Springing Forward

There is something about spring time for us. Fall, winter and summer seem to plod along at a manageable pace. There are periods of manic feeling activity at times, but they are the exception and certainly not the rule. For the most part they keep to their routines and schedules. Then spring comes and it's as though for every burgeoning bloom there is a very important activity going on that must be handled now. Past springs have seen us busy about adoption home studies, major scale home remodeling projects, preparations for intricate Easter productions, significant school events. All cropping up right around March. I've taken to calling this phenomenon March Madness.

March 2010 has certainly followed suit. Here is some of what we've been busy about.

1. Our African visitor:

this is Gabriel Kisanga. He lives in Kinshasa, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. When we started our church we knew that we wanted missions to be a big part of it, so before we had a building, we were praying that God would send us a missionary to support. Before we had any money to support them with, we were praying that God would send us a missionary to support. God laid Africa on our hearts, and we got in touch with the Acts 29 director of Africa, whose name is JD. When we were asking JD who might be in need of some support for their kingdom work on the continent of Africa, he didn't hesitate a bit before naming Gabriel. In JD's words, Gabriel was "legit." He told us Gabriel was a church planter in the Congo who had been doing it for years...long before Acts 29 was in Africa, long before Acts 29 existed in fact.

It just so happens that in March of 2008, when Jeff and I went to A29 Bootcamp in Seattle, Gabriel was there too. We had hopes and made plans to take him to dinner to talk to him about his ministry, but due to some scheduling glitches we had to settle for giving him a ride to his next event and a 40 minute conversation in the car. Still, though we weren't able to find out all about his ministry, we were impressed.

We went home to pray about supporting Gabriel and did some more research on the Congo. We were surprised to learn that over 68 million people call the DRC home...making it the 4th largest nation in Africa. Because of it's strategic and central location in Africa, as well as its substantial natural resources, it has a history of being the nation oft coveted by war lords and power hungry politicians...so it has a bloody history, hosting the deadliest war since WWII. We learned that Kinshasa, Gabriel's home town, has been listed as the single most dangerous city for a woman to live on the plant. We learned that when the perpetrators of the Rwandan genocide were driven out of Rwanda, they moved to the Congo...which was good news for the Rwandans, bad news for the Congolese. Clearly this place needed the Gospel. Our hearts grew more and more burdened as we learned and prayed and spoke with Gabriel and JD, and not long after our church voted to begin supporting Gabriel with our whopping $150 a month missions budget. We knew it wasn't much, but we were so excited to get involved in what Gabriel was doing, and we figured what we lacked in financial support we could make up in prayer support.

Still, though, we longed to do more. Jeff and I grew up in churches where "the missionaries" weren't just some faceless group of strangers that checks were written to each month...they were people we knew and loved. They stayed in our homes and told stories of their culture and how God was working, and everyone got a burden for what God was up to in other areas. When Gabriel told us he might be coming to San Diego for a conference, we just knew we had to get him up here. We may not be able to afford air fare from Africa at this point, but we could afford air fare from San Diego.

Over meals together and prayer times together and Bible studies together we got to hear of all that God is using Gabriel to do. He currently has 7 churches that he has planted. Yeah. Seven urban, growing churches. Just in case that wasn't enough of an impact, he has recently begun his second seminary to train pastors. This, of course, is in addition to his five children, and various orphans who he cares for in his home. We were amazed to learn that because of the Gospel he has fallen out of favor with his family. In the Congo, one hopes to be able to send ONE of their children to university...so parents typically pick the child that has the most potential to send...with the understanding that once that son was established in his career he would care for his parents and siblings financially. So Gabriel's decision to leave his established career as a civil engineer in order to go to seminary in Paris was not met warmly, and much less his decision to return to start churches in the Congo. In the mind of the Congolese, if someone in the family gets the opportunity to travel to Europe or the USA, they should stay, earn money, and eventually send for the rest of the family so they can have a better life.

When Gabriel gave up a good paying job in engineering, then went to seminary, he was frowned upon. When he decided to come back to the Congo instead of staying in Europe or America, he was all but renounced. At first it was just his parents and siblings taking this view, but he shared with us that his eldest son, who is in his early 20's has been harboring resentment at his father's decision to be poor and remain in the Congo rather than taking his family to the states where his children could get a good education and make a comfortable living for themselves.

Yet he spoke with excitement about all that God was doing in his country. About all the young pastors that are being trained in the seminaries, who will then go out to plant more churches that will take the Gospel to his fellow Congolese. He spoke of some of these young pastors walking for miles to the next village to copy some passage of Scripture (because they didn't have Bibles in their language) which they would take back to their village and preach on for about 6-8 weeks before making the next journey for a new passage. He told us the astronomical prices that are paid in his country for even basic things, and how several of his seminary students go for weeks at a time with no income. We learned from another A29 pastor that Gabriel typically eats only once a day because funds are low. But far from complaining, we saw this rock solid faith that God was going to provide for their needs, and an excitement about what the future would be.

It was inspiring. It was an amazing gift for all the people of our church to get to meet him and break bread (or goat) with him and catch the burden for someone who only a week before was only a name they'd heard at church. Suddenly he was a real person with a real family who was their friend. Most churches our size could never bring in a missionary from that far away...we were so thankful for the opportunity God gave us.

2. Operation make-a-church. It's this really cool thing where you find a building that was once an auto shop, an herb shop, and a random office suite and turn them into a church. The very long process of finding a suitable building that we could afford to use culminated last month when we signed the lease on a building. Then began the fun stuff...like taking down the giant garage door and replacing it with regular human-sized doors...

and creating fun kid spaces...

...and general clean-up/drywall/stage-building/sound-booth creating activities. We're not finished yet, thankfully there's still some March to go.

3. A project called "sure, it may be EASIER to get your produce at the store...but what fun is that?" We're planning our very first garden.

Seeds have been started indoors (basil, peppers and tomatoes) and we even have some cute little baby sprouts poking up out of the dirt. Our raised beds are built and expectantly waiting for the arrival of soil and seed. It has been a fun so far. What we lack in knowledge or experience we make up for in ignorance and enthusiasm...so we'll see how it goes. Silas likes that there is dirt involved. Alex likes that there is record keeping involved. I like that there is food involved.

You can expect to hear far more about our gardening expedition than you probably care to. Just giving you fair warning.

4. Three funerals and a school porch...

God sometimes has very interesting answers to prayer. For the past few months Jeff and our elders at Culdesac have been praying that God would give them opportunities to share the Gospel in that very needy community. We were expecting the answers to come through packed Easter services, or maybe even a well attended VBS this summer. But so far it's just been through people dropping off. Three people (who we didn't know) passed away in the Culdesac community so far this month, and being the only church in town means you get to do all the marryin' and buryin'. So throughout the services Jeff has performed, we estimate about 100-200 previously unknown citizens of Culdesac have been confronted with mortality and then given a Gospel presentation. It will be interesting to to see what fruit comes out of God's word going out.

The school porch is the never-ending volunteer project that Jeff signed up for back in the days of only having one job. It's taken a while, but it has picked up speed in the past few weeks.

So...if you've seen my frenetic facebook status updates about busy-ness or disappearing weekends...these are the sorts of things I've meant. All good things...but all happening, when else, but in March.