SNAKE.

Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. -Genesis 3:1

This morning I went into my tukel to get something and heard a scurrying noise that was coming from the top of the wall. I saw a lizard wiggle over to the window and then saw IT dangling from one of the beams in the ceiling.

I feel very strongly that killing IT needed to be a boy's job so I yelled for Davis and the commotion brought pretty much everyone else within shouting distance.

Edwin got an arrow and chased IT back out of whatever hole in the ceiling that IT had come in from so then they were able to get a shot at IT with a big stick and knock IT off the outside wall and onto the ground where the dogs could get to IT.

After the dogs and sticks got ahold of IT this is what was left. And yes, I am now freaked out about every little noise in my tukel and wondering if another one will drop on my head.

Like I said, killing IT is a job for boys. I just take pictures.

Seriously?

The second half of our stay in Kenya was for doctor appointments and re-stocking. I'm now on the right meds so my strep-throat madness is over. I can swallow again! One of the "fun" things we get to do every time is pack up everything we buy in Nairobi and get it ready for customs at the border. Yikes.

Note the lovely plastic drawers. Those would be for my clothes because the termites have attacked the wooden dresser I've been using. This has enabled lizards to get into my clothes. Nothing like finding termites and lizard poop on your tshirts!

We got home to Paringa on Saturday night with relatively few problems so thanks to those who prayed for our trip!

Today was the day we went to Kapoeta to find our language helper from the last two weeks in December. He had agreed to help us when we got back and lo and behold...he's left the country. In Kenya for school. So now we are back to square one with no language helper...again. Seriously? I could write a novel about how frustrating this whole situation has been but I will skip that (you're welcome) and just ask you all to pray even more earnestly and diligently for us as we try to learn the Toposa language to be more effective in communicating the good news of Jesus.

I leave you with this: one of the monitor lizards that the dogs caught the other day. Betcha don't have one of these in your backyard!

HAPPY New Year

So many things have happened in the past 2 and a half weeks that there's no way a blog post can handle all the details. Here are the highlights:

-The day before we left for Nairobi, Alyssa and I had the best story group ever in one of the nearby villages. We listened to the story of the calling of Peter, James and John to be followers of Jesus and fishers of men (Luke 5:1-11) on the Proclaimer, then discussed the story substituting more Toposa-friendly things like gardens for boats and sorghum for fish. Some key spiritual leaders were listening to the story and had some really good questions afterwards. "We've heard we can only sin 70 times and then we die, is this true? What exactly is a sin? If someone comes and steals my cattle and I kill him in order to get my cattle back, is that a sin? Why did Jesus mix good and bad people together? How could Jesus never sin if his mother Mary had sinned? Why did God make man separate from Him?" Whew! We have lots of work to do when we get back on Saturday.

-We are currently in Nairobi because last week we had a company meeting for all the career missionaries who have been in Africa 3 years or less. Alyssa and I, along with three other Journeygirls and a team of volunteers from the US, helped with childcare for those who were attending the meeting. Shout out to Edwards Road Baptist Church for raising money to bring each of us care packages from the US. They blessed me so much!

-The day the meeting ended we went to visit Benton at his boarding school. Rift Valley Academy has some of the best views in all of Africa and I don't feel too sorry for Benton having to look at that scenery every day.

-Later that night we got to go to the airport to pick up our newest addition to the Toposa team, Jonathan and Holly! WOOHOO!!!! They will live about an hour and a half from us but it is awesome to have them so close. Currently we are all boosting the Kenyan economy by stocking up on food, toilet paper, and other necessities that we can't get in South Sudan.

-We got haircuts for the first time since September! You know the epic hair wash/massage you get when you get a haircut at a salon? Yeah, that was wonderful. And we had our curly hair straightened for the first time in months!

Thank you to those who have been praying for the Toposa people. Some specific things to pray for this week are:

-Safe and smooth travel back to South Sudan for all of us. We are bringing back a LOT of stuff since we won't be out again until after Easter, and Jonathan and Holly are setting up their house. The customs process is never consistent but always ridiculous so please pray that we can get everyone and everything to where it needs to go!

-School starts next week. Davis is in 4th grade and Walker is in pre-k. Pray that Alyssa and I will be able to teach the boys in a fun and creative way that helps them learn.

-There are lots of opportunities for sharing about the gospel of Jesus with the Toposa. Please pray that God would lead us to specific people in specific villages who are open to hearing the Truth.

Christmas in Toposaland

The most important part of today was this group that met under a big tree here in Paringa. A few of the believers from nearby villages led the singing and the discussion after hearing the story from God's Word (Luke 1-2).

 She's got her fancy safety pin/bead hair for Christmas...

 ...and the answer is YES, that is a bra on the top of her head. Fabulous!

