See Something More

I watched the line of people winding as they walked down the dirt path headed towards the small collection of water about two kilometers away where the baptisms were about to take place. It reminded me of Bible times, and I wondered if people used to walk like that to see Jesus.  "Are you going to walk or ride?" the other missionaries asked as they walked to the car. I looked back at the throng of people steadily marching in the other direction, their colorful clothes and head wraps, their sandals lifting the dirt, the children running alongside their mothers.  Despite the heat, the glaring sun, and the rugged terrain, I said, "I'm going to walk with them."  As I walked, I prayed. For the baptisms that were about to happen. For the people who would watch. For the faith of the believers to increase. For the curiosity of the unbelievers to increase. For the church to rise up as a light in their community of darkness. For Jesus to be made famous among the nations. ...

Life in Burkina Faso has taught me in general to slow down...until this past week.  Just when I was getting used to the slower pace of life, last week happened.  It could have possibly been the busiest week of my life. It reminded me of my fast paced life in college, where every hour of every day had an event or activity, except to complicate matters, every activity and event was in French.  I had six medical cases in Ouagadougou, and I spent every waking moment taking care of them. Figuring out directions to new clinics, arranging appointment times, explaining medical cases, planning care,  learning how the health care system works, and  paying bills. I wish you could see a map of my route - going in circles all around Ouagadougou as I visited medical clinics, hospitals, pharmacies, and diagnostic testing centers.  When I wasn't handling medical stuff, I dropped in to the In ternational Co-op of Ouagadougou (ICO) to teach missionary kids about the story of...

Bumping along the narrow dirt road that was sometimes only as wide as a bike path, I tried to prepare for what I thought I was going to see.  A few weeks ago, I had learned about a man in a nearby village who had two wives, and each wife gave birth to twins last year. We served the twins for one month in our program, providing them with milk and nutritional cereal and watching them grow. Then I learned that the father is sick and unable to work, which is why he can't provide for his family, especially his four new babies. So instead of just giving handouts, we decided to make a trip to the village, talk more with the family, and see how we could truly help.  I expected to pull up to a mud brick house and sit on a bench under a shade tree, having a nice conversation with the family while bouncing a twin on my knee.  Yet when Rebeca, Juliette, and I arrived, we came to where the church meets under a hangar, and found about sixty church members were there, participating in a...

I drew a small cloud in the sky on a page of his coloring book, and then I asked him to color the cloud. He picked up a brown crayon and put it to the paper, and I almost corrected him before I laughed to myself and thought, he's actually right!   For a child in Burkina Faso during the dry, hot, dusty season that we are in right now, the sky and the clouds are indeed quite brown.  My mom frequently compares the weather in our hometown to the weather in Burkina. She has them side by side on weather.com and often teases me with it. "It's 72 and sunny in Little Rock, and it says 102 dust in Ouagadougou!" I like how "dust" is an actual weather condition. You have sunny. You have cloudy. You have rainy. And you have dust. If you don't know what that means, come to Burkina.  Because the ground has been deprived of a good rain since last October, the dust picks up quick. The other day, we saw a gigantic dust tornado swirling around the neighborhood. We even sto...

He was the very first person I saw when we arrived to our house about six weeks ago after our furlough to the United States. He was waiting outside our gate when we pulled up in the dark, his smile glowing.  You might remember his story. We met him about a year ago. His family situation is a mess and he lives on the streets. His name is Bombakebe, which means "no problem".  Our first big question upon arriving back to Burkina Faso was, "What do we do about Bombakebe?"  It's funny. We never really came up with a plan. We just kept doing the next thing.  First we bought him so new clothes and personal hygiene supplies in the market. When he kept losing the stuff we bought, we gave him a trunk to keep on our property next door, and he could keep all his stuff inside. He sleeps over there and uses the faucet to wash his clothes and fill up his bucket to take a bath.  Next we told him he could raise some chickens if he would build them a fence and feed them every day...

There's a first time for everything, including playing bananagrams...in French! Which reminds me, I need to see if they actually make that game in French, because we need some letters with accents and a few more Qs.  We have four young ladies in our young scholars program that attend a special dormitory-like school where they study and sleep and live all in the same place. He guidelines are strict, and the girls aren't allowed to leave unless given special permission, which is why we don't get to see them that much. It's also why Suzanne and I choose to go see them every Saturday, a decision that we made not too long ago. Last Saturday, in fact.  I stuffed bananagrams and my Bible in my kavu sack (what else do you need?), and then went to their school where we spent two and a half hours attempting to explain and play bananagrams in French. Needless to say, the girls absolutely loved it. Meanwhile, we talked and laughed and helped each other make words.  Towards the end,...

One by one, we put babies on the scale and waited. Some cried big tears with arms outstretched, and so I pulled a little rubber frog out of my pocket to try to get them to smile. It worked once, but another time it just made the poor child cry harder. Some children were perfectly content to sit on the scale with big smiles on their faces as if to say, "Look at me! Look how much I've grown!"  "6 kilos, 78." Delphine called out, and I grabbed the pen and jotted down the date and 6.78 kg in the child's paperwork. Last month, he weighed 5.24 kg. I smiled and said to the child, "Bravo! You've grown a lot this month!" Of course the child didn't understand, but the grandmother did as she picked him off the scale and smiled at me. I really wanted to give her something to be proud about. She's done a lot, you know, taking in the child of her own child that died tragically. She doesn't have a whole lot of extra to make ends meet, but she has ...

I wonder what Jacob was thinking when he laid his head upon that rock and tried to go to sleep. I wonder if, instead of counting sheep, he started to count his mistakes.  He tricked his older brother into selling is birthright for a pot of stew.  He conspired with his mother to rob the same older brother of his father's blessing.  And now he's on the run away from home and the fierce anger of his brother.  Did he stare up at the night sky and wonder? I got the birthright and the blessing that I wanted, but why do I not feel the contentment I longed for?   He just wanted to be great. He just wanted to be blessed. He just wanted to see the promise fulfilled to his family: "All people of the earth will be blessed through you."  Yet what did he have to show for it? A rock for a pillow. Maybe he felt like he'd been cheated because he was a cheater.  But as he drifted off to sleep, counting his mistakes and wondering what the future held, he fell into a drea...