How does your garden grow?

The seeds we plant today are the harvest we’ll reap tomorrow. But when is tomorrow? In some ways it’s today, in some ways it’s in a few weeks, or months, and in other ways it’s for the rest of our lives. What do I mean? Well, you see the seeds are not just plants, they’re also seeds of encouragement and seeds of hope, seeds that don’t just grow in the future…they give a future.

These last few weeks some fellow volunteers and I have been doing garden trainings. We’ve held these at the homes of different families, many who have children who have had or currently have malnutrition. By sharing with them simple ways to improve their gardens (i.e. digging deeper, enriching the soil, pulling weeds, and planting (and then eating) nutritious vegetables), we’re building on what they already know and helping them to help themselves.

Last season in my own garden I planted lettuce, something I can never find in my local market here. It grew great and I enjoyed many a salad. Eventually a few remaining plants went to seed. I didn’t pull them, but instead enjoyed watching the life cycle, and was surprised by the almost broccoli looking form it took. In due course, it was time to replant and when I went to pull out the remaining lettuce stalks (they were no longer heads) I was met by a great surprise. I didn’t need to replant. The lettuce had sprinkled its seeds in the soil itself and plants were already growing…in abundance!

I’d planted, but then they’d grown and multiplied. That’s just what I hope for the gardens we plant and the skills we share. That they will grow and multiply and produce an abundant harvest. I hope this for the plants of course, but also for the smiles and the encouraging words.

The story of Jonah and the big fish is well known, but as I reread it, the end of the book was what really stood out to me.

Jonah 4:5-11: Then Jonah went out from the city and sat east of it. There he made a shelter for himself and sat under it in the shade until he could see what would happen in the city. So the LORD God appointed a plant and it grew up over Jonah to be a shade over his head to deliver him from his discomfort. And Jonah was extremely happy about the plant. But God appointed a worm when dawn came the next day and it attacked the plant and it withered. When the sun came up God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on Jonah's head so that he became faint and begged with all his soul to die, saying, "Death is better to me than life." Then God said to Jonah, "Do you have good reason to be angry about the plant?" And he said, "I have good reason to be angry, even to death." Then the LORD said, "You had compassion on the plant for which you did not work and which you did not cause to grow, which came up overnight and perished overnight. "Should I not have compassion on Nineveh, the great city in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know the difference between their right and left hand, as well as many animals?"

“And Jonah was extremely happy about the plant.” It’s easy to get excited about plants growing, change comes quickly and it’s easy to see that a difference has been made. In lives and hearts it can be a little harder to see, but don’t give up. Remember the compassion of the Lord, His faithfulness and love. How glad I am that this world is in the hands of the Gracious God instead of the Jonah and what a delight it is to get to be a gardener.

James 3:17 & 18, “But the wisdom from above is first pure, the peaceable, gentle, reasonable, full of mercy and good fruits, unwavering without hypocrisy. And the seed whose fruit is righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.”

Climbing

The beginning of Isaiah 40: 9 says “Get yourself up on a high mountain…”

Well, that’ exactly what I did! But why does the verse say to go? To declare good news. And I do have good news: Together my friend Sonia and I, made to the top of Africa and the world’s tallest free standing mountain, Urhuru Peak, Mt. Kilimanjaro, Tanzania. In fact, we were standing on the summit a month ago today.

What a delightful adventure and experience. I loved every minute of the climb (and am so thankful I didn’t have any altitude sickness!)

However, that is not the Good News. The good news, the glorious Truth, is even more exciting. (And I must say, I was pretty excited, skipping on the summit after watching the most spectacular sunrise up above the clouds!)

So what could be better?

Just a little further in the same chapter of Isaiah, verses 28-31 shares this:

“Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth does not become weary or tired. His understanding is inscrutable. He gives strength to the weary, and to him who lacks might He increases power. Though youths grow weary and tired, and vigorous young men stumble badly, yet those who hope in the Lord will gain new strength; they will mount up with wings like eagles, they will run and not get tired, they will walk and not become weary.”

God is the Good News! He’s the Creator of the ends of the earth (glaciers in Africa) and His handiwork was such a delight see all along our trek. From unusual trees, friendly monkeys, and a zebra rock, His creativity was declared everywhere I looked.

But He didn’t just create, He sustains! How wonderful to know no matter what type of mountain, when challenges come along, God will be there, faithful and strong!

Happy Trails

A Pennyful of Thoughts

Thanks to the EWU Children’s Studies Club and their Pennies for Pencils drive I was able to make some very special deliveries last week. They were just simple things that seem so basic back home. But here, they were very big things! I just couldn’t stop smiling, seeing the teacher and student’s delight. And it was so delightful to give, not just pencils, but markers, colored pencils, scissors, notebooks, balls, and books too.

I made a similar delivery at the prison (where young children stay with their mothers until the age of three, and sometimes longer if they have nowhere else to go.) And my last stop was the hospital, with erasable drawing boards.

This was all from money raised from college student’s pocket change!

I was thinking about pennies, how they can sometimes seem insignificant, just one small coin. But they are the very makeup of the dollar, which is the very makeup of the American economy (whether in a recession or not). One penny might not seem like much, but if every American gave just one penny, the total amount of money would be over 3 million dollars! Wow! I think it’s the same way with our daily actions. They can seem so small, like what we are doing couldn’t ever really make a difference. But if together we do little things, to reach out, to show others that we care, it really can change the world.

