The Real Africa

Tuesday, June 11.

The ladies started off the day with prayer. A small group of us women who live at Kachele Village gathered in the middle of the yard, sitting on tree stumps in the sun. We shared our stories to one another and then continued praying for the things on our heart.

Shortly after, we jumped into a tinted-windowed mini-bus and headed to Kitwe to meet up with the Service Centre team. We were warmly welcomed by Blessings, Towela, Mary, Clement, and Esnart. This a power-house of a team. A power-house of the most gentle and sacrificial, yet anointed and authoritative people. They shared about their hearts, about the work in Mulenga, and a particular child in Mulenga that touches each of their hearts.

The mini-bus then took us into Mulenga, a slum-compound on the outskirts of Kitwe. I first visited this community in 2009. A few things are noticed immediately. First, the only road that enters into the community is one that was built by the care workers themselves. Secondly, children are everywhere. The majority of the population is children. Thirdly, drunk men and women wander around everywhere from early morning to late evening. The best part about visiting these communities is not the adorable children we get to play with and hold and love on (although a plus), but seeing anointed men and women of God playing with, loving, and truly delighting in the most vulnerable children in the community. These are children whose parents are drunkards and/or prostitutes and/or deathly sick or children completely without parents.

We then proceeded to Luanshya to sit at the feet of James and Sukai. I continue to use the word 'anointed' because there is no other way to describe all the people around us. When I first met them, I found myself to be in the presence of people that completely exude Christ. I found myself wanting to be with them all the time, to sit and listen to them. Today during tea with them, Lisa leaned over and whispered to me, “I just want to cry this whole time. I feel like I'm with Jesus.” We sat together, hearing the story of how they came to be involved with Hands, how God has touched and changed their lives, and about the Jesus that they know. James, especially, has a crazy testimony of how God viciously chased him down. After James shared a word with us, we prayed and sang together, then came home.

Julia has been really wanting to lead us in communion (something she has never led or been involved in organizing before). When we returned home, we had a beautiful time of breaking bread and praying together. It's been really amazing to see people become inspired to initiate or lead something along the way this trip. I was so proud of Julia tonight.

I lie in bed tonight with a grateful heart, completely filled. I don't deserve to be here, I don't deserve to be with these amazing leaders of Africa, to walk with them, and I don't deserve to be leading an amazing family of random individuals who love God desperately and have hearts so filled with compassion. So all I can do is sit here and be completely grateful, giving God the glory and thanking him for his goodness and choosing me to be a part of it.

-K

in Photos

We made it to South Africa. Some proof of the journey along the way:

Kachele Farm, Luanshya, Zambia. Our home during
Hands at Work African and International Celebrations.

Waiting for food. Celebrations.

Celebrating with our volunteers from all over Africa.

A South African braai in anticipation of a certain upcoming wedding.

Our Hands at Work family.

Wedding.

Proof Will has spent time in the community since we've been here.

Kristal loving life.

Siyaphila

Mulishani from Zambia!

We have arrived and we are ecstatic! Just a quick update to essentially say siyaphila (we are alive). Flights were long but that's how it goes. We arrived in Zambia yesterday afternoon to a farm full of family and friends from all over the world, but most especially all over Africa. That first day Willis got busy helping get things set up for our Celebrations and I sat around blubbering like a baby. It feels SO good to be here. We missed these people like crazy. What a gift to have been part of these lives and to continue to be part of it, despite being in Canada for the past two years.

It's a bit surreal. Yesterday I found myself going on an 8 km run with George and Levy on footpaths through tall grass in 33 degree weather. Eish. That was a bit much.

As I write this, Willis is with a crew of men fixing the road. Living the dream.

Not sure when we'll write again. I hope to not write too often. It becomes easy to experience things through a blogger's eyes as opposed to one's own. But, just wanted to say we are alive and we love you all.

K (+W)


To Shelly - Sukai just hugged me. Be jealous. She's got a cute little fro happening right now. She's the best.

Africa, siyabuya namuhla!

Staring out at the Poplars and mountains as I write this, it's hard to believe our view will soon turn to Acacias and mounds of red dirt. We leave today. We are THRILLED! I could hardly sleep this morning. I have found myself frolicking around the house, doing absurd and awkward movements with my body corresponding with absurd and awkward sounds with my mouth. This is what happens to me when I'm excited.

Just wanted to write this so people know we will try to blog about our journey.

We arrive in Ndola, Zambia on Sunday and are there for a week. Then we head down to our homeland in South Africa for a month as we prepare and wait for our lovely team members to arrive.

HUGE HUGE HUGE thanks to all who have supported us with words, prayers, and moneys all along the way. We are truly grateful. We love our community here and are so excited to come back and LIVE among you!

Lots of love to you all!

K (+W)

Home and At Home

After two years of departing my long-time home in Africa, Willis and I will be returning. For a short stint, I assure you. We have the gift of returning for 3 months, two of which we will be leading a group of 8 fine individuals from Canada, Germany, and Australia, to and through four wonderful countries: South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Malawi. I've met (mostly through skype) most of them and truly feel like it is a gift and an honour to be comrades with these folk, journeying together through bush and plain, urban and rural, heart ache and joy.

