continue to pull people into its cycle.

SERVICE: Human values are only spread through human contact with other humans. Skin touching skin is an acknowledgment of the other person’s humanity.

EDUCATION: Without the vocabulary, the questions can not be asked. People generally don’t act unless they have something to react to. Tell them.

If you can honestly address each of those vertebrate, the odds are incredibly good that you have found a viable and just solution to the situation.

About His Father's Business

I was reading in the second chapter of Luke this morning, and I was struck in a new way by the section where the twelve year old Jesus was left behind in the temple.

How often do we, as Christians, do the same thing as Jesus' mother and father? How often do we go with Him on "spiritual" business, maybe a yearly missions trip or conference, and, when we are finished, simply turn around and go, expecting that Jesus will come with us, that the depths of His presence that we felt will stay constant, no matter where we are?

It is never long, maybe a day or a week or a month, before we realize that He is not where we thought that He was. He has no followed us, not back into our accomplishment focused American lifestyle. He has not done what we thought that He would.

Like His parents did, we search for Him until we find Him, back in the place that we came from. We chide Him and show him the bruises on our knees from constant prayer and the well worn pages of our Bibles, thumbed over in day after day of faithful reading, all of it our anxious attempt to search for Him. We expect an explanation, surely He meant to come back with us, and something merely hindered Him.

But, instead of comforting us or commending our faithful search, He simply looks back at us, our frazzled, worried selves, and asks two simple questions.

"Why did you seek me? Did you not know that I must be about my Father's business?"
--
Next time that you feel like you have lost Jesus somewhere along the road, go back, and look for Him among the last, the least, and the lonely. He will be there, going about His Father's business.

Luke 2:41-50

Battling Boredom

One of the interesting things about having a new team of students here is getting the chance to watch them go through some of the same things that we went through, one of those things being a cultural difference in the understanding of time.

Unlike in America, where things are -- ideally -- always scheduled out and there is always a plan in place to get as much use as possible out of each moment of the day, life here tends to happen when it happens, and there is nothing wrong with an afternoon spent simply sitting and not "doing" anything other than passing the time.

As crazy as it seems to them now, they will eventually get to a place where a morning spent taking pictures of our supervisors' kids is a good morning.

(All pictures belong to Laura)

And, where getting a picture of Jessica not making a face is an exciting accomplishment.


For now, they still need things like slip n' slides in the desert (not such a good idea as it sounds like...packed dirt is hard) to keep them occupied and entertained -- we still enjoy such things as well -- and I can't say that I blame them. I was bored enough when we got here that I wrote a book in order to keep myself busy. Lol!


Slowly, though, perhaps without them even realizing it, they will adjust and grow more comfortable with boredom.

As evidence of the fact that our perception of time has changed, Laura, originally one of our most time conscious, "go, go, go" type personalities, has been known, in recent months, to spend a good hour sitting on the floor in our front room, tossing a candle back and forth, as a small group of us talk about "nothing" while we wait for the power to come back on (Believe it or not, there actually is logic to the timing of the rationing.) so that we can finish the things that we are "supposed" to be doing.

(things like updating blogs, writing newsletters, prepping for ministry, writing papers, and researching for various projects)

It will be interesting to see what we do with ourselves when we get back to the States, where there are not nearly the same number of stray hours to fill.

Do One Thing

In his book, The Translator, Daoud Hari describes a refugee camp on the Chad-Sudan border of the Darfur region in this way. 

“Familiar smells and the low rumble of a great crowd greeted us as we rolled down the windows: babies crying but also children laughing and running after us, stretching out their fingers to touch ours, mothers calling for their children to be careful, the crunch of bundles of firewood being unloaded from the backs of donkeys, the braying of those donkeys, the smoke and smell of a thousand little fires, of spiced and mint teas brewing, of hot cooking oils and overheated, dirty children. A gauze of this sound, smoke and dust extended over the tangled nest as far as one cared to look, except where the women wore their beautiful colors, which stood out through the sticks: clean and bright reds, oranges, yellows, brilliant blues and greens. The women of Africa, as the world knows, have a genius for color, and they decorated this place with themselves, as they always do.”

With the world's focus on Haiti, it can be easy to forget that other crisis situations across the globe have not righted themselves overnight.

For the month of February, do one thing to help Sudanese families living in Chadian refugee camp.

Save a jar or a plastic water bottle that you would have thrown away, and use it as a collection bowl for stray change. $15 in loose change can provide an energy efficient stove that helps protect refugees from the violence they face simply trying to gather wood for cooking fires.

Wazee

It's been just over twelve months since we arrived in Kenya -- as evidenced by the fact that I spent last weekend in Nairobi getting a final extension on my visitor's visa (and an alien card... that should be ready just in time to pick up on my way out of the country...). But, until the last couple of weeks, I don't think that my team really comprehended the fact that we had been living here for an entire year.


