Living In Community

living in community doesn't create communion, nor does it create unity. attempting to create unity while living in community is difficult, time consuming, exhausting, etc. i'm going on 4 weeks in tanzania, and i'm finally settling in. it feels good, quite refreshing. it feels like the rain that is falling outside my window, blowing a cool breeze thru the curtains. it feels like the green vegetables in the small garden outside of the office. it feels like the electricity which just came back on after the lightning. (the electricity is always going out here.) class was held with candles again this evening.

our speaker this week brought along his wife and 4 girls. the girls ages are 8, 5, 4, and 3 months. the four year old has become my little shadow. she's the cutest little thing - a little tomboy. she has short hair and dislikes shoes. she's constantly carrying around our orphaned puppy. her name is meekala. she has brought me great joy the last couple of days. having the 3 bright-white, blonde hair, blue-eyed, english speaking little girls running around the camp has brought a refreshing spirit. they are typical missionary kids, and i love them to pieces! there is something so precious about them.

one of the guys from my class asked me why i was a different color than them. (guess i'm getting a bit of a tan!) who knew? perhaps my watchband line should be some indication. it struck me odd that he would ask that question, but he was simply curious. i told him for the same reason that some of the other students are darker than he is. (as i typed that last sentence the electricity went out again. guess this post will need to be updated tomorrow. i've learned to type the blog updates in a word processor first, so that i can save them without losing my work.

today is tuesday, march 20. that means a month ago tomorrow my friends were taking me to the airport. how crazy is that! i can barely believe that it's been a month.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Have I told you you're amazing lately? Because you are. Seriously. It was amazing to get to talk to you with the whhole youth group! I was pretty much crying the whole time. You're definitely missed around here! I'm glad you had some English speaking folks to talk to for a while, and I continue to pray for you to be endowed with the knowledge of Swahili. Knock-up-end-do-way-way! (That's my swahili for you.)

Kevin Gantz said...

Reading all your posts to catch up. Its 11:36 pm here in Connecticut. I am out of town on business (week 3). Pretty tired from all the travel. It is 30 degrees outside and there is snow on the ground. Weird, huh? Anyway, my mind is not far from you. Prayers lifted daily. Your adventure sounds quite difficult, especially the food. Praise God for technology that would allow you to speak to 38 kids at SLR, live over a cell phone. Thats just amazing. I got tears in my eyes thinking about you being so far away. Shottie and I have been talking about praying for you as a more organized group of supporters. Maybe we can connect and come up with something. In the mean time, just ordinary prayers will have to do. We miss you lots. But are excited that you are where God has led you to be. May you find ever increasing peace.

Love,

Kevin