Note the Western clothes on a lot of the guys. The Toposa were told many years ago (and not by us) that they need to have new clothes to wear to Mass on Christmas. Most have a long way to go before they will understand that God sent Jesus for the Toposa just as they are, and He cares about their hearts, not their clothes.

Before we did the main celebration, we had a US Christmas at the Lewis house. We started cooking pancakes at 6am so that the boys could come out of their room at 6:30. They didn't want to sleep in, weird....

My gifts were a necklace, ornaments, and notebook from Uganda, a bottle of gold Heinz ketchup, dried fruit and a pumpkin from Carrie's garden.

Christmas Eve Part 2

Since there are three "units" (me, Alyssa and the Lewises) that are now one Toposa Team family, we tried to incorporate a Christmas tradition that each one of us did in the US. My family's tradition is pizza on Christmas Eve and Alyssa's family does a birthday cake for Jesus so we had both last night!

I may have had 4 pieces. Oops...

There are 7 different colors of sprinkles for the birthday cake and each color represents an attribute of Jesus (green for creator, yellow for light of the world, etc). We would read about the attribute, read a Bible verse that describes it, and then each person would get to sprinkle their color on the cake. My color was brown: Jesus is the servant of all.

I believe I've mentioned before that the Lewises' house gets extremely hot when you add the ovens cooking to the Sudanese heat. Don't judge the sweat.

Missing a few letters, but you get the point!

Christmas Eve Part 1

These activities really have nothing to do with Christmas, but since they happened today (Christmas Eve) I am considering them part of the festivities. Benton, Davis and Alyssa made one of those plaster garden decoration pieces where you mix the plaster and water together, pour it in a mold, and then put decorative beads and stones on it.

Davis is 9 and Benton just turned 12 on Thursday. They are awesome. Who needs pest control when you have two capable Toposa boys who love to kill the rats and bats that live in your shower area?

 The boys did a great job!

Here comes Sgt. Walker, age 4

He was sneaking around the corner to scare "Alytha"

Got her!

Poor Davis was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

God isn't Gandalf and Jesus didn't surf

You know how in the western church, especially in the US, there seems to be an occasional push to remind ourselves that God isn’t a prayer vending machine who resembles Gandalf, and how Jesus isn’t a white guy with long flowing surfer hair but actually was born in the Middle East? Okay, so take that sense of redefinition and multiply it by as many times as you can. That’s what’s happening out here. 

I’m reading the Bible through chronologically and it’s been a really helpful way to see how the Bible is ONE story, not a bunch of stories that God thought were important enough to group together. The reading plan I’m doing is a one-year plan. Last week I finished Genesis (with some chapters from Psalms and John 1 on a few days), currently I am reading Job, then in January I'll move to Exodus and so on. 

South Sudan is so, so, so underdeveloped. In fact, minus our compound with its solar panels and two vehicles, the area where we are is literally about as developed as Old Testament times. It’s hard to imagine, especially with all of the globalization and development in other parts of the "developing world", that some places still live out all the stereotypes in a National Geographic documentary. I’ve met less than five Toposa adults who can read. Some of the kids can read a little bit because they are in primary school. Everything we do is oral, so I have to read Bible stories a little bit differently when I’m preparing for a story group. This week we’ve been telling Luke 2 in preparation for Christmas. The emphases are in MUCH different places than what I’m used to. We’ve been talking about how Jesus was born on the earth just like a Toposa. In the US I learned how shocking the birth circumstances were: Jesus was born in a barn with the animals. There wasn’t even room inside anyone’s home or hotel and how dare the earth receive its king like that? Well, the Toposa know all about being born outside among the bulls and goats because that’s how all the women give birth. There isn’t a concept of what an “inn” is out here so of course visitors to villages just sleep on the ground with everyone else. The new perception of God from Luke 2 is that He came not in a shocking way but in a very ordinary way to show that from the very beginning He made all the effort to show that He is really Emmanuel…God WITH us. The Christmas story is just as applicable in Toposaland as it is in Dallas or Lubbock. I mean, duh I already knew that in my head, but now I’m really experiencing it. Two different things.

One really neat thing that is also extremely annoying to my type-A Western personality is that the really good conversations about God’s Word seem to happen when I don’t plan them. It’s frustrating to go to all of the trouble to continually remind people “hey, we’ll be coming back every Wednesday afternoon to listen to a story from God’s Word,” or “all of the women are invited to come to our compound tomorrow at 3 to sing and talk about a story from God’s Word,” and everyone says they will be there or they will come, and then like two people (or no people) show up. Then we could just walk into a village completely unannounced and there will be like 20 people that come over to sit and listen and all of them ask good questions about the story. God’s schedule is soooo not my schedule. That’s okay, just not a concept that I easily embrace. As I’m learning more and more, I am so NOT in control of anything out here.