Home is something I've been thinking about lately. For years I have been dancing back and forth between the notion of my home being in Africa or my home being in Canada, but Willis and I feel truly blessed with a calm heart in terms of "home". We feel like we've finally entered into a time where we are no longer wandering. We are making our home in Calgary. God is lining up all kinds of great things: a house, a job I love, schooling Will feels excited about, beautiful community. It's happening. Our African Father, George, visited us one weekend a few months back and shared with us about the Israelites that wandered until finally they entered the promised land and ate fruit from their land. This feels like us right now. No longer are we on manna. We are eating from our land. And this land finally feels like home.

The Lord's Prayer.

Jesus said this is how we are to pray.

Lord, my heart is heavy and burdened for your creation: your people, your land, and your critters. Thank you that you dwell in goodness and faithfulness and love and mercy and grace. I rejoice in the power of your name.  Your plan is to restore all of creation; I pray for that now in this moment. Make earth new, just as it is where you are. Until then, give us what we need each day to serve you and serve your creation. Sorry we are hurting the works of your hand and making it into a place where suffering and brokenness play. I choose to love the perpetrators of this, including myself. Protect us from ourselves and other sources of pain and greed and corruption. This place is yours, we are yours. Make yourself known.

Amen.

At work in the small things.

It's been two months now that I've been serving the students of Mount Royal University. It has been a really amazing experience. God is teaching so much to me about his heart for people, and his heart for all people. It's been amazing to really learn to celebrate diversity. There's no other place to learn that than in a University. There have definitely been hard moments, moments where things are quiet, conversations feel uncomfortable, and I feel tired. In these moments I question why I'm here and whether this is really where God wants me. I question if it is necessary for me to be here, if students need someone like me. And then there are days like today when I saw a hunger and desire to have spaces for meaningful dialogue about faith, to have an individual to talk with about inner struggles and fears, to be cared for in a way not offered anywhere else in the institution. The reason I felt so excited to be here in the beginning was because of the faith crisis people enter into post high school. Students are smacked in the face with different ways of living contrary to the way they were raised and many have no safe place (even within their own faith communities) to question and wrestle. I always tell these students how God delights in their questioning. By questioning, I believe God recognizes your pursuit of Him, your eagerness to be true to him, to know him.

I'd like to share the last two days with you and how I have really felt God using me to be a safe place for people to question and wrestle, as well as be encouraged and commissioned.

Every Wednesday on campus we facilitate a Christian worship time. This was a beautiful time of worship and prayer and encouragement. We shared about our hope and how we live out our hope.

I met up with a young woman named Carrie who has a huge heart for broken people. She is very keen to serve in Africa with my husband and I this coming May. She has a Catholic/Native spirituality background, but doesn't seem to practice anything seriously now. I could see a passion in her for people that I am convinced can only be from her Maker himself. I left feeling incredibly grateful for people like her.

A few days ago I had a young lady flag me down, almost desperate to meet with me. We met up Wednesday and spent an hour and a half together, sharing our stories, sharing our challenges, and praying for one another. It was beautiful.

Thursday started with a student Interfaith Dialogue I help facilitate. We had a few students and faculty gather and share on the question "What do you see as your role in the world?" It was amazing to hear the different perspectives, but most seem to talk about bringing hope, restoring people, bringing change.

After the dialogue, there seemed to be a number of different students gathering in our office. It's an extremely small office so the 8 of us packed it pretty good. Out of the 8 people, there were 7 faiths represented. We immediately engaged in an amazing conversation about faith and different faiths and what it means to pursue faith intentionally. We were able to challenge one another on seeking God whole-heartedly, on questioning what is the world and what is God, on what life is really all about. After most cleared out, there were three of us left: Muhammad, Nasra, and myself. Muhammad and Nasra had never met each other prior, but both are from Pakistan and have an Islamic background. Muhammad left his faith and has been searching since. Nasra opened up about being really uncomfortable in her faith and wanting to explore also. She said she's been reading the Bible a little bit and has been connecting with it, but is really scared because of her family. She expressed, very emotionally, that she wanted to seek out Christianity because it feels true. Muhammad expressed how he knows exactly what she's going through and encouraged her to be courageous in her pursuit of God, that she needs to do this and be confident in it. Nasra was really keen to meet up with me next week to ask questions and share our journeys. I feel absolutely privileged to be the one to journey with students like this. Not that I'm trying to snatch them up to convert them, but that I really care for them and want to walk with them as they journey through their questions and doubts.

There is a scripture that has been energizing me lately:

"I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved." Romans 8:18-24

All of creation, everything that lives and breathes, is waiting for this hope: to be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God! Lord, may it be so!

Thank you so so much for your prayer and financial support and participation in my life in general! You are absolutely essential to this ministry. Please continue to pray for the students I mentioned, as well as energy and spiritual discernment. There are 13,000 students on campus and I'm trying to figure out ways to connect with them, so wisdom is also needed!

If you are looking to give and don't want to support monthly, an online donation via credit card can be made at http://www.canadahelps.org/CharityProfilePage.aspx?charityID=s54389

Kristal