We left our hearts in Guru Guru

All of a sudden we are all blogging tonight. I know some of the moms back home have been waiting patientely to hear from their kids, but we have so little time and then when we try to blog, the internet goes down on us. For the past four days in Guru Guru, we have been broken into teams--the roadies are Kelley, Leo and Janelle.  Their work on the road inspired the village leader to get other villages to work on the road as well.  It seems that they all just need a push that things are indeed possible.  The others are on construction teams that are building two houses (huts).  The VBS team stays at the center of the village and runs Bible School at the church.  The first day we had over 65 kids, the second day 130, the third day we had 250 and today we had the entire village.  We learned flexibility by the minute.  The language barrier was much more difficult than we expected but we have learned the Acholi tribal language quickly.  Lubonga Dit! God is Great!  We heard this so much from the elders of the village who would come up to us with their canes and speak with such vigor about how they appreciate all we have done for them.  We learned this week that we are the first "mazungos" (white people) who have ever visited their village. We continue to remind ourselves at every night's meeting that these are people who have been in a war zone for 20 years.  Fear is the norm.  But they have invited us into their lives with such joy.  This is a place that is non churched and only recently began hearing about Jesus.  Some of the older people know God, but many of the children do not.  That is why VBS was so huge.  The translators and the leaders kept telling us that what we were teaching was so beautiful. The kids gathered and listened with such an obvious thirst for knowing Jesus.  Over 100 people invited Jesus into their hearts today. I told them that we would meet as one community in heaven one day--Acholi and Mazungos and they clapped and yelled Amen! We have so many "moments" to share with all of you back home.  We have all been moved and touched in huge ways.  One obvious way is the spiritual growth even within our team.  The bonding we have with each other--sharing coffee in the morning, talking on the dusty bus, eating meals at night, journaling together, praying and sharing all the stories of our days. I will conclude tonight with a story of our departure--one of the women I grew closest with was Florence. Each time we saw each other her smile lit up and she greeted me with a huge hug and kisses on both cheeks.  When I learned the Acholi word for friend, I went to her and said, "Larema" and she hugged me and said, "Best Larema".  When we left today we prayed together and I told her I would see her again (soon).  When we parted our last words at the same time were "aremi"--I love you.  Truly, our hearts are in Guru Guru and we can't wait to see our "laremas" again. 

Kirsten