Time to break the radio silence. God's goodness continues. I must say that up to this point I feel that when writing the blog that I tend to lean more towards the happier side of things, and that we as humans tend to want to hear more about the happy things then the sad things. So today I am going to break from that mold.
The other week courtney and I were able to go with veronica and see where some of the kids from aurora school live. Most of these children live in what is called a shanty town (or squater camps). We went to visit one that was about five minutes from the school. Basically what a shanty town or squatter camp is is when someone comes and sets up residence on a piece of land and others follow. By law if the owner of the property doesn't get that person to leave within 24 hours then that squatter has a legal right to stay there and the owner of that property can no longer do anything about it. So usually once someone has set up "residence" then other people come and a squatter or shanty town is made.
There is usually no running water, trash disposal, and no electricity. The camp we went to had a water tower where a local farmer would bring water in once a week to fill up the water tower. As there is no running water people have outhouses, but because of the world cup the governemnt had put up porta potties in these camps. The government still comes in and once a week removes the waste from them but there is no way of knowing how much longer the government will continue to do this. So while the younger generations may have gotten rid of their outhouses, the older generations have not. Just like there is no running water they also don't have a way of getting trash removed, so they take their trash and dump it on the outskirts of the camp. So as we drove in there was a field of trash.
The houses that people live in are made up of playwood, sheet metal,and anything that they can find. Most houses had one or two rooms and the house we went into had a gas stove, that was run on what smelled like lighter fluid and they had a candle in the bedroom for at night. Basically if a fire were to start it would spread quickly from house to house as the houses are built right beside each other. We learned that the witch doctor had come back to the camp. They had gotten rid of him about a year ago but he returned. There is definitly spiritual warfare within these areas.
Petty thieft is big in these areas. The things that these kids at the school witness and deal with is insane. At the ages of five and six some kids know more about sex then people know about at the age of twenty. The abuse that happens in some of these areas ranges from drug and alcohol abuse to sexual, physical and verbal abuse. That is what some of these kids have to go back home to on the weekends. They don't all come from nice home lives, but go back to homes where they are going to be abused.
Visting that camp and seeing where some of these kids live and learning about the area and what happens there at times allowed us to see why some kids behave as they do. Life isn't easy for some of these kids. Even in those darkest places God is still there and for some of these kids they may be the only believer in their house or area. Its equiping those kids to be the light in the dark and to not be afraid to shine the light of God in those places.
It wasn't only the fact that we learned about these camps and saw the poverty that people lived in but we also learned about what is called a kangaroo court. This still goes on in some of the shantty towns around the area. After hearing this it also brought into perspective why some of the people here and children are so cold and shut off. In these areas there is a neighborhood council that basically is the judge and jury. When somone committs a crime they find them and bring them to the center of the town and everyone in that shantty town from babies to old people come and gather around for this "court". Here they find if the person convicted of the crime is innocent or guilty. If found guilty they will usually kill them on the spot and make everyone watch. Veronica was telling us how sometimes they force them to drink gasoline and then light them on fire. Hearing this disgusted me but allowed me to understand why some people are so numb and cold. I can't imagine growing up having to watch that, its no wonder people aren't trusting and why they build up walls. Yes, this may be the most industrialized country in africa but you don't have to go far to see that it is still africa and see the poverty and how the way of life is still rooted in village and tribal traditions.
We may not be working in a village in the dessert but it is still so evident just how much people here need the gospel. John 13:34 tells us to "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another." Just loving others as Christ has loved us. At times it can be so easy to judge and make assumptions of others when they aren't like us or from a different culture or area. But Christ loves us despite our imperfections and loves us unconditionally and He commands us to love others as He has loved us. At times it is so evident how some of these kids just need love and so we show them love and try to encourage them. Christ never said this life would be easy, and he uses suffering to grow us and bring us closer to him and uses us to turn us into the people he wants us to be.
A few prayer request: As we have entered the second half of our term I ask that you would continue to pray that we would be able to reach out to the people we work with and that God would continue to open doors that could lead to more conversation about Him and the love He has for them. Pray for the kids at the school, that they would come to know them. Pray for the teachers there and that they would continue to show them Christ in their words and actions, and pray that God would send more teachers to work with aurora school. They need more teachers and people to come and help. I also ask that you would pray not only for the continued physical protection of the students when they go home but also for spiritual protection from attacks from satan and that they wouldn't be afraid to be a light in the darkness and that God would just raise up leaders in these camps that wouldn't be afraid to proclaim His name and it would lead to more and more people in these camps coming to know the Lord.
I just want to add that the whole country is not like that, that is just one part of it. This is a very industrialized and is a well developed country and what was written was about one part of it, so please don't assume the whole country is like that, because it is not.
Thank you for your continued support and prayers.
