Sunday, July 29th

Muraho everyone!! This is Jennifer coming to you from Gitarama, Rwanda. As you may know from reading the previous entries I am writing today to tell you about our day on Sunday. Before I do that I want to say that this trip started out very difficult for me and for about the first four days all I really wanted to do was go home. I remember the first time Ford asked for a volunteer to write for the blog all I could think was that I would never write anything because I felt so miserable. Looking back now I know I was suffering from sleep depravation, culture shock and on top of that I was the last one to receive my personal luggage from the airline. Having that little bit of home with me went a long way toward improving my outlook and catching up on some sleep helped a lot too. As we were driving to Lake Kivu this morning (more from someone else on that later) I just knew I wanted to write about Sunday. It was a special day for all of us and I thought I could do a good job writing up the days experience for the blog. So here I go.

We were up early and headed out to Gikomero. We brought gifts with us as this would be the last day we would be spending any time in this village with members of our sister church. We were all a little sad as we had come to enjoy our time with the people of our village. It was easier this time as this was our second Sunday in this church and we knew more about what to expect during the service. And what a wonderful, spirit filled service it was. Starting off with the entire church singing and a group of teenagers & children dancing in the center of everyone. We processed in and took our very special seats up front facing everyone, behind the Lord’s table. Once again all of the children, as well as the ladies of the church, had huge eyes and big smiles to greet us and many were much less cautious with us. Makes me wonder if they’ll miss us next Sunday and wonder where we are. But I digress. We sang Amazing Grace for everyone as this was a familiar song to anyone who had sat in on our lessons since we sang it there too. There were two baptisms that Ford performed. Two beautiful little girls were welcomed into the body of Christ. Ford did great and neither baby cried. Eric gave a wonderful sermon on Mark 9:18-26 and they had communion for the confirmed members of the church using the wafers that we had brought for them. After the sermon we got up and sang On Jordan’s Stormy Banks I Stand for everyone and soon the service was over.

It was now time for us to present our gifts to the congregation and Etienne & Felicima but first the congregation presented their gift to us. I happened to be sitting next to Ford and whispered to him, in jest, that they were probably going to present us with a goat. (Back story; I believe someone else has written about our adoration of the goats that just stand around on the side of the road. We ladies have ooed and ahhed all over them.) At that point Vianne (pronounced Vi-ah-nay), who seems to be one of Etienne’s right hand men came up the aisle through the congregation with…. A SHEEP!!!!!!! We could NOT believe it and I jumped up immediately with my camera to get some shots of the sheep. Etienne then presented the goat to Ford who immediately named it COTA. Now… WHAT were we going to DO with this gift??? Did they really want us to take it?? Did it have a passport?? More about that later. The gift giving continued with Eric presenting the guitar he had brought to the congregation and let me tell you they were SO excited about this! Sarah was standing next to Eric holding the guitar and before Eric even started speaking a woman let out an excited screech and another one started to cry.  What a generous gift Eric offered and it was wonderful to see the excitement on everyone’s faces. We also presented the congregation with our team verse (Isaiah 55:11-12) that Erin Solomon had painted on a canvas for us.

There were other smaller gifts presented to us. It may have been mentioned in earlier posts that Hillary had found a sweet friend in little Phoibe (pronounced Foy- be) and was given a sweet card that expressed Phoibe’s love for Hillary. Hillary also received a very kind and thoughtful note from a young man we all recognized as exceptional named John Baptiste. It might just be me but I sensed a little crush in the air. J (I got permission from Hillary to write this.) People in the village and even here have been referring to Teresa as Mama which in this culture means grandmother and she was presented with a card expressing thankfulness for her concern & helpfulness to the church & village. Felicima presented all of the ladies with a gift of passion fruit and then I was given a present from the head of the mother’s union at the church. She gave me a picture of her youngest son Timothy from when he was two years old because they had all noticed my love for children. I have to say I so very touched by this and gave a huge wave to everyone. At this point, as they were wrapping up the gift giving, I had the urge to speak and asked Ford if I could say something. I explained in as few words as possible how the trip had been difficult for me, how I had never been this far away from home and how all of the love & joy they had showered on all of us had helped me so much in feeling better. I had not planned on doing this but I felt the prompting of the Holy Spirit to convey to everyone how much their love had meant to me.

After the service we were led immediately to the health center where two avocado trees were planted – the first one was a tree planted by Apostles and the civic representatives who had come to greet us (a lady who served as executive manager for the area and a gentleman who was in charge of development) and the second was planted by Apostles and the Gikomero Parish.  The trees will take about 3 – 5 years before bearing fruit, but future Apostles teams should make sure to enjoy! 

After tree planting we went into Pastor Etienne’s house and had lunch. This has become as very familiar thing as we have shared many meals this week with quite a few of the same people. After lunch Ford was able to use some very good advice Venant had given him about the sheep and asked Etienne if he could find a family to take care of the sheep for us in the hopes it would be helpful to them.  The first offspring of the sheep would be ours, any subsequent offspring wil belong to the family caring for it.  This seemed to be accepted and we all hope that COTA can be a blessing to a family from our village. Then one of the senior leaders of the church presented Ford with a document detailing the different ministries in the church and their progress as well as the progress on the new church building including a cad drawing of the front & back elevations of the church building.

It was soon time to say goodbye to our sweet friends and this precious village. I think we all couldn’t believe this would be the last time we’d see these people and were all sad especially Hillary as she had to say goodbye to sweet Phoibe. We all pray that this little girl maintains the light of love she has and that her relationship with Christ deepens as she matures.

On the drive home we all realized that the church service had been four and a half hours and suddenly we were all drained from the joy & excitement of this special day. Each of us took some time that afternoon to rest, journal or read and we had a wonderful dinner together. (One of the many we’ve had since being here.) After that it was time to visit with one another and just to make the day end on a fun note Taylor decided to let Hillary trim her hair a bit. Once that was finished it was lights out for everyone as we prepared to start our second week here in Rwanda.

I hope this entry has painted a joyful picture for you as I have come to feel in this place. We have all talked about how hard it will be for us to put into words the beauty of this place. I know we are all thankful we came and I can honestly say I certainly am. We’ll see if the Lord ever calls me to do this again but I know now that He will provide me with what I need. Maybe not what I want but what I need.

Praise God for his creation, love & mercy!

Love,

Jennifer