fallen

We went to the village again at the beginning of the week. The good news is it had rained a good rain and I was able to help with weeding our peanuts. The bad news, is, well, when we first got there our friend informed us that his two cousins who are also former child soldiers, had along with their uncle, raped a young girl of 13 years. They were most likely high and/or drunk. They've since ran and no one knows where they are. If they show themselves again they will be arrested. The girl was tested and found to be HIV+. Whether or not she was before that they don't know, but if they catch the men and any of them is HIV+ then it's a capital offense, or at least life in prison, because giving someone HIV is charged as murder, rather than the 18 years they would otherwise be sentenced to. It's so disappointing to me. We had taken those guys to Father Heart, we had talked with them, prayed with them, but it seemed nothing was releasing them from the grip that marijuana and alcohol had on them. If they had never been captured and taken as child soldiers for 3 years, maybe this would never have happened. But the uncle was never taken to the bush, and it was their father who introduced them to marijuana at a young age, so maybe it still would have happened. Either way, it makes me feel bad. This one mistake has changed the course of their lives. And now, as I begin spending more time in this village with Ruudy, I was hoping he would be able to reach these young men in a way that I was never able to. And now it's too late. They can't come back or they'll be in prison for life.
And then another one of my friends in the village seems to be thinking of taking a second woman, even though he has one child and another on the way, and he's a christian. The way satan can deceive us and we become so blinded that we don't see the way he has come only to steal, kill and destroy. Somehow he makes it look so attractive, so appealing, until you take the first bite and realize...and by then it's too late. Thank you Lord for redemption, for grace, for being slow to anger and abounding in love. Help my friends, heal their deepest wounds that they try to heal with temporary bandages, like money, drugs, and women. Oh Lord, only You. How we need you, so desperately need you, no matter how much we realize it or not. Minister to the depths of our hearts. Help us to recognize the schemes of the evil one and not be blinded by them, but thwart them.

wanderings/wonderings

I guess I have to stop waiting for stand-out stories and just begin telling it as it is. Ruudy and I just came back from the village in Morungatuny today. Francis and I had done several community assessments before as I described on a previous post (I'd put the link here if I knew how) and so we let Ruudy try it out this time. As he was sitting there asking questions in Ateso, I let my mind begin to wander a bit. As I carefully studied the women and children who sat before us, I tried to put myself in their shoes or lack there of actually. There were two women who were around 40 years somewhere, then there was an especially old lady sitting behind a ways, then there were some of these ladies' daughters with their own children. I looked at their arms, as thick as a man's. Speaking of men, where were they? hmm...anyway, back to the arms, strengthened over years of lugging water from the well, collecting firewood, planting food, weeding, harvesting food, and carrying food to the weekly market. I then looked around at the trees, and the rest of the landscape thinking, this is all they know. They rarely leave their village, there is no electricity, no running water, no how-to manuel, village living for dummies...not there... how do you dream of something you don't even know exists? How can I say I want to be a chiropractor when I grow up when I don't even know that such a thing is even a possibility? and is it even a possibility? The chances for a girl in this village to even finish grade school is so low, then if she can make it in to secondary, will she be able to complete? And if she does complete, is she really equipped enough to think about university in the big city? And if by the grace of God she finishes university, will she really find a job?
Sitting there amongst the ladies and the huts, I began to really wonder how they manage life, and what is life for them? Do they have a longing to go out and see the world, or because they don't know what's out there, there's no desire. Do they think that the rest of the world is just like their place? And where the heck do these white folk come from and why? And somehow without an Iphone, an Ipod, or an Ipad, these ladies are able to survive.  Are they any worse than anyone else? Any better? I guess they are who they are, and so am I. This blog has no ending, it just keeps asking questions? What questions do you have?