Lately, it just seems all too much . . . and I’m not just talking about the news, where bloodied victims are paraded before us daily, where parents mourn the loss of their children and war atrocies become commonplace.

It’s in the lives of people we know . . . .struggling with terminal disease, losing their darling loved ones, struggling to pay the bills through escalating cost of living. People don’t do what they should, making us frustrated. People are mean to each other, making us angry. People are, well, people.

Sometimes my heart just can’t take it anymore . . . the kids suggest a movie with a sad story and I say no, because the real life sadness is plenty, spilling over. COVID makes the rounds again, making everything harder and everyone more tired.

In the midst of all this, the small victories sometimes seem very small. I am old enough now to know that God rarely just fixes things. We live in this reality of sin and death, clinging to the hope that only He can give. Don’t you just wish for a break? For a day when the badness stops and the goodness is all around us? Spiritually, this is already true, but with our human eyes it is hard to see.

I think I’m supposed to wrap up with a blog entry with an “and this is how it all got fixed” tale or a spiritual observation that smoothes it all over. But nope. Not this time. Instead, I sit with you in your sadness, feel it with you, and you can feel it in my heart as well. We are dearly loved, as we sit among the ashes, and not forgotten. You are not forgotten. – Cami

Although crime exists everywhere, there are places where there is just more.  Likely those are places were there are a lot of impoverished people with few opportunities and Mozambique certainly qualified.  Burglar bars, multiple locks, guard dogs and hired watchmen were all a part of our normal life.

One night, though, had a weird twist to it.

We woke near midnight to the sound of our guard speaking to us urgently through our bedroom window:  “Boss!  There’s someone on the roof!” We leapt up and dressed, and came out the locked (with burglar bars) back veranda.  He pointed, but of course we couldn’t see anything.

However, we could hear him walking around.  He’d put himself in quite a spot.  Our backyard had high walls with broken glass on top, but even if he could manage to get over the wall, our big dogs would have him before he could reach it.  He had come over the front, but that way was now blocked by our guard with a machete.

Kevin called the neighbor on his cell phone, and he came through the front gate, chuckling at the thief’s predicament.  Kevin went out and met him, and they gazed up at the guy on the roof, crouched in uncertainly.  Every once in a while they’d urge him to come down and be caught, but there was no way he was doing it.

I sat around in the veranda, wondering what the heck I was supposed to do.  There was no police to call (they didn’t have transport), nothing to be done but try to watch for a person dropping from the roof.  I walked out to the living room and switched on the lights and to my horror discovered a large handprint on the doorjamb of the front door.  He’d managed to pry the door partly open before the bar at the bottom stopped him and he decided to go over the top.  That image is still seared in my brain.

It ended rather anticlimactically. Eventually he took a flying leap onto the front lower wall and after a merry chase, got away.  No one ever tried again though – I guess word got around. 

One of our most beautiful, and funniest, moments, came in the last week when we were preparing to leave Mozambique after 8 years of work.  Kevin worked closely with a group of 8 men for all of that time (and we cannot say enough about their dedication which continues to this day!) as well as a small group of young men in the last couple of years. 

In Mozambique, there are lots of babies, and the mothers wisely carry them around in slings which mostly keep baby in front and often on the hip.  So much more practical, to my mind, than the babies strapped on backs!  With the sling, the baby has access to its food source, mother’s breast, and this is incredibly important in a place where diarrhea and malaria carry off 50% of children before age five.   In most households, it would be too hard to keep bottles clean and the cost of formula is simply unattainable.

Hence, mom literally keeps that child alive and brings the baby simply everywhere.  Babies are not allowed to cry, and the “walking pacifier” keeps them happy whenever they fuss.

Anyway, we were deep in the middle of a moving church service in the week before we left Mozambique permanently to move to Namibia.  Some of the men who had worked with Kevin got up to speak, and one of them in particular caught our attention.

“Kevin, you are our boob”, he intoned with deep feeling.  In that culture, it meant exactly what it meant in the Bible – he gave nourishment to grow the baby believer to maturity.  It was a perfectly appropriate allegory and no one in the congregation batted an eye.  To our American ears, however, it was totally hilarious.  It was all we could do to hold ourselves together and we didn’t dare catch each other’s eye. 

He went on to describe how the group was ready for meat, and thus it was time for Kevin to move on so they could sustain themselves and continue to grow.  It was a beautiful, beautiful moment.  He went on to speak for several more minutes and tears were running down our faces from the emotion and sadness at leaving.  But as soon as we got in the car, I couldn’t resist saying to Kevin “You are the boob” and we collapsed in laughter.  To this day, it gets us every time.  But really, how lovely a sentiment our brother blessed Kevin with.  It still tears at my heart and we are grateful for the privilege of being the boob.

