Burkina Missionary Top Ten

My posts have been a bit dark lately. But my life isn’t all death and disease though. Therefore, today I wanted to post . . .

THE TOP TEN REALLY FUN THINGS I GOT TO DO THIS WEEK BECAUSE I’M A MISSIONARY IN BURKINA FASO

1. I got to hang out with other expatriates who were tourists who had come to see life in Africa and be a translator for them.
   
2. I got to “off-road” in a 4 x 4 truck because I actually needed 4 wheels of traction and the place to which I needed to go didn’t exactly have what most Americans would call a road.
   
3. I got to learn how to make new culinary delights like coffee flavored ice cream.
   
4. I got to write a blog about living in AFRICA.

   
5. I got to play foosball with my family

   
6. I got to learn how to play soccer along with my son, Daniel, from the neighborhood kids, who, because they grow up with soccer being the only real sport, are really really good at it.

   
7. I got to read a bible story in a foreign language to some people who had never heard that story before.

   
8. I got to work out of my home which means that I got to take a break anytime I wanted to play with my kids or give my wife a hug.

   
9. I got to help some people who needed a loan of what to me was a minuscule amount of money ($4), but to them was a lifesaver.

   
10. I got to be sent on a mission from God, for real.

O.k. I know that not all of these fun things are exclusively African missionary things, but the point is that I do live a really blessed life. What are some really fun things that you got to do, because of where God has put you? (And that doesn’t necessarily just mean a physical place that he has put you on this planet) Let me know what you “got to do” this week.


What Do You Say?

First of all, thanks, again for everybody’s comments on my blog post commemorating Do from Didoro and for the messages on twitter and facebook and email. It always helps me to not feel so alone when walking through hard stuff like that.

We currently work with 34 churches meeting on any given Sunday. We are not able to make it to all of them all the time obviously. So my teammate Melissa does an amazing job of putting together the puzzle of which missionaries go where on which dates called the “Sunday Village Visit Schedule.” So one would think that I would know what was going to happen this past Sunday, but . . .

Plan A - go to Didoro according to schedule

Andy went to church in Didoro’s neighboring village of Nyinyime last Sunday. He met some folks from Didoro who told him about Do’s death. Since Didoro is so far out, he didn’t have time to still go there and make it back home to Dano at a decent time. So he promised folks from Didoro that he would be there next Sunday. Because we have so many possible places to go each Sunday, I wanted to go somewhere else, so there went plan A.

Plan B - go to next week's scheduled church this week and then go to Didoro the following week.

So l decided I would go to Bavule instead. I can always go to Didoro next week. But then God brought plan C to my front gate.

Plan C - help Ngmin-puor from Pen-zan

Ngmin-puor

You may remember my talking about the great literacy night classes going on in Pen-zan. One of the teachers from there is Ngmin-puor (I won’t even provide a pronunciation guide - after 9 years it’s still hard for me to say his name).  He came to my gate while I was still getting ready to head out for church.

He told me about his baby boy Pierre. Pierre had gotten a fever three nights ago. They took the one year old to the nurse’s station in Polebar and tried to find treatment. The nurses there strongly suggested that he bring Pierre to Dano. So Ngmin-puor and his wife and little Pierre all got on a bicycle together to come to Dano Saturday night, but Pierre didn’t make it.

Overcome with grief, they asked for my help in bringing them to Pen-zan (which is not close to Dano, even in a car). So that confirmed my plan C.

The wife was silent all the way home except for an almost inaudible moan from time to time. I didn’t know what to say exactly so I tried to chat a little with Ngmin-puor about the literacy program - thought it might take his mind off of it - or maybe I was thinking of taking my own mind off of it . . . I wish I was better at this.

Dagara cultural aside #1

What should I have said? I mean . . . I can think of some things that I’m supposed to say to an American family that might be going through a tough time like this, but Dagara culture is so different. They see suffering and death all the time. For them, it’s the norm. Of course, it still hurts, but it doesn’t shake their world - it is their world.

So, anyway, when we got to Pen-zan, Ngmin-puor's wife got out of the truck with Pierre still strapped to her back, but with his face covered.  What before had been inaudible turned into the typical moan that a mourning mother might emit here to announce the death of her child to the whole village.

The Pen-zan Christians were worshipping, but the funeral had begun at the same time. So there was all this wailing and moaning just a stone's throw away from the worship service going on.  It felt a bit awkward, like they were performing a worship service for the missionary while their brother and sister were over there crying about the loss of their child.

Dagara cultural aside #2

Dagara culture is very status driven. So one of the ways that they show the importance of someone who has died is by the length of their funeral. A chief might get a three or even four day long funeral. A one year old will usually just get a half day. I was worried this would be what would happen for little Pierre, so . . .

