Labour time!

30/06/2012

The team is tired! Today all 7 of the Damascus Trust Rwanda team were involved in a lot of heavy lifting and getting very muddy as we helped build a new church in Gaseke. We all wore slightly too large red t-shirts with the Damascus Trust logo on as we made a fool of ourselves in front of about 200 Rwandan’s from the local community. The morning started off early as we set off at around 8 am to arrive at the building site for 9. We picked our good friend Pastor Tedae up on the way which made a total of 8 of us in a vehicle that certainly did not accommodate 8. When we arrived at the spot where we were to spend the morning heaping heavy bags of sand, the Rwandan’s were highly amused at our presence!

After a while of the sand bags causing dints in our shoulders, different members of the team diverged into different tasks that were going on. Stephanie, Pete Nadin and Lucy helped transporting water before getting involved in what would be a very mucky hour. The threesome got their hands muddy as they helped with literally throwing the sloppy cement like mud onto the half built wall (this was clearly entertaining for the audience). Pete Ellis, Heather, Andy and Hazel continued for a while lifting the bags of sand, they are obviously more fit than the first 3 who ran off! Pete Ellis was crowned champion of the day as he did not stop lifting heavy bags of sand all morning (not bad for a 70 year old)! 

After throwing mud around and laying a few bricks, the morning of building the church was coming to an end. It was such a blessing for the team to spend time with the local community, sharing in not only practical labour but also many laughs. Everyone was then gathered to what will be the centre of the church floor for a sing along and dance. 

After introducing ourselves to the community, and Andy sharing a message about Nehemiah, we had lunch with Pastor Bernard, his wife Patricia and two of their seven children! Then the team were involved with a meeting consisting of the entire church leadership and like all meetings in Rwanda, it dragged on a bit! With sitting in such a warm room for such a period of time, this resulted in Pete Ellis humorously falling asleep (only for a minute though). There was then a video interview with the Pastor and his wife with Pastor Tedae translating before we headed off back to the guesthouse. The team are very tired but still pushing on as Stephanie and Heather have just gone off to meet with another Heather to discuss what her life has been like living here for a year as a teacher in the local schools. Tomorrow is the Lord’s Day and the team will be splitting to lead two different church services so stay tuned to see what we get up to!

Too many patients and children

29/06/2012

Today was another busy day for some of the team as Andy, Heather, Stephanie, Lucy and Pete Nadin traveled to Bushara to meet Pastor Lucian and Leah (a family supported through the Support a Pastor program) and the health centre located there. The team of 5 had a very bumpy ride for up to an hour to get there in a very fancy 4x4 with a banner across the windscreen saying ‘God is all’, the 4x4 was driven by a cool young lad playing rap music throughout the whole journey; we arrived at Pastor Lucian’s house to be greeted with our second breakfast of the morning!

The next step on the journey was the health centre where we met Projene, the 25 year old director of the centre. After having a chat the team split as Andy went back to visit the church leaders, whilst Doctor Stephanie and Nurse Hazel was shown around the very established health centre (Pete and Lucy just tagged along doing bits of filming). Our own Doctor and Nurse learnt many lessons and suggested many helpful insights as they discussed with Projene the differences in cultural hospital aid. One of these differences is that the health centre in Bushara has over 16,000 patients and only 9 nurses (with no Doctors)! After walking around the complex and seeing two beautiful 1 day old twins, Lucy and Pete headed back to meet Andy; whereas Heather and Stephanie were able to get involved with the work that Projene had planned for the day and saw a total of 6 patients.

Lucy and Pete joined Andy towards the end of a meeting with the church leaders and engaged in discussing with the group different aspects of what the Damascus Trust team could do to help the church there in Bushara (with many positive potential outcomes)! Next up was an interview with Pastor Lucian and Leah as Pastor Thadae helped with translating; the purpose of this interview was to inform the partners of the Pastor and his family the progress that has occurred in Pastor Lucian’s families life, but also the struggles that he is experiencing, relating mostly to his work with the 8 churches that he visits (some taking 4 hours to get to).