Johannesburg used to be the murder capital of the world, though it has slipped down in the rankings in the last years.  It is not a place you want to be wandering around at night.  So I approached one of the guards and asked him to help me find a taxi.  He was amenable, and as we walked toward the edge of the parking lot, he said to me, “So we will find someone and I will look in his face so that tomorrow he cannot say he didn’t do it.”

A newcomer might have missed the meaning, but what he was saying was that when I was missing the next day or found dead in a ditch, the taxi driver could be prosecuted.   I understood perfectly and looked at him sideways, but on we went, a driver was found, a price was agreed, and we drove off, hopefully to the airport.

He was delightful, regaling me with stories of the process of death from different kinds of snakebites in South Africa.  He was a hunter in his home area, you see.  Since I have lived many years in Africa, I found it highly entertaining and exited the taxi safely at my destination with handshaking and laughter and wishes for safety for both of us.  A novice?  Probably would not have enjoyed this adventure.  To me, it was another good story to tell, another reminder of life on this lovely continent.

I should note that this was a small green mamba, perhaps even a baby, but mambas are more than slightly poisonous – they are deadly.  Having a snake that could kill you in our house was not a regular occurrence, thankfully, but it was our day.

Lucky the cat strolled in from the kitchen, took one look, and did his own leap – right onto the snake and killed it.  We were the lucky ones that day.

Somehow, all of our animals knew what to do with snakes – both the Jack Russells and the German Shepherds would grab an adult snake by the tail, snap it into the air like a whip and break its neck. Quite a sight to see and bringing relief to the humans who didn’t have to try to pin it and kill it!

Another time, a letter came home with 3-year old Toby saying that he was going to the farm.  We spent the next week looking at picture books with farm animals and telling him the names for the animals in Portuguese.  On the day, we dressed him in jeans and wellington boots and sent him off.  When we picked him up that afternoon we asked how he enjoyed his day at the farm and he said to us with some confusion “but they took us to the movies!”.  Apparently the movie theatre was named “The Yellow Farm”

In Mozambique, our Portuguese skills (or lack thereof) frequently caused amusement to friends and strangers alike.  I went to the fresh vegetable market every week or two, and one of the things I often bought was fresh coconuts.  I won’t go into the whole drama of learning how to open them and grate up coconut meat for stews – a delicious result but an arduous process until you get the hang of it.

Anyway, buying coconuts was a dangerous prospect for one reason:  the word for coconut, pronounced COH-cooh, is very similar to the word for poop, pronounced coh-COH.  You’ll understand better when you see them:

Coco – coconut      Cocô- poop

So, the first time I had to buy the thing you eat, I blithely said “I want a poop, please.”  Everybody just about died laughing, and though I was embarrassed, I had to admit it was pretty funny.  Thereafter, whenever I approached the vendor he would get this anticipatory look on his face, mutter to his colleagues “here she comes,” pick up a coconut and hold it up while looking at me sideways.  I was always a disappointment, however, because I learned to stop and think about it for a few seconds before I carefully said “Can I have a coconut please?”  We all had a good laugh and it still brings a smile to my face.  That was one of the funnest parts of going to market. – Cami

A story of our time in Mozambique.

(By Cami)

I was attending an oral storying conference at the nearby missionary Bible translation compound, when I remembered I needed something in town.  So at lunchtime, I popped on the motorcycle and bumped along the dirt path to the main road, which was also – you guessed it – dirt.

Near the entrance to our street was an area where people waited for the minibus taxis to fill up, going out to various locations out of town both near and far.  Goats waited patiently under trees to be purchased and strapped to the top of said minibuses, and motorcycle taxis vied for local riders.

A crowd was gathered, blocking the street, which should have been my first sign to turn around and hightail it out of there, but curiosity got the best of me and I ended up on the edge of the crowd, seated on my bike.  As one of two white ladies who rode bikes around the town, I always attracted lots of interest.  Attention turned immediately to me, and the person at the center of the gathered crowd, a mentally ill man, immediately ran toward me and grabbed the purse from my arms. 

In many African countries, people go out of their way to help strangers and be incredibly kind.  Nampula was not such a place.  You could never count on the goodwill of people on the street to save you.  But it all boiled down to me, sitting on my motorbike and watching said man run around waving my purse in the air.  The crowd watched me with interest to see what I would do.  Now this was entertaining!

