Team Life

`Our life is full of brokenness - broken relationships, broken promises, broken expectations. How can we live with that brokenness without becoming bitter and resentful except by returning again and again to God's faithful presence in our lives.` A quote from Henri Nouwen.

When I first started to think about joining Medair, one of the great attractions was the sense of community and belonging that a role with the organisation offered. Living alongside other Christians, from all over the world, all working together to serve the most vulnerable. To me, it sounded like an amazing opportunity to part of a unique community, living with like minded people.

Its therefore pretty ironic that this community has started to become one of the greatest challenges about being here in the DR Congo. Maybe i was naive, I would prefer to think that i was hopeful and optimistic. I have been surprised by some of the dysfunctionality that exists in our team here, and im talking specifically about the international team.

Of course, with our colleagues from the Congo, there are huge cultural differences which sometimes make it difficult to work together. I did not expect so many problems between a group of people who come mostly from Europe and North America.

Life in the field is intense, there is no doubt about that. People grow tired and weary, especially those who have been here for a longer period. Stress levels can be high emergencies can develop pretty quickly. We definately find ourselves under spiritual attack , we are working on the front line after all, soldiers for God. In Bunia, where I have been based for the last 3 weeks, there is a very heavy spiritual feeling. No doubt the results of many years of war and conflict and the terrible things that have been done here. There are all sorts of reasons that contribute to this level of dysfunctionality we are experiencing at the moment. Not that i think any of these are good excuses.

Christ says in Hebrews that we are a Royal Priesthood, that we stand out. Im not sure that we have been doing that as a team here recently. By my own admission I have pretty high expectations of myself and the people around me. Perhaps there is a lesson for me in all of this, to display the same grace God has extened to me, to show that grace and love to the people around me, I can be pretty impatient at the best of times .

Maybe its a lesson that we are all human, we all have weakness and people do from time to time disappoint us. Through the ups and downs Im being stretched and challenged thats for sure, and that can only be a good thing....

Some more news...

On Friday we moved Solomon into the new Thread of Life sew and craft shop!!!!!!!! It was such sweet relief when we drove away from that wretched building with the last of our things, breathing huge thanks to God for the landlord not showing up and the fact that we NEVER have to go to that place again! It felt a bit miraculous & indeed it is.

Morgan wrote these updates, so I thought I would mooch from him and share (sorry no pics!):

First of all is the story of Jordan and Jackson. Jordan and Jackson are brothers and they are two babies that have lived at the kids' house for a little over a year now. They were completely abandoned and we didn't have any idea who their parents were. But over the summer, there was a woman who became interested in adopting them. So Wilfred, the director of the kids' home, started asking around again seeing if he could figure anything out. By some coincidence, he happened to come across their uncle. The uncle said that he had no idea what happened to the mother but thought that the father was working in some distant village somewhere. But then, about a week later, the father got in touch with Wilfred through the uncle. As it turns out, he had gone to Sudan to try to find some work. When he went North, he lost his phone with all his contacts in it and couldn't call his wife. There ended up not being any work in Sudan and he couldn't scrape enough money to get back home. So do to some rather unfortunate circumstances, he ended up being stuck in SUdan for almost two years. When he finally came back, he immediately started asking friends and relatives where his family was. That's how the uncle got him in contact with Wilfred and he found Jordan and Jackson, but he was still trying to find what happened to his wife.
A week or so after the father got in touch with Wilfred, he found his wife. It turns out she had gotten sick and was in the hospital for a little bit and had left Jordan and Jackson with a family friend that was living near them. The friend though, for some reason or another, took Jordan and Jackson and gave them to the police saying that they were abandoned and thats how they came to Wilfred. The mother new that they were with Wilfred and were staying in the kids' home all along, but she was scared that if she went and tried to get them back then she would get into trouble for abandoning them in the first place and so she just left them there.
But now Jordan and Jackson are both living with their parents again. Mercy Ministries and CLD are still keeping tabs on them and helping the father and mother support them, but it's really great that they are bak home with their parents now.
It's so cool to see stuff like this, especially when we can look back and see how this might not have happened if our friend hadn't been interested in adopting them this summer. If they hadn't started looking into the family again, they might not have found the uncle, and, in turn, the father. It's so cool to see how God knows the things that need to be done and can use us to make those things happen.

Love this story - miss the boys, but so thankful they are with their family!!!

