I am in Congo

First update from Congo.

And first things first—praise report from last time, the missionaries’ car successfully passed through customs.  Sort of.  Still waiting on some paperwork.  Thank God for Speed the Light anyway!

On Sunday I spent a layover night in Washington DC.  Got to see the monuments and stuff downtown and had a bit of missions experience there as well in trying to work with foreign shuttle drivers and talking to international people.  I was already with one of the interns then, and we met up with the other two the next morning before we got on the plane to Ethiopia.  On Tuesday, after a very short one-and-a-half days of travel, we here to Lubumbashi, DR Congo safely and without any issues. 

The Engage Congo team.  Starting from me going
clockwise is Michelle, Savannah, Bill Shaw, Rachel,
and Hannah.  Sonia's taking the picture.

 Very excited about things to come during this time.    Bill and Sonia, the resident missionaries, are    awesome.  I learn great things about interacting with  life here in Congo and how to do missions from  them.  Rachel DiTrolio, our student coordinator, also  has a lot of great insight and experience to share.

Mon ami Pascal, the one I talked with for a bit

 I still don’t feel like I’m in Africa.  Every morning I  hear the Bible school students across the path  singing in a local language for chapel.  We drive  every day through iconic pictures of dusty African towns, wave at kids running around playing soccer on the street, see women carrying fish and water on their heads… yup this is definitely Africa, but it sure hasn’t felt like it yet!!  I do feel like I’m being more integrated into life here… or at least life to the extent of right outside our house.  Had about an hour long conversation with a worker on the compound and a local student and it looks like I made a couple friends.  But everywhere else, people just kinda stare at us.  When we walk by houses with kids playing out front, they’ll all run off, gathering their friends while shouting “Mzungu!” (white people, in Swahili).  The girls have gotten a few catcalls and bridal prices too.  Two million Congolese francs seems to be where the fellas back off a bit though. 

Here’s a word on ministry plans.  Bill has a close contact with a vibrant and godly young pastor, Pasteur Ezekiel, who’s been heading up a church plant in the local neighborhood since August.  Several opportunities are available there.  The girls are all interested in children’s ministry and about 60-100 kids have been coming to the church’s children’s church.  They’re greatly considering helping to expand that.  Two of the girls are singing in the choir this Sunday.  I’m not too geared for children’s ministry… more at home talking with young people.  There’s two possibilities on my mind right now.  I could possibly do a sort of sidewalk Sunday school deal near the church as a draw for people to come and be integrated into the fellowship and discipled.  Or, I could go more downtown and just hang out with people and invite them to another church in that area.  I really want my French skills to improve this way before I commence any further, larger, more long-lasting ministry plans.

This is a chameleon.
If you can't see it...well, it is a chameleon...

Which reminds me of a big lesson I’ve realized.  Listen up all wannabe missionaries and cross-cultural workers.  If you learn the language of the people you’re working with, your effectiveness there in every aspect of life and ministry increases tremendously.  If you learn the local heart mother tongue language as well, your effectiveness increases many many times more.  Language learning is something that cannot be skipped or skimped on in ministry preparation.  How is my French doing here?  I’m surprised at how much I’m recalling.  Like I got through an hour long conversation today.  Wow.  Praise God!  Yeah whatever verb tense comes out just comes out, and I pay no attention to noun genders, but it’s coming, “petit à petit,” as my Congolese friends say.  Let’s place a goal to preach in French sometime, shall we?

Oh but about the ministry plans… I do only have 11 months here.  During this time, I want to use what I can offer and be who I can be and be where I can be in order to leave the greatest long-lasting influence.  That would include discovering what God is already doing and integrating myself into that.  Ultimately, it’s all about discovering what God wants to do and following through with the work that God is doing in us, the desires and the actions He’s forming in us, in order to complete His purpose and will.  That’s what I want to do.  And that requires some patience and carefulness with choosing opportunities and even friends.  Every opportunity is not a calling, as Bill said today.  Please pray that I am guided to the right place and use in faith what God has given me to benefit His kingdom!

One thing about that too… church dynamics are interesting here.  I’ll talk more about this once I’ve been to church, but as far as Pasteur Ezekiel’s schedule goes, they have a service on Sunday, intercessory prayer on Monday, I think a Wednesday night service, a women’s group on Thursday, and a big prayer meeting on Friday.  An interesting thing about the leadership dynamic is that leaders here have a “chief mentality” as Bill calls it—if I’m not benefitting as a leader, something is wrong.  I am serving to be served.  Which is exactly the opposite of what we Americans understand as “servant leadership.”  I’m actually really not sure how that should be approached… do the people function well underneath that kind of leadership because it’s a part of their culture?  Or do the largest churches grow because the pastors can delegate well and have a stable church structure that doesn’t depend on them?  Well the latter is a fact.  Point is that sometimes, or most times, “biblical” principles that Americans follow are just cultural applications of a certain perspective on Scripture.  We must be careful in translating what really is biblical and what is only American so as to create the least amount of baggage within the church.  And here’s another thing I noticed… within about a couple blocks of this church there’s about 3 other churches if not more, and yet Pasteur Ezekiel tells us that spiritual darkness is becoming more and more openly practiced.  Reminds me of New Orleans a bit…

About the faith life here—Bill says it’s a mile wide and an inch deep.  Everyone will claim Christianity, but not much fruit is shown.  A large part of that is due to the lack of training in the pastors.  I think in about 150 pastors, one had a solid biblical education but about 50 didn’t even have a Bible.  Talk about up the river without a paddle.  That’s what Bill’s been placed to work on recently, to revive the 60-year old Bible education (and I thought some of my textbooks for school were outdated…), to train the teachers teaching the curriculum, and facilitate access and accreditation for church-planting pastors. 

These were probably the first things you looked at, but I posted a few pictures of life around town.  As you can see, it’s a bit dusty, there’s trash on the ground, and the buildings aren’t super polished but definitely no less vibrant.  Looking at the children and people in the residential areas… yes, they do have much less than we do here and ya’ll do there, but I do not want to be the first to tell them that they’re poor.  They live and are loved.  Not that they don’t need help in some areas… ok poverty is something that I definitely do not know a lot about and haven’t experienced much.  I do know that this country and this Congolese church is very wealthy.  There’s a church nearby that’s built a quarter-million dollar church building all on with the congregants’ own money.  Granted this may be coming from a higher strata of society (there are business people and stuff here too), but the resources are certainly there.  Now our final goal, towards which our work would also go as well, is to help the Congolese church mature in to a missionary-sending church using these trained pastors and allocated resources.  May the Lord be with us and guide us in this!

Well… this just might be the making of a missionary.

MLK Memorial

Our house

Oh and biggest prayer request now falls along what I mentioned about following what God wants us to do and that we would be empowered to do that and communicate effectively through growing language skills.  Thanks ya'll!  This is it!