I talked to the meeting Christians about how Jesus welcomed children and how he had to get his disciples to stop 'acting like children' by telling them that they had to have the heart of a child. I reminded them how 'Do' was so humble and didn’t try to get recognition, and I encouraged them to honor little Pierre as Jesus would have.



All this death, and I feel so inadequate to address it all. Burkina has a life expectancy of 53 years. But what does that statistic even mean to Pierre’s parents? I’m sure they expected him to live more than one year. Sure, there is the promise of the afterlife, but the living still have to deal with the separation. What would you have said? Help me out here.  Go ahead, there won't be any consequences, except that maybe I'll have more insight the next time I have to face a situation like this, which could be soon given the way things are here.

Don't Look Back

I’m really glad for my teammate Andy.  It has been a great privilege to work with him for so many years.  We had worked together to study with separate families in the same village starting a year or so ago.

That village, Yabogawn, called up Andy and said, “We’d like to see you again.  It’s been a while.”  Andy graciously invited me.  

I went although at first I wasn’t feeling great about going.  Have you ever peeled your skin back?  I’m a klutz, so I get little nicks all the time.  For a week or so, depending on how deep it is and how good you take care of it, those spots can cause a lot of pain if you touch them directly.  I was feeling sort of the emotional equivalent of that, because of Do’s death.  I was afraid that they would be really nostalgic or give us a guilt trip for not having been back with them for a long time, and I really didn’t want to have to deal with an emotional conflict like that.

It was none of those things.  It was a simple celebration of our relationship.  They just wanted us to give them some more direction.  Here are a couple of pictures from the worship time we shared.

We did a lot of singing and they asked us each to share a message.  I read to them from the new Children’s Bible.  This thing is amazing.   It’s got full page full color graphical art printed on glossy paper, etc., you know just like the bajilion magazines and children’s books and coffee table books that are filling your children’s bookshelves or your living room or cluttering up your attic.  The difference is that the Dagara have never seen anything like it.  It’s the first ever hardback book printed in Dagara.  

They loved the pictures and the story of Samson (which they had never heard before becuase there is no old testament in their language nor any plans to publish one).  


We pondered whether Samson started to question whether his power really came from God.  I encouraged them to remember that as their lives change for the better in Christ, God is the one who maintains their strength.  We should not rely on ourselves.

I announced that I will be having a seminar soon for those who might feel called to teach literacy in their village or region.  There were two guys who could sort of read.  I had asked if anyone knew how to read.  No one raised their hands, but a couple of people pointed to these guys.  


As we continued discussing this I referred to those guys a couple of times and each time they shook their head as if they were worried I would ask them to read something in front of everyone.  You can see that with so few theological resources at their disposal why they wanted Andy and I to come again and visit them.  Here’s a picture of Andy with one of the two people who can read in Yabogawn.

Next it was Andy’s turn.  He challenged them to not look back at their old life but to keep looking forward to what the next step is.  (Don’t put your hand to the plow and look back - although Andy and I had to admit that we didn’t know the slightest thing about plowing).  


It struck me this morning in thinking about this reunion that the next step is what should be my focus as well.  I will never forget my friend, Do, who died this week.  I will never forget all the different churches that I’ve had the privilege of helping to plant, like Yabogawn, but they are not my focus.  This row I have to hoe with literacy now is on what the Holy Spirit has me focused and I need to keep myself applied to it.

Can you tell the difference between your “old life” and your “new one?”  If so, do you ever feel like going back there? What is God calling you to in your life?  What’s the next step for you?

I Really Hate This

This is the third time I've had to do this over the last couple of years.  I hate writing obituaries.  A person’s life cannot be wrapped up even in a well written biography, much less in a few paragraphs on some website.  But it would be worse to say nothing.  So, like this pile of artifacts from his life that they put together at Do's funeral, this is my pile of things to say about him.

I’d like to tell you what I know about Do (pronounced like “dough”).  He had gotten about a 6th grade education in French and was able to use his understanding of the French alphabet to teach himself to read Dagara.  As one of the few in Didoro who could do this, he naturally became the leader of the church plant in Didoro in 2006.  


As he began to become more confident in his reading skills and more so in his calling, he started planting other churches.  He helped to plant churches in Yehoun, Yerfin, Sambion, and Penzaan.  He was the first Dagara evangelist to become a missionary to the Puguli tribe and he made Puguli converts in Banyere.   


