Singing Streams...

I find it extremely incredible that my first "official lecture" about my experiences in Egypt was in front of 30 village high schoolers from Togo, some of whom still have doubts about the existence of America, let alone Egypt. Christmas came and went fairly quickly, I celebrated Christmas the "African way," which involves lots of visiting and constant eating. We had our family Christmas on Boxing Day, during which all of us kids watched in incredulous cynicism how many gifts were loaded upon us, knowing that we could never tell our African neighbors about the traditional way of celebrating American Christmas. My cynicism has been overbearing at times, but I've also found a lot of comfort in continuing to ask questions and continuing to question God's reality. After all, I am sure that God is still working, despite the cultural insensitivity and social awareness. The day after Christmas, the school in the compound here began to host a nation-wide youth camp (think American youth rally made African--terrible loud music, Bible jeopardy, and hour long lectures). Now, I'll have you know, I'm extremely sick of not understanding people. Of having everything be translated. My goal going into this semester was to listen, and the complexities of such a goal are becoming to be more relevant, especially because most of the village kids don't even speak French. Anyway, I went through some identity crises these last couple of days. The theme of the camp was: Global Christianity--between the traditional world and the modern world. Very relevant to the questions that had been raging in my mind. Then last night I was informed that I was going to be speaking at the camp about the global church and my experiences in Egypt. Now, this would normally be ok, but last night I was also struck by the same flipping infection that hit the night before we left. That's right, the eye pain was back. Now, I couldn't help but think about Abbie and Dena and Susannah and everyone who sat by me and did everything they could to make me feel better that night and I got Egypt-sick. In getting Egypt-sick, however, I was also able to remember how completely dependent on God I was during the entire semester. Thus, I walked up onto the stage thingy this morning having prepared nothing, standing in front of a bunch of kids who are so different then me, who's Christianity is so different then any I'd ever seen before. I just thought I'd share with you the sum of my talk this morning:

It may be that when we no longer know what to do
we have come to our real work
and when we no longer know where to go
we have come to our true journey
the mind that is not baffled
is not employed
the impeded stream is the one that sing


wendell berry

I don't know about you guys, but I don't know much anymore. I don't really know what I'm doing with my life, I don't really know what truth is, I don't really know where I'm going even...but I think this is OK. Who I do know is Jesus and I think that this semester, he made us sing.

Anyway, that's the latest from Togo. My eyes are feeling better, ilhamdu-lilleh, and I'm heading home in a week! Hope everyone's doing well and I can't wait to see some of you soon!