What could I do?  If I got off the bike, someone was sure to grab it and take off, cheered on by the young men.  I started crying out “Help me!  Help me!”  The people around me really looked annoyed.  Didn’t I know this man had demons?  But faced with the loss of my money and my identity document, I persisted.  Finally two men approached the runner and retrieved my purse,  handing it to me in disgust.  I nicely said thank you, but they didn’t wait to hear it as they had already stalked off in the other direction.

The crowd watched me ride away, their fun ruined until the next victim arrived. Carrying along  the dusty road to the store (where I spent some time securing my bike with the heavy chain we carried), I was watched by yet another set of people as I went in and came out with my purchases. Normal.  However, I made the fatal error of going back down the same road, figuring that Mr. Entertainment had moved on.  But he was even closer to town, and as I slowed to avoid a large pothole,  he jumped on the back of my bike!  Now what?  Insanity must have been catching that day, as I decided to try to dislodge him by riding straight up a steep embankment.  I wasn’t what you’d call an experienced rider, but with the help, surely, of patient angels and raging andrenaline, I went over the top, took a steep right, and somehow dumped the man clinging to me like a scared cat. Right into a soft pile of dirt. 

In disbelief, I rode back to the conference and parked the bike and walked in.  One of the organizers, a kind man, noticed I was disheveled and after I told him what had happened, he tried to guide me to a chair to recover.  He knew how hard it was for foreign women in that town.  So many times, I returned home humiliated or in tears because I’d been verbally harassed by men who thought I must surely want to do nasty things with them, had street boys try to rob me, was cheated in the market, or made some terrible language mistake. 

But I didn’t need to sit down and be comforted.  “You don’t understand,” I told him, elated.  “I won!” 

There is no time in my life where the phrase, “in acceptance there is peace” has more truth and depth. Recently I have been walking through some past traumas and for some reason am surprised to find relief and freedom in the voicing and acknowledging of the fact.

In John 16, Jesus is laying out a list of warnings to his trusted compadres,  then in verse 12 he says, “I have much more to say to you, more than you can bear.” We find the disciples confused and wondering about the time frame and where is he going. And then halfway through in verse 19 Jesus starts explaining things more clearly ending with, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace, In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

Part of me is so very thankful for not knowing what lies ahead, I think it is mercy. If we had known what Covid would do to our psyche’s, if we knew the fear we would feel about getting sick or the pain of watching loved ones die would we be any better prepared? Possibly. And I think that is why in the beginning Jesus mentions sending the Holy Spirit and then in the closing remark he tells us, ‘sure, you will experience pain and sorrow and heartache…but if you stick with me, I will take care of it all’.

As we await the students to return and our future (I am done here in July) to unfold we rest well at night knowing the truth that we have the Holy Spirit to guide us and promise of Jesus sorting it all out in the end. And because of these things—we have peace (Just as he promised in earlier in chapter 14:27).

Whatever situation you are in may you be able to accept it and then fall back in the comfortable embrace of our Jesus. – Kevin

During our years in Mozambique, we lost six dogs to death. Old age, poison, tick bite fever, etc. We had to give six dogs away, because we went on furlough twice and were away for a year each time. We lost lots of cats, some because the neighbors next to our first house were apparently killing and eating them (these are folks who are so poor they also ate rats), and others were killed by various wild things near our other house. Anyway, it was a trauma zone of pet loss over our two terms there.

When we moved to Namibia, I told Kevin that I wanted a Great Dane puppy, to be companion to the elderly Great Dane who lived at the house and acted as superb crime deterrent in our crime-prone suburb. There were none to be found anywhere in Namibia, until God dropped Pepper in our laps on the very day we officially moved into our house. I told Kevin “I AM KEEPING THIS DOG.”

When we told Charlie we were moving from Moz to Namibia, he was quite upset, so foolish mommy promised him a kitten. Come Christmas, it was time to deliver and there was none to be found! But on Christmas eve, we checked online one more time and there he was – the male Siamese kitten we’d been hoping for, at the SPCA. He was hastily collected and when Charlie opened the box on Christmas morning, his expression was priceless. Percy the cat sat through two years of homeschooling on Charlie’s lap, and slept with him every night. They were inseparable.

After our elderly Great Dane died, we found a companion dog for Pepper at the SPCA, a border collie mix who adores her and can’t stand to be separated from her. I think Georgie is the sweetest dog I have ever had and is very eager to please.

