Dear family and friends,
I got up early this morning so that, before the power (and therefore, wireless) went out, I could send something out in the form of an update. I hope that by now you've found a couple different student blogs that update frequently, to hopefully fill in some of the gaps between my updates. Also, we'll be posting more and more to the HIZambia blog in the next few days. The point of the blog is to share a little snippet of this experience, this story, and point to its significance in the overall story, the "big picture." We're learning so much that we hope to share some of that learning with you, and want to use a blog as a forum for that shared learning process.
On Saturday morning we attended the funeral for Adam at the Havens. We spent some time Saturday evening talking together as a group, to let individuals express some of the emotions they were feeling and questions they were asking as we work our way through this experience. There are so many layers of complexity at play. First of all, many of us Americans haven't had to deal with the death of a child. There are so many "buffer" layers in the US because of general good health, nourishment, and medical care that, long before a child gets past the point of no return, the right medicine or treatment can be found. It's surprising to us when a child who was so lively can get to that edge so quickly here. That's one layer of complexity.
Another is that we're immersed in another culture, which makes even the simplest tasks (for instance, driving into town to pick up some fresh fruit for the group) harder. Going to this Zambian funeral was hard to handle because it was unfamiliar. The Zambians grieve out loud, they wail, and they sing. It seems like they've perfected the art of grieving because they were able to grieve and then go back to work right away. We're not nearly that well-prepared or resilient, so we blocked off time that evening to talk about it all.
Someone once said "Impression without expression leads to depression". We're being impressed all day every day, so we're being intentional as a group to verbally express the experience.
On Sunday we went to a village only about 40 minutes away, Simakakata. One of the teachers at the Basic school, Ba Simafuta, brought 10 students from the Basic for this "outreach trip" with us. When we arrived that morning, the church asked us to lead singing, preach, and speak before the Lord's supper, so we led in each of those areas. Phil spoke about Solomon and finding meaning in life in God's presence, Chris led singing (in Tonga!) and I spoke before the Lord's supper. At the conclusion of the worship service, several choruses got up to sing, including a couple from the congregation, the students from the Basic, and the mamakua (that is, us white people!). They are still so surprised to see us singing in Tonga that we are able to make up for mispronunciations and singing the songs differently than they're used to hearing.
After a late lunch and an afternoon off, we went to evening service here at Namwianga church. Now that George Benson Christian College of Education is in full swing, the service was pretty packed. We had been asked to teach some songs in English and there were song sheets printed out with some newer songs and a couple four part songs (the Magnificat and He is Wonderful). As we were walking in we were asked to come to the front and actually stand in front of everyone in choral formation to "perform" the songs as we taught them. The group was incredible. Not just anyone can walk in at the end of a tiring weekend and stand in a hot room for an hour, and, without fainting, sing. This group really has a talent for singing and I believe God is using that to bless and to make His name known.
This week has been especially busy and clinic-focused. The whole country is doing a "measles awareness week," which means they've been doing measles vaccinations at the clinic here at Namwianga. It also means they've been going out into the bush to different villages to give vaccinations and some of our students have gotten to help with that. They've gone with Ba Janice and others from the clinic here, taken the day off from classes, and spent the entire day out in the villages. I'll let one of our medical people tell you more about it, and I'm sure the students who have gone will tell you all about what they've done.
Besides that it's been a normal, crazy week! Tonga every morning at 6:30, and our humanities class at 7. Roy Merritt teaches on Monday mornings about mission methods and the story of mission here in Zambia. Dr Kapaale teaches us African cultural anthropology, Ba Siaziyu does African lit with us Wednesday morning, and this morning we'll have Ba Moonga with African history. Ba Janice is giving her first Health Care and Missions exam this week, and somehow in the midst of all this busyness the students are finding time to get readings done, study, and work. It's incredible how integrated this experience is and how it all ties together on so many levels.
Since the term for the college is well under way, we got to play sports with the GBCCE students on Tuesday. Some of us played football (that is, soccer) and others volleyball. Some of our students will join their choirs and we hope to build relationships with the students as we go throughout the semester. We are their guests, guests of Namwianga, here to learn, and hoping to serve in any way we can.
Tonight the students are getting paired with a student from the college to be their "Tonga tutor". Tomorrow is the big GBCCE graduation, so we've blocked off the entire morning to be here for that, and we'll do our regular morning classes in the afternoon.
Thanks so much for being our audience and for praying for us. Our constant prayer is that we will see God's hand at work in this, to see what He's done worldwide throughout history, and that we can recognize it and join THAT. And that's not just our prayer because we're here in Zambia. We pray that for you too, because our God is a global God, which means being His people has significance here in Zambia, in the US of A, and wherever we go. It's a lifestyle thing, asking the questions, looking for God, trying to make sense of comfort on one side of the spectrum and pain and suffering on the other. We believe God governs the big picture. Jesus prayed that God's Kingdom would come and will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven. Let's be a part of more and more of that kingdom breaking in on earth, God's will ACTUALLY being done by His people here below.
We're hoping it's not just 3 months of learning setting us up for a return to "sameness". God gives us opportunity to learn something about Him through cross-cultural encounter and we want to translate that to wherever we go in the future.
All that to say, thanks for praying for us :)
Grace and peace,
Jeremy Daggett
HIZ 2012 Field Director
No comments:
Post a Comment