Sunday, June 1, 2008



"There is no despair as there is in Africa. No hope brighter than the hope of Africa. Africans have been waiting and hoping a very long time."
This quote was taken from a book by Eddy Harris an American journalist trying to see africa from the perspective of Africans in a year long journey from north to south. He was a black author but his blackness could not hide him in this continent. Yet through his journey across the continent he had some real insights into the culture, the climate and mostly the people. Waiting and hope is in the air we breathe and the water we drink. It is the substance that defines our existence, like a fish to water or an eagle to air. Waiting drags us down and hope sustains us.

In my trip to Dar Es Salaam I saw little of what I would call hope, but many opportunities for despair. First we went to the customs warehouse and saw the contents of our container spilled out into a pile next to the contents of several other containers awaiting a similar fate. The tough packing crates that we built and packed carefully into the container were gone and the contents laid bare. Even many smaller boxes were opened and contents dumped out. It was difficult to see what was there and what wasn't. The hours of work and thousands of dollars that went into packing and shipping the container flashed through my mind and I became angry with no vent to my anger. The Tanzanians who watched from behind a desk sat expressionless. The secretary of the church whom I traveled with still clung to the hope of releasing even this and was ready for the next stage.

The next stage brought us to an office building known as "the long room". We moved from the bottom floor to the top floor which had a balcony overlooking the room below. I was confused first by the name of the building because the room itself was more of a cube than it was long. The office building was hot and humid and though nobody appeared to be talking the room echoed in loud constant droning noises. I saw bright eyed men and women in blue and white shirts walk to the crowds surrounding the counters in no semblance of a line. Throughout the day these same hopeful ones would slump into the middle of the room where shoes were removed, and apparently backbones, as people melted in hard chairs to jellyfish. They had reached despair. A thought popped in my mind that if there is a purgatory it would look a lot like this room. The building was called the long room not because of its shape but rather because of the waiting. In another quote Eddy Harris said, "Lives here are shorter in time, but are infinitely long in the emptiness of days." For two days we repeated a cycle of going into offices in this building, being told to come back later and then tomorrow, and then later and then tomorrow. I left the general secretary for our church and received My dad, my father in law (Craig Apel) and Kevin Rigg at the airport. Besides coming to visit us they had come to lead a seminar for 40 of our pastors in Sumbawanga.

Throughout the week Method held out hope for returning home with the container and the remaining contents, while the pastors in Sumbawanga learned and grew in their understanding of the Bible and the role of leaders in the church. Kevin and Craig shared their lives as well as their knowledge and expertise and were then themselves blown away by the passion in which the pastors sang. Every pastor in that room has lived in the tension between despair and hope. Still waiting for the church to take hold in the lives of this country. Still hoping to rise above the infinite emptiness of time. despairing the stories of lives cut short in their congregations. Hoping for a future that does not resemble their present.

As Method returned from Dar he was still hopeful in recovering the container and its contents. Two days later that hope has sunk again into despair as the paperwork has officially and permanently become lost and needs to be re-filed from the beginning. Many have asked me about the container and I have been slow to respond because I keep waiting for news myself- still hopeful. If the container doesn't come construction will be more difficult but we will not let our hope sink that far into despair because watching and guiding us all throughout the process is a Father who loves us.

I will share more about our time with family and the continued progress of the building of our school. Keep us in your prayers.

In Him who provides hope from out of the despair,
The Zubers