The team then had lunch with the Pastors before they visited the local school that had over 800 children, but only 14 teachers! A few of us introduced ourselves to some excited children before they sang an English song to send us on our way. The cool 4x4 then picked us up as we had another very bumpy ride back to the guesthouse. Hazel and Pete Ellis had a nice relaxing day getting stuck in God’s Word, and so all the team were reunited for the evening to spend team time together before going to visit Pastor Juvenal’s house for tea. Looking forward to what God has planned for tomorrow!

Goodbye's are hard

27/06/2012

On the last blog post we wrote about the Mother’s Union bringing some of their handiwork to show us, in order that we may buy it. When we wrote the blog, this had not yet happened. When the representatives of the Mother’s Union arrived, Venant, a Pastor who is involved in Diocese administration gave a speech about the value of our time in Shyogwe and asked that we would come back as soon as possible. We then each shared our feelings of our time with them, which was emotional for all present. Claudine, the head of the Mother’s Union in Shyogwe, along with Janet, presented each of us with individual gift bags containing the craft that the widows and orphans had made. The female members of the team were given jewellery and purses, and the men received small drums. Pete Nadin got a carved wooden zebra – they must have known how much he loves animals! We were truly overwhelmed by their generosity.

The next morning the goodbyes continued as we left Alphonsine (the chef) and Ilva (the German girl living there for a year) to head towards Kigali and then Byumba. We made a short stop at the Pineapple Juice Factory and the Mother’s Union where we bought gifts for ourselves and loved ones at home. 

After about an hour’s journey, and stopping to ask for directions, we arrived to meet Archbishop Rwaje in Kigali. Pete Nadin filmed as Andy interviewed him about the Church in Rwanda and the Support a Pastor program (hopefully the video will be ok despite 8 army helicopters flying over whilst the cameras were rolling!). The rest of the team had a little time to relax, getting to know Pastor Robert from Byumba who had come to meet us there, along with our new driver named Innocent. The lovely thing about this was that Venant and Claudine had travelled the whole way with us and our driver Celestine so that they could hand over the responsibility of us to the Byumba diocese. They show how much they care by sitting in a hot bus with us rather than just setting us off on our way and getting on with their day.  We said a final goodbye to those from Shyogwe as we headed to the Genocide Memorial Museum.

Most of the team had visited the Memorial before, but it still affected each one of us. Some went round all the exhibits whilst others sat in the gardens. Robert and Innocent also viewed the entire memorial, and we did not realise until afterwards that it was the first time Innocent had been. We felt so ashamed that we had been asking Innocent about small things like the bags being left in the car when for him it was such an emotional visit. We later found out that he had lost three brothers in the genocide and that his family do not talk about it. He does not speak much English, but when we asked him if visiting the memorial was bad or good, he answered ‘bad’.

The team were involved in other eye-opening conversations around the memorial. Andy spoke to some schoolboys who, at the age of about 15, were learning about the genocide for the first time. It became apparent that they were not told details by their parents because they were too young before, but were now at an appropriate age to learn about their country’s past. Andy asked how they felt after learning, and one boy said that he felt fear; not that it might happen again, but the very real fear that people must have felt when it was happening. 

Stephanie also had a conversation with a boy that was 20 years old, and was also visiting the memorial for the first time. He would have been two at the time of the genocide and his entire family was wiped out except for his two brothers. He told Stephanie that a picture of his father was in the memorial but he could not find one of his mother; we do not know if he has photos of them or knows what they look like as he was so young when they died. He is at boarding school, along with his two brothers, and would have to go through the experience of the memorial and then simply go back to his school with maybe no one to talk to about how he feels. He asked Stephanie questions about suffering and God, and simply asked ‘how can I have any hope’?

