A Tale of Two Journeys: Vignettes of the Church around the World

I’m in Kigali, Rwanda as I write this blog. My grandson Aren is working on a writing assignment for school, an imaginary journey down the Nile 3000 years ago. Writing can sometimes be a struggle, whether you’re 12 or 63, so I offered to accompany Aren. I’m on the couch and he’s across from me in an oversized stuffed chair. We’ve both got our spiral notebooks open on our laps. (Yes, we’re actually writing on paper with pens!) The fact that we are struggling together with the hard task of writing seems to be encouraging us both. Out of the corner of my eye, I see his pen finally moving. He’s smiling as he writes.

We’re both writing travel logs. But while Aren is stoking his imagination to bring forth the word pictures, I’m reaching into memory.

Short term memory, actually. For the past two months Hal and I have wended our way among four continents. We’ve experienced the church, the body of Christ, in very different contexts and worshipped in five languages. Vignettes of beauty and strength swim through my brain. I need to look at these and process them. Sometimes writing is the best way to do this.

--I recall a classroom in Paraguay where I found myself, a Quaker, leading a seminar of doctoral students from ten Latin American countries, representing six denominations, from Presbyterian to Pentecostal. The topic was spirituality and mission, and the students agreed to present the best of their own traditions, carefully listen to each other and the Holy Spirit, and be open to growth and change. I am encouraged by the vision of a robust, vital Christian spirituality that is currently coming out of Latin America, a spirituality that integrates personal intimacy with God, with authentic community, and active participation in God’s wider purposes in the social context surrounding the church. We North Americans have much to learn from our brothers and sisters in Latin America.

--I’m picturing the small Mennonite congregation a few of us worshipped in on Sunday in Asuncion. One of my students pastors the church, along with his fulltime job in a local radio station and the challenge of doctoral studies. The congregation had been praying for us every day during our seminars, and now they welcomed us as brothers and sisters, genuinely full of joy at hosting us. As we shared a meal after the service, the words hospitality and generosity came to mind. I knew I was with family.

--After two weeks in Asuncion, Hal and I flew to Santa Cruz, Bolivia and another five weeks of classes in the Bolivian Evangelical University. I taught another class on spirituality and mission, but this time with a focus on a context of suffering and persecution. This proved appropriate. During those weeks, socio-political conditions in the country reached a crisis point, and civil war seemed almost inevitable. As a class we explored the meaning of intimacy with God and participation in God’s mission under such conditions. Concepts that surfaced from the readings, discussions and activities included a strong affirmation of God’s sovereignty, the need for Christian unity across denominational and racial lines, the importance of intercession and wise and informed spiritual warfare, and the need for total surrender to whatever work God wants to do in us and through us. We reflected on the role of suffering in spirituality and mission.

In the middle of the course, we learned of the death of an evangelical pastor in the north of Bolivia who was invited to mediate between warring factions. As he literally stepped out between the two groups as a peacemaker, he was shot and killed. His family used the media to publically forgive the killer and ask that vengeance not be taken. Each morning during the last week of the class, some 300 pastors and Christian leaders gathered in one of the central plazas of Santa Cruz to pray for the peace of the country. We left Bolivia, both reluctant at “abandoning” our friends in such uncertainty and also, I admit it, relieved at leaving the tensions and violence behind.

At this point I pause in my remembering. I’ve been watching Aren as I write, noting that he has been totally absorbed in whatever tale he is spinning. Now he wants to read out loud the section he has just written. His hero has just fled the catacombs of a city called Beni Hassad in ancient Egypt. Interestingly enough, it was timed to match my “escape” from Bolivia. We congratulate each other on our accomplishments, and he decides he’s done enough for one sitting. Time to play! I keep writing.

--Due to the cancellation of all American Airlines flights to and from Bolivia, we had to find an alternative way to continue our journey to Rwanda. We managed to find a local flight to Buenos Aires, where we made our way to one of the oldest Protestant seminaries in the country, dating from sometime in the late 1800s. The large brick ivy-covered building gave the impression of age and stability. Guest accommodations were spartan but clean, and we imagined ourselves in a Protestant monastery for the next four days. We especially noticed the quiet, even though traffic was heavy on this residential street. Perhaps it was the contrast with Bolivia. We used the time to walk around Buenos Aires and to meet with some of our students and colleagues who live here.

On Sunday in Buenos Aires, we worshipped in a small but growing new Presbyterian church-plant in a working class barrio. Many of the people there were new Christians. One of our ministry colleagues pastors the church, and his son, our student, preached an excellent sermon from one of Jesus’ parables, with applications on how we live out kingdom values of justice and grace in our everyday jobs. Both during the service and in the shared meal afterwards, I was impressed by the desire of these believers to make a difference in their barrio. It was a taxi driver from the congregation who drove us to the airport the next day for the next leg of our long journey.

--Now finally we’re in Kigali, where our focus is family. This also is ministry, a joyful form of ministry, where we give and receive. It’s good to listen and learn from our son and daughter-in-law, to understand how God is leading them in ministry alongside leaders from the Rwandan Friends Church. And of course, it’s very good to spend time with our four grandkids, to participate in their school, to read together in the evenings, and even to struggle together as writers.

I love worshipping among African Friends. While I’m used to exuberant celebration with Latin American Christians, Quakers included, the flavor is different here in Africa. Something about the drums, the rhythms, the swaying bodies, the bright colors of the women’s clothing, the sincerity of expression, and the sheer volume of the singing combines to provide a type of full-body worship, the senses working as servants as we draw near to God and lift him up. After the hour and a half of singing, our son David quietly translated the pastor’s sermon. The little black girl sitting next to me and playing with my hands was only a minor distraction. Later I found out that she was the daughter of Geoffrey and Odette, a couple I had met on a previous trip, part of David’s small discipleship group in a poor neighborhood. They had inspired me at that time with their heroic efforts to survive Aids, raise their family, earn a living (Odette is a basket weaver) and testify to their neighbors of Christ’s love.

After the church service David took me over to talk with Odette. She seemed pleased and surprised that I remembered her and still knew her name. I do remember her, as I remember so many of the brothers and sisters God has allowed me to know and love in different parts of the world.

--Even as I am still in the middle of my trip, I am in contact with my home church in Oregon, where I have recently been named an elder. Through the wonder of the Internet, I am reading minutes of the various meetings, contributing from time to time, and participating in this congregation’s efforts to deepen in its life with God and its role in the local social context. One of the highlights of any trip is coming home and once again worshipping at North Valley Friends Church.

As I bring all these multicultural experiences together in memory, what stands out is the beauty of God’s church. With all the variety and styles, with all the distinct contexts and languages, in places of peace and in places of violence, whether old congregations or new church-plants, in poverty and in prosperity, and coming from so many theological traditions, we are one and we are family. I am reminded of a diamond, with many facets, each reflecting the light from a slightly different angle. We need all the facets. But it’s the whole that is so beautiful.

A day has passed since I started my travel log. Aren has yet to complete his imaginary journey; his hero needs another day floating down the Nile to get to Thebes, his final destination. I’m in the middle of my journey, too. It’s been good to reflect on the trip, enjoy the scenery, and to realize that the reality of what God is doing and will do in and through his church goes far beyond imagination.

We are the people of God.