Anyway, we were sad to be parted from them all for a full year during furlough, and when the decision was made to move to Kenya for a year, I must confess that many tears were shed. We didn’t feel the dogs’ situation was ideal, and I felt guilty about that too. Imagine our surprise when someone in Namibia offered to pay a significant portion of the cost of bringing them to Kenya. What had seemed impossible was suddenly an option. We started a GoFundMe to cover the rest, and people immediately jumped in to help. Suddenly, it was a go. Charlie and I kept looking at each other in disbelief. As a missionary, you relinquish certain “rights,” including the right to take your things (and pets) with you. You release a lot. Imagine our delight at having them handed back to us!

The process of bringing them was fraught with issues, including Pepper needing a mircrochip and her being slightly too big to fit in the biggest crate that the airplane door would take. We decided she would be a little cramped. The animals could not travel if they’d had a rabies injection less than 6 months before, and thankfully Kevin had taken them in just before he left Namibia last September. Those vaccines would expire on September 14th, leaving them unable to travel, so we had a deadline!

Georgie dog, Pepper’s companion, completely freaked out when he was tested in the crate, and failed his exam at the state vet because he was too upset. He was taken back again later in the day without the crate and passed. Then the airline said the cat couldn’t come on the same flight with the dogs, thinking it would upset him. Little did they know that Percy runs the house and the dogs. Finally they relented. The caretakers of the dogs in Namibia, the vet (who helped for free) and the agent all worked together to get everything ready, and the agent took them to the airport hours early to work with Georgie to calm him into the crate . She had miraculous success.

In Kenya, we had to get paperwork from a vet who applied to the government for our permits, which were slightly delayed. We hired an agent, who had to work with the state vet at the last minute when a signature was missing and he said that although the animals were already enroute, we could not claim them. The agent sorted it out.

As we drove to the airport, I was in tears, sure that something else would go wrong. God spoke to me, telling me that He had arranged all of it and to “get a grip” or something like that. We came early, against the agent’s advice on timing, hoping that the animals would not have to sit in their crates for hours being processed. And as we pulled into the airport, he called us: “Where are you? We are ready.”

After 13 hours in crates, the dogs burst out onto the pavement, greeting each other and greeting us and racing around. They were so happy. Percy, in his crate, purred and rubbed against the side, relaxed and recognizing our scent. None of them were traumatized, and as we arrived home they explored and jumped around and it was all joy.

Just a few hours later, we got word that Kevin’s dad was in the hospital and not expected to live. Kevin and I looked at each other and said, “that is why He brought them to us – He knew we needed them as we walk through this.” I think it is more for me and Charlie, who has found having his cat a great comfort. I take the dogs out two or three times a day for a walk and to see students, and it helps me get out of the house (I work alone at home), get exercise, and connect with the kids. It is wonderful to see the kids hugging giant Pepper and rubbing sweet Georgie’s face, and they run up calling their names and telling me how much they miss their pets left at home with their parents. The dogs have been great with the small and big kids, and are so calm and patient.

As Charlie and I watched the memorial service for Kevin’s dad this weekend on the computer, we sat on the floor with the animals piled around and on top of us, and it was comforting in a way we couldn’t express. We are grateful for the series of miracles, and it is easy to recognize God’s care for us, a reminder that He knew, and He knows, and He cares for us despite and through our painful circumstances.

Not too long ago we were traveling and came about 6 hours from someplace I lived for awhile when I was younger. Those of you who know me know that I have been a tumbling tumbleweed for much of my life and there is only one place left from my childhood where people I know still live. I’ll be visiting there soon. Anyway, I came out of the hotel last week in the morning and the smell of the air, the color of the sky, the feel of the breeze . . . it brought so many memories rushing back from a period in my life that I left behind. My breath caught in my throat and a big smile spread across my face. I closed my eyes, feeling for a moment that I belonged somewhere.

Rootless is a theme that seems to keep popping up these days. My children feel rootless and even though I mostly grew up in the USA I can identify a little. For them, it is disorienting and confusing. For me, just a sadness mixed with gratefulness for the variety of experiences. This year has been especially fraught, as I moved from place to place for four months, finally upending our plans because I had to unpack my suitcase somewhere. As we prepared to return to Namibia, plans changed and I will be away from “home” in Namibia for yet another year.

It’s ok, really. My head tells my heart this over and over. And it is true. But the desire to be at home, to fold your own towels and open your own closet of clothes, to look out on a familiar view, it peeps around the edges now and then. I haven’t decided yet how to pop that one in the head to keep it at bay. I suspect that it cannot be kept off, not without some lying to myself. Instead, I try to breathe through it, ask the Father to smooth the ragged edges, make my home with Him rather. He does not change, and that reality is better than feeling at home in a house. I am always at home with Him, and He does not change even while my location does. – C