Missions Team to Rwanda

In 2 weeks, I will greet a missions team coming from Taylor University into Kigali.  I will brief them on major cultural issues and integration protocol for Rwanda.  I will help their choir adjust the pronunciation as they will be singing in Kinyarwanda, the local language.  They will visit my school as part of their tour to sing to the students and help paint a world map on the outside wall.
I am very excited to help host this team, and we are asking for your support.

 As you can imagine, a trip like this requires tremendous prayer and financial support, particularly during an economic downturn.  The team of 18 must raise $61,000.  This will cover all our transportation, food, housing, and materials.  If you can support us in a financial way, the entire team would be extremely grateful.   

If you support the Rwanda/Uganda team financially, you can either visit the following link (https://secure.touchnet.com/C21485_ustores/web/store_cat.jsp?STOREID=6&CATID=95&SINGLESTORE=true ), or make a check payable to Taylor University: SCGE, and send it to

Taylor University: SCGE
236W Reade Ave
Upland, IN 46989-1001

Contributions are tax deductible.

Their Story :
In 2009, Taylor took its first team to Rwanda.  On June 11-29, 2011, we are going back to Rwanda with fifteen nervous and energetic students and three faculty ready to share the redemptive love of Christ. We will be working in Kigali, Rwanda with ALARM (African Leadership and Reconciliation Ministries).  ALARM exists to empower the African church by developing and equipping leaders with the skills and tools needed to nurture and deepen the Christian faith for the transformation and reconciliation of African communities.  We will be presenting a conference to Rwandan youth on social justice, seminars to pastors and community leaders on God’s call for Biblical reconciliation, as well as providing training on microfinance, developing spiritual and educational programs at two schools run by ALARM, and volunteering at an AIDS hospital and orphanage.  In addition, we will be working with World Gospel Mission (WGM) in Kampala, Uganda.  We will be partnering with students from Kampala International University, working on a variety of mission projects throughout the city.

No mission trip, no matter how well conceived and planned, would be successful without prayer.  Please pray that our team will think, act, and feel more systematically about social justice, and mightily promote the redemption of Christ and the power of reconciliation to the people of Rwanda and Uganda.  Pray that we will be humble servants and an encouragement to all who work with ALARM and WGM.  Finally, please pray that we will be able to raise the financial support for this international justice mission trip.

In the midst of AIDS, poverty, and oppression, we earnestly anticipate seeing what God will do in the lives of our team and the people of Rwanda and Uganda.

back from the brink

   Thank you for your patience and forgiveness for my absence. I got lost. Being lost is why I came on this journey to begin with, but it took 9 months to really grasp how I was lost, and just how lost I was. Everything was gone. Everything I knew about myself.

   After I got dumped (very kindly, and all for the best, but dumped none the less), I felt like I lost a really important lifeline. Looking at why the relationship ended called into question who I was and where I would go from there. Both of these issues were what drew me to Peace Corps in the first place (and, to be honest, for the same reasons) but where PC started as a place to get away from these issues, it was now the place where I had to confront them. I needed to withdraw and face my own demons for a while.

   After I started to recover, I faced the quandary of re-entry into y’all’s lives. How do I explain myself? Not only the disappearance, but the 9 months beforehand of grand plans and (what felt like) disappointing reports. Nothing I was trying had any forward motion. I had no real job, no language skills, one family I integrated with to speak of, and now, three months of no news to try and explain away or catch up on.

   Those of you who have known me long enough know I had braces for 5 years. Those of you who didn’t, yes, that says Five. My teeth weren’t that bad. It certainly wasn’t Planned to take that long. I didn’t know how to handle it on my own after my parents moved away. Finding transportation, getting myself to the office, dealing with payment and insurance (potentially – as I recall, I didn’t actually have to deal with any of that until we took them off…) was all too much and, frankly, not as important as the immediate demands on my time. I was resistant to going, and then once I missed an appointment, I felt really foolish. I couldn’t bear to go back to the office and face my ortho who would inevitably look down at me in the chair, list how long between meetings it had been this time, hold up my failure to my face and remind me of just how much of a child I still was. I think he was hoping to inspire me to come on time, but this presentation scared me away for longer and longer periods.

   At this point, some of you will have seen the parallel. All of you have been so supportive and encouraging throughout this whole endeavor – I felt like I had failed you because I had certainly hadn’t accomplished anything of significance. And after such a long pause, I felt foolish in trying to explain it all.
Thank you – for not giving up on me, for praying for me, for sending packages and emails to check in even after I disappeared. Specifically; thank you to Union Church – I got your Christmas package and just seeing your address on the box warmed my heart. Thank you to Aunt April and Stephanie for writing updates with your life so I don’t feel left out or behind – you both claim they’re not worth much because it’s just day to day news, but being able to be a part of your lives especially after I disappeared out of them was a life preserver and a huge encouragement to return. Thank you to Josh who, although is as bad as me at keeping up with people (or maybe because of that similarity?), gave me a safe place to dive back in to socializing and told me that he would rather hear bad news than nothing at all.

   Which brings me to my third stumbling block. I was increasingly frustrated with the content of my posts – not only was I not living up to my own eagerness and promises, but I often struggled to find positive experiences to share at all. I still can’t post anything too critical of my host country or administration on here, but there was a stretch where I was searching for reasons to stay, and none of what I came up with had to do with my actual Peace Corps experience. I started writing this post on the plane on the way back to Rwanda (those who weren’t aware, I went back to the states for 3 weeks to see my family and regroup). I thought about what this blog should look like from here on out – no promises, no goals, reports of what was currently happening and at least 1 positive anecdote per post – and spent the next 2 weeks looking for a positive story to add. Losing some close friends certainly wasn’t going to make the list (I love you guys and I’m still very proud of you!); neither was the inanity of the beginning of school (we’ve been in session for 3 weeks and I Just finished making the schedule for classes and teachers – at least 50-60 hours working on it); I was exceedingly frustrated that my time at home was simultaneously way more than I wanted and way less than I needed; and just as I started to build my spiritual life and started praying that I would be a person slow to anger and quick to forgive, someone pissed me off to the point that I almost punched them – I’m going to need some of you to inform me on how in or out of character this is for me, I can’t tell anymore.

   Point being – I will probably always find reasons and excuses not to post, but I don’t want to. I can’t promise any kind of regularity in timing or content, but I Will continue to share my life with you as I can. I will probably be including more of how God is working in my life and where I see him in this whole experience, and I Will try to find positive anecdotes to share with each post.

   I’m glad to be back – in Rwanda, online, as me. I apologize for leaving you all hanging and am, again, extremely grateful for all your support.