The STEM team that came over Thanksgiving was our first clue that we had learned a lot more about this place than we might have thought that we had.

At the same time that the new team arrived, though, just under two weeks ago, -- actually, on the same bus that they came on -- we had a short term team of doctors from the States and translators from a church in Nairobi come up to do some medical clinics, and we realized then just how comfortable and familiar this place has become.


It was strange to ride out to the bush in a van full of Kenyans, pointing out to them different types of trees and wildlife that, even though this is their country, they had never seen before. And, it was strange to realize that, although they had a better chance at blending into the crowd (ish), we were the ones who were more comfortable with the situation and more familiar with the culture.


It was strange to listen to the American doctors diagnose and realize how my thinking has changed and how it seems natural now to start with the tropical ("exotic") diseases and only move on to things like colds and influenza after other things have been ruled out -- as opposed to the doctors, who looked at (seemingly) every other cause before considering malaria.

This morning, we helped to chaperon the boarders at a local primary school on a visit to the children's wing of the general hospital, and it was strange to be the one trying to encourage the kids to talk, be the one taking them by the hand or the shoulder and helping them to introduce themselves to the mamas and babies in the room that they were visiting.

The strangest part, though, is that none of the situations felt strange in the moment.

(Completely unrelated picture of chicken plucking...in which only Jason has a head

**"Wazee" is a Kiswahili word for old people or elders. We use it as a sort of a joking method or differentiating between the "old" team and the new team. When we got here, the team before us were the "wazee." Now, we're the old ones.**

At One End of the Road

There is a world where markets are open air, a maze of stalls, brightly colored clothing, and fresh vegetables, a world where the road stretches as far as the eye can see, bending into a potholed ribbon in the distance.

Last week, seven new interns arrived from the States, joining us in their new home. Pray that they would adjust well and learn to see this area through the eyes of Christ.

And...the Newbies are Here

And, they have officially survived their first week here.

We took them on an Amazing Race their first full day here, to get them familiar with town and more comfortable interacting with people outside of our teams. Laura, Warren and I each led a team through town - "led" being a relative term, as our main job was to follow, unless they were getting themselves completely lost.

Within a few minutes of starting the race, my team had met a Somali businessman who took them back to meet his father, then bought them pops and sat and visited with them behind the counter in his shop. Cool cultural experience, not so conducive to racing.

Somehow, though, they still managed to come in second, so they got the best of both worlds.

We put about half of them to work this Saturday, chopping up meat and vegetables for a staff lunch out at one of the schools, and all of them got to experience the challenge of plowing through a mountainous plate of pilau at a school function. : )


So far, they are eager and excited to do anything, even chop vegetables while sitting on the ground or slaughter chickens, and it will be interesting to see how they grow and change over their internship as the initial uncertainty wears off.


And, since we haven't left yet, some pictures of the wazee (old folks) chopping vegetables as well.

Reusing Trash

Imagine if a rich man died and left his huge house to his only child. The child, upon receiving the keys to the house, wandered through the rooms to check on the state of things.

In every room that he entered there was a huge pile of trash, paper, metal, Styrofoam, wood, plastic, even old food. In the one of the rooms, the trash was actually on fire, a slow, soldering burn that filled the entire hallway with smoke.

Not exactly the type of inheritance that one would hope for, huh?

Like it or not, we are piling up mountains of trash that will take far longer than our human lifespans to decompose. Essentially, we are ensuring an inheritance of garbage for future generations.

Everybody learned in elementary school how to get rid of extra trash. Reduce. Reuse. Recycle.

So, today, have some fun with justice.

Rescue some toilet paper tubes and make something goofy out of them or cut up some clean plastic wrappers and use them to stuff something. If you would normally throw it away...it's fair game!

Joyful Justice

Yes.

Having God turn your life upside down and ask you to live out your faith in a way that embodies social justice carries a steep price tag.

Yes.

Opening yourself up to reality of the things that are going on in our world can hurt.

But,

At it's core, justice is something that God instigated. It is a gift from Him.

And, that makes it a good gift, a joyful act that leads to worship,

Because where justice is, His glory follows,

And, His glory inspires joy in His children.

Yes.

It's okay to be not okay with the things that are going on in the world.

That's kind of the whole point.

When it comes down to it though, make sure that your sense of justice is coming from a place of joy.

If it's not. There is a problem.

New Friend

So, when Jessica gets bored and the power is out...

...four legged creatures get made out of scrap fabric and stuffed with clean trash (shredded candy wrappers, etc). She (it??) even got super cool antenna made from the bottom edge of a Reisen bag. Lol.

Thanks mom for the Christmas candy!