All of these stories, as well as those in the Memorial themselves, greatly affected the team and made us realise that whilst Rwanda is progressing rapidly, there is still so much hurt, so much hopelessness and so much pain in so many of the people. 

After this, we then were driven to Byumba in the heat of the day, seeing the beautiful views that area available everywhere you look in Rwanda. We arrived in Byumba where we were greeted by Chantal, Robert’s wife, and shown where we were staying for the rest of our time here. Instead of being in the conference centre as we have been before, we are across the road in our own private villa (ish)! We will still eat our meals over in the complex and did so for our tea. We met Bishop Emmanuel and then headed back for some prayer and discussion as a team before bed.

Highs and Lows

26/06/2012

The team were awoken this morning quite early due to very heavy rain beating down upon the roof and there may have been a potential tiny earthquake, but this is not definite. Today was similar to yesterday in some ways as the DT team were teaching all day again, however the teaching was instead aimed at approximately 40 pastors rather than just bible college students (however the students did also attend). The pastors were from the Diocese of Shyogwe and ranged in age and experience. Some of the pastors walked for up to 2 hours in the bad weather to be at the seminar and Andy raised a good point concerning the pastor’s toil, questioning whether people in England would even drive for this amount of time in hard rain, never mind walk!

Stephanie was first up to teach at the seminar and spoke about different ways that we can study the bible and there were a few surprises when discussing the differences in techniques of learning the scriptures. Pete Nadin and Lucy were up next and spoke about working with young people, and many interesting conversations grew from this seminar resulting in some of the pastors thinking about appointing youth workers within their congregations! At the same time Pete Ellis and Heather were also teaching about setting an example for people to follow, and reflected upon the examples of Jesus and Paul.

After dinner it was time for Hazel to speak about what she had prepared on how to be encouraging, which was most definitely encouraging in itself for not only the pastors but also the members of the DT team that listened in. Andy then finished the seminar day with an encouraging word that ended up turning into a passionate sermon presented by the double act of Emmanuel and Andy. The pastors were clearly encouraged by the thought provoking teaching throughout the day, and requested for our team to come back and do a 2-3 day seminar next time rather than just the one day! God obviously wanted to do a lot of encouraging today!

For a short time during the day Stephanie revisited the clinic, and while sitting with the nurse seeing one patient the door opened and two men burst in carrying a seemingly unconscious woman. The woman was 42 and had a 4 month old baby, her husband said she had been manic and for the last few days had not been speaking, eating or drinking. The nurse surmised that this was because of the traumas of the genocide which she had been reminded of during the annual 100 day remembrance time. The woman’s eyes were wide open and they were full of horror; Stephanie and the nurse prayed for her before she was transferred to the hospital by ambulance. This experience has brought to reality that the trauma from such a devastating event still continues.

The team spent the evening reflecting upon the issues of the day whilst the mothers union came round to the guest house in order for us to take a look at some of their handiwork.

Hours and Hours

25^th June 2012

Monday morning began with a team split when we arrived in Shyogwe; Stephanie, Hazel, Heather and Pete Ellis headed to the clinic, whilst Andy, Pete Nadin and Lucy headed to the Bible School.
At the Bible School, the team were teaching seminars throughout the day and Andy began the day with a seminar on evangelism. Pete and Lucy then led a discussion based session on working with young people and valuing their role in the Church with about 15 students. This time finished off with a very insightful discussion where the students were very interactive and it may even be said that God spoke not only through the work that was prepared but also to Pete and Lucy as they started to understand the differences and similarities between the British and Rwandan Church concerning youth work. Andy carried on teaching the students whilst Pete and Lucy went off to the clinic at the same time as the school lunchtime and so were mobbed by hundreds of children!

Stephanie’s morning at the clinic was very busy as she describes:

Standing in the middle of Shyogwe clinic at 11 on Monday, and doing a 360deg what do you see?