Prison Break

In my role as acting country director for the Medair programme, I am based in Bunia, the location of our main support base in the Congo. Bunia has been badly affected by ethnic conflict in recent years. Even today, there is a huge MONUC (United Nations) presence in town. The war that raged has all but ended, but there is still banditry and general lawlessness in town. I can hear gunshots most nights, especially fom the local Prison.

The conditions of the prisons in the Congo is quite frankly dreadful and to be quite honest, a complete affront to human dignity. Conditions are so bad that prisoners will reguarly risk their lives trying to escape, the exchange of gunfire that follows can be heard almost every night at the Medair compund.

The statement below comes from a recent UN report on social justice in the DR Congo. For Goma, read Bunia. The condition of the prison here is rumored to be equally as apalling.

`My interlocutors, including the Minister of Justice, who is responsible for the penitentiary system, unanimously agreed that prison conditions are atrocious. I visited the Central Prison of Goma and spoke with detainees there. In a prison built to hold 150, over 800 prisoners live in squalor. They receive one inadequate meal per day from the prison authorities, and rely essentially on food brought by their families. Because internal control of the prison is entirely left to the inmates, the stronger prisoners take the lion’s share of the provided food. The weaker prisoners and those without family nearby gradually become emaciated, and especially vulnerable to disease. Not surprisingly, many die in prison.

The number of prisons and prisoners in the Congo is unknown. Totally inadequate records of prisoners are kept and many are left rotting in prison even after their sentence has been served. The great majority of prisoners have never been tried before a judge. In essence, the prison system seems to be a depository for the enemies of the state and for those too poor to buy their way out of the justice system. The abominable conditions, together with corruption and minimal state control, mean that escapes are common, thus adding further to impunity`

How can anybody be expected to live in such a way. Some of these prisoners have not even been proved guilty, they are awaiting trial. The prsion sytem is just one of numerous problems this country has to overcome as they try to rebuild after years of conflict. But nobody should have their dignity stripped away like this?

Great news for Thread of Life sew shop

On Monday we had a small victory for Good - Solomon was able to secure a new location for the Thread of Life sew shop! We'll be moving out in the next week or so to a new building with access to power, water, that is secure & provides us with a safe place to be for the next few months as we seek a permanent place to purchase!!! I'll post pics once we move in!

Goodbye Mr. Evil Landlord!!!!!!!

Loving Hard...

Loving regardless

Never giving up

Never losing faith

Always hopeful

Enduring through every circumstance

Loving people that are too hard to love…the unloveable

A conscious choice

Mourning with those who mourn

Rejoicing with those who rejoice

Being with, not doing – enjoying presence, not accomplishment or success

‘We were meant to be Lovers, bold in broken places, pouring ourselves out again and again until we are called home.’

How it looks for me to ‘love hard’ daily…

Serving our volunteers in patience

Awaiting the day in expectation of what may come, not of what I have planned

Greeting my Ugandan friends and co-workers with a smile and a genuine desire to know how they are and how their family is

Patience as I travel on public transport – in heat, humidity, traffic, delays, stares, lack of personal space…

Getting one thing accomplished when ten were on the list to be done

Hugging and playing with children who have seen and experienced more suffering in their 8 years than I’ll ever see in my lifetime

Trying to find a tension of loving these children with all of me, yet not so much that they feel abandoned yet again when I leave

Choosing to not give money or resources sometimes because it will aid dependency rather than promote sustainability

Choosing to give some shillings to the beggar on the street

Praying for a friend that is hiding because she feels ashamed of something she’s done – not turning away from her, writing her off, because she made a bad choice

Holding the tension of protecting myself and caring for the strangers I meet along my way

Remembering that everyone has a deeper story than I know, not judging by appearance or first, second, or even hundredth impression

Clinging to glimpses of joy instead of dark clouds of despair

Hoping

Loving Good

Seeking Peace

Comforting those who are broken

Being open to their comfort expressed to me as well

Wish I could say this is how I look every day – but its most definitely not! Only what I aspire & hope to…aim high, right? Love Hard.

TNL visit to Uganda

the guys teaching yoga to the kids!




Jared & Julie working hard on the Farm!!


the girls planting our live fence!!


Tiffney & I


baby Julio, our new goat!


sunset over the Nile River


Jared & I on the Nile


impending storm...


in Ben's village of Kaliro - we spent 3 days here with his family & community