One of my favorite books was written by J.R.R. Tolkien and is called The Hobbit. The subtitle is: There and Back Again and this book turned my reading light on. My 5th grade teacher Mrs. Schutz would read to us every day after lunch and I remember begging her to read "just one more chapter". Imagine a dirty-faced group of boys sitting on the ground of a dirt basketball court, ball at our feet, talking about Bilbo's cool sword - that was us. Finally, I had enough of group reading. I wasn't quite sure what the look on my mom's face meant when I asked her to help me get a library card. I knew I had done something right though as she picked up her keys, went to the door, looked me in the eye, and said: "let's go". My mom had five kids so I don't remember going anywhere before that without running twelve errands and picking up two siblings at sporting events. That night by flashlight under the covers I devoured the book. I’m man enough to admit that I cried at the end. My brother Val who shared my room heard me crying under the covers and asked me what was wrong. All I could get out was "Thorin died" before I choked up again...I don't think I ever asked him what he thought about that because I'm pretty sure I punched him in the arm in the morning first thing just to show him I was still tougher than he was.
I’ve never had a blog before and I doubt if I ever will again. I can’t imagine that anyone would want to read this but I am excited, in a demented sort of way, to see if family and friends have a life or if they actually read this blog from time to time. My friend Phil, who is having his own unique (life vs death) adventure at the moment, told me that no one reads blogs unless you talk about how you looked death in the face and won (I assume if you lost you wouldn’t write a blog about it). Well, Thorin doesn’t have a blog but Phil does and you’ll find all kinds of courageous (and funny) words of faith there if you go to felipebeach.wordpress.com
You see Chris, Matt, and I, like Bilbo, have started out on this strange adventure that has brought us to Tanzania...but we have very quickly noticed that the real interesting adventurers are the people, like Phil, that we are meeting at home and on our journey. These are the ones that when Jesus asked then to stick their neck out, leave the comfort zone, and follow him – they did it. We stayed at the Mennonite Guest House in Nairobi last week and it was amazing to hear story after story, at literally every meal, of people like Ashley that leaves her family every couple of months to come to remote Kenya for several weeks to manage an orphanage she started. I am really humbled and amazed by these people. I decided that for my blog I want to record as many of their stories as I can.
In two weeks I’ll tell you about Yattani and Paul as Matt and I have the opportunity to travel with them to an area near Somalia to visit a school. These people work in what Paul describes as the “wild west” part of Kenya where there have been hundreds of thousands of Muslim refugees moving in from Somalia. The name of the place is Dadaab and if you are interested in details you can easily find information by googling it.
We went to chapel yesterday and there in Swahili, to this wonderful African rhythm, they sang over and over again: you, you, you are; you, you, you are Lord. We’re learning about that...