The reception area with about 12 people waiting, a nurse’s room where a 29 year old lady with tummy pain and palpitations is getting some help. A small window where another nurse is giving out medicines in small packets, a concrete shelf where a small child is fast asleep, a room where slides are being examined for intestinal worms, a new building where about 20 women and children are waiting for family planning, a room where an educational DVD is playing about living with HIV aids, the entrance gates where an ambulance is parked, collecting a lady with high blood pressure to take to the hospital 4km away and an enclosure with about 60 chickens . . . and the land where they will start building a new maternity block in July.

Also, no litter, tidy paths, clean toilets and a warm welcome.

After time at the clinic the team returned for another tasty lunch at the Bible school before two more seminars were taught; Heather and Pete Ellis delivered a session about setting an example as a Christian and Hazel and Stephanie taught about encouragement and pastoral care. During this time there was a wild goose chase for a toilet that finished with Stephanie and Lucy using the toilet of a random Dutch man’s house nearby, even though neither actually needed to go!

After a long day of teaching, the team were thanked by the Bible School students who had done very well to stay awake through hours and hours of our teaching. Pastor Emmanuel also interpreted every word we used, and so worked the hardest out of all of us! We gave the students some of the St. Philips and St. James Holiday Happening t-shirts and some of the Maurice Paine books, which were all very well received. We hope that our teaching has helped the students to understand something new of what it means to not only be a leader and potential pastor of the future, but also to be an everyday Christian. We then headed back to the Alleluia guest house where we worked on our seminars, as we would be delivering them again the next day for the Pastors of the Shyogwe diocese.

Stephanie's Special Spectacular Spectacles

24th June

Today was a very special day for one member of the team. Midsummer’s day marks the birthday of Stephanie and so the day began with much hilarity as we all donned pairs of glasses that we will later be giving to Pastors in Byumba as we ate our breakfast. Alfonsine, who prepares our meals, wore a pair and in so doing realised that she needed some to aid her reading and therefore received her own birthday gift! Throughout the day Stephanie received cards and presents, including flowers from the Bishop’s garden, and ended the day with a massive chocolate cake! 

After a humorous breakfast, we headed to a service at Shyogwe Cathedral, where we took part in a 3 hour service that did not seem to be long at all due it being very enjoyable. The service was full of beautiful choirs, who put our singing to shame when later on we attempted to sing ‘Blessed be the name of the Lord’ for them!  Pastor Emmanuel led the service, with Andy delivering a sermon based on the story of Gideon, and Stephanie and Heather giving testimonies; we were very involved in the service and were made to feel very welcome by everyone we met (except by the colony of large fruit bats in the tree next to the building).

We walked around the area nearby with Pastor Emmanuel and had a look at a coffee plantation before we headed to the Bible school for lunch. Emmanuel’s wife Beatrice had prepared a stylish meal for us that was set out on the plate like Masterchef! We sipped on Fanta and Coke whilst we were introduced to the leadership team of the church and then headed off to visit the Teacher Training College that was nearby.

The T.T.C. trains 370 pupils who all board there and who are mostly between the ages of 16 and 21. We saw a contrast between them and British young people as they were busy revising of their own accord on a Sunday! It is clear that education is incredibly valued and that those that were being trained recognised it as a privilege. After a bumpy journey back to the guesthouse, the rest of the evening was then spent sorting the next two days regarding  teaching seminars as well as visiting the clinic in Shyogwe. We are looking forward to see what God has in store for us tomorrow as we realise a day can bring many twists and turns when doing His work!

Travelling, Pineapples and Lots of Smiling Kids

22^nd June

After 17 hours of travelling from 4.00 a.m., we arrived in Kigali and were met by Eugenie (the Diocesan secretary), Pastor John and our driver Celestine. The team along with many large bags covering the back doors were then driven in a fantastic minibus through the Kigali center. The sun goes down here at 6 p.m. which felt quite odd for the newcomers to Rwanda considering it was pitch black yet very very busy with motorbikes and people swarming the streets. We then drove to the Alleluia guesthouse near Gitarama, in the Shyogwe diocese; the driving is not too terrifying and the roads are established so far, although we did see three crashed vehicles in the space of 30 minutes!