So, heads or tails? I say heads. Where on every penny (and nickel, quarter, and dime too) it is written “In God we trust.” There is no other place I would rather place my trust! Indeed, how very good it is to be able to trust in God and to know that He is all the time trustworthy! Well, that’s my two cents worth. I’ll end with this challenge from Psalm 37:3 that echoes this project and my heart’s desire for the rest of my service here, “Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness.”

Blessings!

What’s been happening since I last wrote? First of all SWAA, where I was previously working, closed their branch here in Kibungo. After assisting to clean out the office, I transitioned to working as a community based volunteer, spending the majority of my time at the hospital. I am so thankful for the Lord’s provision of a job I love!


The lit up smile, on this girl’s face (and her mother’s) came not because of the camera, but from playing with the small cloth doll she has in her hands. I've been enjoying sewing these and bean bags during my spare time.


Recent hospital projects:


*Applying for a grant, receiving funding and having a sink installed in the pediatric ward
*Helping facilitate a support group for HIV positive children
*Beginning to establish a psycho-social support program for children during their hospital stay.



Before the sink, the bucket in the background was used for hand washing



Sink Installed!

Back in March I spent a week in Rwanda’s capital Kigali and volunteered with Operation Smile.What a great experience and dream come true. I spent most of my time with the children, providing entertainment and education before and after surgeries. However, I also assisted with medical records and was given the incredible opportunity of sitting in and watching one of the surgeries. Seeing the transformation take place was amazing! But truly, it was amazing just to be there. To do small things, to play with and to teach and prepare children, so that a big difference could be being made. In a week, children’s smiles were healed and their lives forever changed. That is definitely something to smile about!

Other activites:




Teaching at Compassion International, Working with a Cooprtative of People living with HIV, Running in the Kigali 1/2 Marathon in May






And most recently a wonderful visit with my parents! It was delightful to see them, to catch up, show off Rwanda, and go on a safari together. I also put them to work, they brought along with them suitcases full of toothbrushes and tons of stickers too! We were able to teach kids proper tooth care and then provide them with tooth brushes so they could do it! Thanks to all of you who sent toothbrushes, stickers and toys with my parents. That was such a blessing, both to me and especially to the kids here in Rwanda!


So I close with a smile, for all the the Lord's blessings both past, present and future.

"Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning"" James 1:17

It's Been a Year!

Today I have been in Rwanda for a full year. And the Lord has been so amazingly faithful every step of the way. How true I have found Lamentations 3: 22-23 to be“The Lord’s lovingkindnesses indeed never cease, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning, great is Your faithfulness.” There was a while upon first arriving at site that most of my job was just doing paperwork in an office. How thankful I am that that has changed!

So what’s happening now? I able to be out of the office and working with children, in a variety of contexts ...

This picture is of me using a stuffed animal to teach teeth brushing during a Community Health Day

I've also been getting to continue my work as a Child Life Specialist in the local hospital! It is a delight to be able to bring play activites into an otherwise rather miserable environment for children...to have tears stop and smiles appear, what a great reason to be here!

SWAA (The Society for Women and AIDS in Africa) is the organization in Rwanda that I am partnered with. This picture is from a camp that we put on for Orphans and Vulnerable Children.

In November I took a trip to Uganda and went bungee jumping and whitewater rafting on the Nile River. It was incredible! But you know, even more incredible than that experince, is the incredible love of our Lord Jesus Christ!

"For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, not things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separated us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” ~ Romans 8:38-39

I am so thankful that He brought me to this beautiful continent and that He is continuing to work in and through me as I continue to be available to Him.

"Faithful is He who calls you, and He also will Bring it to pass" ~ 1 Thessalonians 5: 24

So with that, I'm looking forward to this year ahead and all that the Lord is going to do!

A Collection of Christmas Photos (and a few thoughts too)

Welcome to Winter in Rwanda...

...where family, friends and frosty weather are missed, but Christ’s birth is celebrated with fun traditions and a joyful heart.

I made a wreath for my door,

gingerbread houses with friends,

decorated a tree,

and even fashioned a manger scene from corn husks!

I was so thankful to have a Christmassy home here! But even more so, I am so thankful that Christmas is much, much more than just snowflakes and holiday cheer. It’s the celebration of Christ’s birth and life!

How delightful it was to read the Christmas story together with my host family in both Kinyarwanda and English. “Kuk’ uyu munsi Umukiz’abavukiye mu murwa wa Dawidi, uzaba Kristo Umwami.” “For today in the city of David there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.” ~Luke 2:11
It is such a blessing to know that “you” means each and every one of us. That Christmas, and its message of hope and life in Jesus, is for the whole world. Glory to God in the highest, it is in Him that we find peace!

P.S.~ On January 29th, I will have been in Rwanda for one year. My year-in-review blog update is coming soon.

Home is where the heart is...

So I've moved into my apartment! It's small, just two rooms, but cozy and I have so much enjoyed making it into a home.

Here's some before and after photos.

The curtains I sewed with material I bought at the local market.

And the flowers I found cut and dried, trimmed from a bush that needed pruning and left on the side of the road.

All I did was tie them together with string and hang them up above the door between the two rooms.

And my furniture, that's from the secondary school just down the road from me. My table is not quite so empty now, in fact it's almost completely full as I'm still waiting for a cupboard to store my dishes and food.

And finally, I store my shoes by the door accompanied by this verse:

If you can't quite read it in the photo it's Colossians 2:6, "Therefore as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him."

What a good reminder it is that every day we are to be living in Christ, marveling in His saving and indwelling life. Well, I guess that's about all for now. Hope you enjoyed getting a little glimpse at my house, I'm sure thankful to be moved in. Mostly though I'm thankful that wherever I am, I can trust in the Lord and that my true home and life is found in Him.

Walk in Him.