Congo I

July 20, 2007

After a long trip I’ve arrived in the DRC. The trip started on an interesting note. Literally. When I was checking my luggage in at Sea-Tac I had problems getting it sent straight through to Kinshasa. During the 20 minutes of delay one of the employees asked where I was headed and when I said Kinshasa his eyes lit up. He had grown up there. Before I left the counter (with my bags checked through) he had written me a note and given me a school to visit if possible. Small world.

The trip itself was fairly uneventful, at least for me, however it was getting old by the time 24 hours of traveling had rolled around and we were over North Africa. Finally, we began our descent into Kinshasa and as we did I found my excitement rising. I pondered that for a bit as it caught me off-guard to feel like a kid on Christmas morning. I almost felt elated. Then I had a new experience. Once we touched down people began to applaud. I half-expected the pilot to come out and take a bow! But then I found out today that an Air-bus had crashed in Brazil yesterday, so I wonder if the people knew about that and thus were relieved to have arrived safely.

When we arrived we were met by several men from the church here and they had the challenge of transporting bags for seventeen people, plus additional boxes of supplies, on top of getting all of us into vehicles. A task that they accomplished nicely. It was a bit cozy in the Nissan Pathfinder I rode in with four of us in the back seat, but we made it to where we are staying. Then to our pleasant surprise we found out that we would have hot showers and air conditioning in our rooms! With only a sheet for a bedcover it’s really no surprise that I woke up shivering at 5:00 a.m. this morning, but how ironic can it get? Tonight we will try the ceiling fan alone and see if that helps.

After breakfast this morning we waited for a vehicle to pick us up and take us on a tour of the churches in this city of ten million. But, as is the African way, it took “a little” longer for the bus to get here and we only got to two of the five churches. The first church, Meluku, was about a ninety minute drive out into the country. They are a church plant which is about four years old and they have grown to around 100 people. When we arrived we found perhaps 20 adults (and probably 30 children) who had been waiting since 8:00 a.m. for us, and we did not arrive until nearly 1:00 p.m. They do not have a building but have erected a rudimentary shelter using tree limbs for poles and attaching rope as a frame for the roof. They attached some tarps as the roof and put some benches underneath and that is where they gather.

They have planted Manioch (a.k.a. Casaba in South America) which they harvest for the root (kind of like potatoes) and the leaves from which they get a dish similar to spinach. The purpose is to sell the produce to raise money for ministry, but they have no machetes or other tools to cut the plants to propagate their crop (although that need may have been met today).

They did ask us to pray for them. When they began, an individual gave the church about 3 acres of land, but a government requirement here is that they do something with it within five years or they lose it. So they hope to erect a building and once they have a building started, the government will leave them alone. They have one year left to do this and they figure it will cost them $3,500 for an adequate building, of which they have saved $500. Once they get the building done they also hope to build a clinic and school along with a house for the pastor on the property. So do pray for them and that need. I took some video on my camera and hope to get that posted soon.

Tomorrow we fly north to Gemena, a city of 150,000 (estimated) without any services (such as power and water/sewer). It is here that the major pastors conference will take place.

Keep praying!

Nils