Two kind spirited women named Alfonsine and Claudine welcomed us to the guest house with a tasty meal (much more of this to come we expect) and Alfonsine does not speak English so we are having some fun practicing some French and even Kinyarwandan! We crashed after a prayer meeting and headed off to bed to get an early night’s sleep.

23^rd June

In the morning we relaxed until our breakfast at 9a.m., which was another tasty meal; omelettes, toast, pineapple and other fresh fruits. We all took our Malarone tablets together, and fortunately it seems so far that none of us have had any adverse reactions. We then spent the rest of the morning sorting out gifts that we are planning to give, the teaching we are going to be doing and preparing songs and dramas that we may use in churches and schools. After this time of settling in, we then split into two groups; one travelling to Gitarama to go to the bank and sort out SIM cards and other things, and the other setting off with Pastor John and Claudine up the road to various projects that the diocese is running, as well as seeing Mount Zion church where Pastor John serves. 

The first project we visited was the Compassion children’s centre, run by a man named Jean Baptiste, where each Saturday the children who are sponsored come to be taught French and German, play games, study the Bible, receive gifts and have their school progress checked. There are 288 children currently sponsored from a 3 km radius under the care of the centre, which is run by both the charity Compassion and the Shyogwe diocese; a large proportion of these are orphans. Today the children were very excited to each be given a brand new warm jumper, a tub of Vaseline and two bars of soap.

The team then headed up the road to visit the design and technology centre, where both training and production in metal and woodwork takes place. The manager, Bernard, informed us of their current preparation of an order of 616 school chairs with flip –over desks which looked to be very professionally and efficiently made. When they are finished they are stored in very large containers, ready to be taken away to the buyer. Bernard’s trainees and workmen also make some shoes and other items, along with furniture made to order such as a cot made from scratch in 6 days! 

Andy, Pete and Heather then met up with Lucy, Stephanie, Hazel and Pete and together marched up the hill to Mount Zion church to take a look at what we thought would be a beautiful empty building. However, the beautiful empty building was actually filled with nearly 300 young children singing harmoniously Christian hymns; this was a great delight for us to witness. Understandably the children wanted the team to introduce ourselves and entertain the children for a little while and it was such a privilege for our first trip to be accompanied by so many happy grateful children. Before leaving to head back to the guesthouses, the team was showed around a few other projects including a Mothers Union (where many Rwandan gifts are made) and a pineapple juice factory. On arriving back to the guesthouses, it was time to plan for a very hectic following 3 weeks that we hope God is going to use powerfully for His glory.

History of Rwanda Mission Trip

Brief History of the Damascus Trust Rwanda Mission

 The Damascus Trust mission in Rwanda will be working with the Anglican Diocese of Byumba.

In 2008 Damascus Trust was invited to run the 'Support A Pastor' programme in partnership with the Anglican Diocese of Byumba in the north of Rwanda. The diocese is about an hour's drive north of the capital Kigali, in a very hilly area extending up to the Ugandan border. Most church buildings are large and basic, and many pastors have houses without electricity. Most pastors walk or cycle everywhere and it is rare for anyone in the villages to own a car or a motorbike. The pastors receive training in the diocesan centre in Byumba but it is costly for them to attend training courses and difficult for some of them to reach the required academic standard.

Pastors have to deal with a variety of issues within their parishes such as poverty, HIV/AIDS orphans, ongoing consequences from the 1994 genocide and a lack of secondary education. Congregations are large with often hundreds of children. The services have lively singing with guitars and drums, challenging sermons and lots of choirs and dancing. Communal feasts at times of celebration are popular.
Pastors receive a very small stipend which is insufficient to meet their basic needs so our extra support enables them to fulfill their ministry without financial worries.