Teaching in Rwanda

This past week Bailee, Leilani, Karalyn and I taught at the Rwanda Friends Theological College in Musanze. We lived in the dorm for the college. Each room had its own bathroom which was nice. Some of the students lived in the dorm and some of them commuted from home.

Our day started around 7:30 am for breakfast. I taught Critical Thinking in the mornings (9:00 till 1:00) each day. Pastor Nicodeme translated and helped with illustrations to make the points clear. Pastor Nicodeme is very funny. He often made a joke about what we were talking about. The he would explain to me what the joke was about. We had lots of laughs.

After lunch from 1:30 till 2:30, we all would teach English to the students. Nicodeme divided the students by whether they had finished secondary school. Leilani and Karalyn taught the students who had not finished secondary school and knew less English. They helped them learn to read a skit based on the story of Jesus healing a man who was born blind. Their class then presented the skit to Bailee’s and my class.

Bailee and I taught the ones who knew more English. We had them read out loud from a book written in English by an African. We helped them with vocabulary and pronunciation. Overall it has been a lot of work but a great experience!

Learning About D for D

Yesterday we visited four people who had learned to see that God had given them resources over which they were not good stewards. Through the Discipleship for Development program, they learned that God wants to heal four different relationships: our relationship to God, to others, to self, and to creation.

We visited Pastor Girard’s land which did not grow good crops. He planted eucalyptus trees instead. They gown in 10 years to be harvested, then will send up new sprouts to continue to supply an income. He has planted 4000 trees and hopes to plant another 1000. These trees will provide for his retirement, and also provide for his children, and grand children. This is an example of the change from thinking only of providing for today to having hope for generations to come.

Load ’em up!

Tomorrow morning Bailee, Karalyn, Leilani, and I (Keith) will load up and leave for the airport around noon. Actually, Bailee will be meeting us at the airport. We will fly to Houston, then Istanbul, Turkey, then Kigali, Rwanda. We should arrive a little after midnight Kigali time, early Sunday morning. During Daylight Saving time, Rwanda is 7 hours ahead, so it will be a little after 5:00 pm on Saturday (Haviland time) when we arrive. We will get back to Wichita (Lord willing) around 3:00 pm on Saturday, June 2nd.

We will gather at the student center at 11:45 for prayer. Come join us for a prayerful send off!

Keith