He was not only an evangelist in this region but he was a leader in his family.  Like many new Christians, not everyone in his family was so gung ho about the faith, but rather than becoming an irritant in his family he had begun to draw more and more of them into the faith through his patient love for them.  


He was possibly the gentlest Dagara man I have ever met.  At leaders meetings where, because of his credentials he could have asserted himself, he was usually quiet unless called upon.  He will be missed by everyone who ever met him.

I'm finishing up my literacy training book, and I’ve decided I’m going to dedicate it to his memory.  The things he did with the little he knew still amaze me, and yet it is the kind of thing we are all called to do.  I’m dedicating the literacy training book to him, because our literacy course is not just a generic literacy course but a course with a purpose - that people will take their ability to read the Bible and share it.

The main reason I have a lump in my throat right now and tears running down my cheeks is not that his death is a defeat.  We can celebrate his new life, but still hurt at the separation from a friend.  But honestly that’s still not the main reason my hands are shaking as I write this.  The problem I have is that I don't know if I praised him enough to his face while he was alive.  I never even learned his last name.
  
He was a regular student of mine, but I poured so very little of my life into him compared to how much of his he poured into the kingdom.  I am so so grateful that God used a sometimes inconsiderate, and absent minded man like me to speak His good news in Nakar, and that He used Yawnbacere and Vie from Nakar to speak His good news to Nyinyime and that He used Domanyuoara and Eric from Nyinyime to reach the heart of this beautiful man.  You will be missed Do.  I’m sorry I wasn’t a better missionary.  I’m so glad you didn’t need me to be.  I’m so proud of you.  I will never take credit for the 30 plus villages among the Dagara that have received the gospel, as I know you would not have either.

I need to know that Do’s story means something to the Christian community outside of Dano.  Please tell me if his story has meant anything to you.  How many people have you met like him, willing to give everything for the kingdom?  Tell me what his accomplishments mean to you.  Come post comments on this blog and I promise I will write them down in Dagara and pass these messages on to his church and his family.

God's Surprises

I had a great day yesterday despite the fact that our washing machine overflowed twice.  The ironic thing is that I was trying to wash the towels that I had used to dry up the first wash-tastrophe.

But, like I said I had a great day, because I finally got the literacy materials I needed to take this literacy program to the next level.  We have been using the primers written by the local Bible translation and literacy organization, ANTBA.  But we bought all that they had, and it was only 100,  which we quickly used up in our pilot program that I started a couple of months ago.  So I ordered 1,000 of them and 1,000 of the reading supplements that go with them.  The cool thing about the reading supplements is that each reading is an actual translation of a scripture in Dagara, which means that the materials that were already together apply directly to our goal of getting churches able to read their Bibles.

It was kind of crazy how it happened.  I had been calling Stanislas, who works with ANTBA and lives in the capital city, Ouagadougou.  I had been trying to get an update on the status of these books for over a month now.  Anyway, on Wednesday, he told me that they had finished printing them.  I was amazed.  Then I asked him if he could try to send them on the bus.  He said he would try.  So, yesterday, he went to the bus station in the capital and checked in 21 boxes of books on the bus.  While I was making pizza, that evening, he called and said, you need to go to the bus station NOW! So I rushed down there only to find that they had no idea about ANY boxes for me (let alone 21) and the bus had already gone on to the next station.  I tried to call Stanislas and there was no answer.  I thought, "Great, now the books are halfway on their way to Gaoua and it's raining so they'll probably get dropped off at the station there and get water damage or something,"  but about an hour later Stanislas called me and told me that he had just talked to someone on the bus and the bus hadn't got there yet.  (Then I remembered, duh, that there are two night buses that come to Dano each day).  He also thought, however, that, just to make sure, I ought to just go down and park at the bus station.  So I headed down there leaving my pizza to get cold.  It was like divine timing.  I got there just as the bus pulled up and sure enough after a little bit of a wait at the 'baggage claim' (translation pushing and shoving mass of bodies frantically pulling stuff out of the bus before it pulls out of the station), they finally found my boxes underneath some bicycles and other luggage they had stuffed into the undercarriage of the bus.

You should have been there, although it probably would have felt awkward with my hugging you and dancing around like a whirling dervish.  I was so excited to finally have all these materials in hand.  I have been praying and hoping for this moment for months.  I was really grateful for that feeling I got of joy in the midst of breaking washing machines and interrupted pizza nights.  I really sensed God's hand in the process.  My getting there at that time meant that I was able to get all the boxes into storage just moments before the rain really picked up again.

Have you ever had a day that should have been awful where God did something unexpected that turned it all around?  Tell me about it.  I hope this story did your heart some good and I know it would do my heart some good to hear more stories like it from you.  If you didn't comment on my last blog post, you missed an interesting tangential conversation between my Dad and I about salt and light.  I wonder where God would lead our conversation today.  What has he done to surprise you?  Even if it was the other way around, like you thought your day was going to be a great day and God threw you a curve ball.  How have you sensed God's presence this week, month, year?

Raise Your Hand if You're Sure

I was unsure about what to post this week. I'm mostly working on the Dagara literacy teacher training guide, so I guess I could post a picture of me sitting in front of my computer, but who really wants to see that?

I guess the highlight of my missionary week would be speaking to about 180 leaders about the literacy program. They hadn't gathered for that purpose. They were there mostly to just elect new officers for their legal association and discuss plans to share the cost of getting a plot of land in Dano for the use of all the churches. But they gave me a guest speaking spot to talk about what I've been doing. With over 30 villages represented, I don't make it to all of them too often so many of them may not have known what I've really been doing. I used a rhetorical device that I intended to have an impact on them, but I think it had more of an impact on me.

I reminded them of the story of Jesus being tempted in the wilderness. I reminded them how each of his responses included the phrase "it is written." (See Matthew 4:1-11) How did he know it was written and where it was written? Forget the fact for a moment that He was divine and had originally inspired the text. I think part of the point of the story is that he was in a human body. He was really hungry after fasting for forty days. He had divine power but he didn't zap Satan or do anything like that. He just read his Bible, something even you or I could do. And he used it to defeat Satan. So here comes the dramatic moment. . . I asked everyone to raise their hand if they wanted to defeat Satan in their lives. This idea of defeating Satan is not a concept that seems as weird to them as it might to westerners. It is how they think. They wake up in the morning thinking about what spirits might try to mess with them today, etc. So I got the obvious response that I expected. All 180 hands shot up like fireworks. Then I asked them, "O.k. how many of you can read God's word by yourself?" A smattering of about 10 embarrassed hands slowly raised. It was so shocking that one of the leaders present repeated my question, because he was not sure that they really understood it (after 9 years, my accent can still be difficult for some to understand). But, no, that was basically it. What a visual aid! Now, I believe all those non-readers still have the mark of the Spirit in them having been baptized in Jesus name.  That's why you could still say  that they have "the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God" in their hands (Ephesians 6.10-17). But I hope that this visual aid inspired some of the few reading leaders to champion the cause of literacy in their churches.

What does the Bible mean to you? Can it help you to defeat evil in your day to day life? In your neighborhood? In your home?

Israel in 4 b.c. had no mass communication.

“If you’d come today, you could have reached the whole nation,

Israel in 4 b.c. had no mass communication.”

This is one of the criticisms of Jesus’ work in the film Jesus Christ Superstar (Watch the the song from the movie here).  Or, perhaps it’s just non-believers mocking the idea that he really was the incarnation of God since God would obviously want to take advantage of mass communication.  But believers know that’s not how God works.  He likes to call individuals that change the world (Augustine, St. Thomas, Martin Luther, Martin Luther King, Jr., Mother Theresa etc.)

And yet Christianity is the one world religion with the most adherents.  I believe that God prefers to work through humble available people over working through amazing mission and church growth strategies.  

I know that, but it’s so easy to forget.  So, I started this literacy program all wrong.  I chose strategically located churches wherein to start literacy courses.  The end result is that one of the three literacy courses has completely fallen on its face because there is no real teacher to take the class by the reigns.  Besides, there is no way in my original strategy to then take a literacy course to a church that doesn’t even have one reader.  So, God has now shown me once again that I need to concentrate on those who would champion the cause of literacy among the Dagara. 

This week I visited the Nawile class.  Two almost completely illiterate ladies were trying to review with each other the same lesson they had been going over for weeks.  Nobody else had shown.  Robert, the original teacher, abandoned the class from the beginning.  Then the poor kid that they put in charge of the class after Robert turned out to be a poor choice also bailed due to the pressure and possible backlash from Robert.  I told the ladies that they could do whatever they wanted, but that I was going to concentrate on developing a teacher training program.  I’m not going to go back to Nawile until I get that teacher training program in place.  I’m doing this because my belief has been renewed once again that God prefers working through humble available people to working through my ‘amazing’ mission strategy.  I told them not to feel bad, that it was my fault for not putting my energy where it should have been - in the development of literacy teachers.

So now, I’m refocussing on developing a literacy teacher training guide and then seeking those humble available people whom God may call to be literacy teachers.  Do you find that working with the right people is more important than the program you work?  Why do you think that is?  Seriously folks let’s get a discussion going.  I’ve never had one of those on my blog and I’d like to see what it’s like.