One of the most fun things I do on campus is providing music for the K-6th grade Skate Night every term. Although it seems like they would be content for three hours of Taylor Swift, it is an enjoyable challenge to program music that they might enjoy, or at least endure. Last week, I had a special handicap; I had lost my voice.

Although I so perfectly embody the form of a holy missionary, it might shock you to know that several hundred times in my past life, when I discovered someone had lost their voice, I would loudly declare, “It’s PROOF that God answers PRAYER.” That was highly amusing.

When it was done to ME last week, it was amazing how UN-FUNNY and IMMATURE it was. I think the point is this:  it’s not the joke, it’s how you tell it.

Whenever you think you might have it rough, consider my poor Swahili teacher. Edward gave me a sentence to say, and he told me to say it five times. After I completed my sentences, he looked at me with astonishment and said, “You pronounced that sentence differently EVERY time. That is harder than saying it the RIGHT way every time.”

Why can’t I CHOOSE when to lose my voice?

We have a kitten named Moshi. Nancy, who has been pretty resilient against the pull of a pet, told me the other day, “She is just irresistible, isn’t she?” If you are looking for proof that we are in the end times, look no further.

It is always wonderful to announce when another ceiling has been broken. Koreans make up 15% of our student body. It’s harder for them to get into American colleges with good aid than any group I work with on campus. There are so many strong Asian students worldwide that it has made it doubly hard for my Korean students. In 106 years, RVA has never had a Korean student accepted to the Ivy League.

Until this week. All the seniors are on interim trips, so one of the siblings was checking her sister’s email. She wrote to me from Wellesley and asked, “Does this letter mean what I think it does?” I opened the letter, and I jumped up and down and yelled and cried. Ceilings have a way of staying broken, and I believe that this marks a new era for another subdivision of our student body. I don’t want to say where she is going yet, because I think there is more good news to come. But it was enormously exciting, and we are so grateful to Him.

We are moving ahead on the book, and we can finally announce a title:

A Dream So Big
Our Unlikely Journey to End the Tears of Hunger

There will be more book news coming, but one exciting part is that our contract did not call for pictures, and after approving the initial manuscript, the publisher authorized 16 pages of photographs. My suggestion to include 16 pictures of ME was rather abruptly rejected, for mysterious reasons I cannot fathom.

We were short on monies for food this term, and I knew it might be light the last few days. What we didn’t know was that Kenya decided to add several weeks to this term. The result is that most of the schools are out of food, and won’t have any more until the next term.

We made a short video:

Challenges

And we would appreciate if you could watch it and share it if you think it is worth sharing. We need fresh ideas and fresh blood, and the kids really need the food.

A little girl told me last week that she was used to being hungry. Of all the sad things I’ve heard in 13 years, that strikes me as the saddest one of them all.

Your pal,
Steve

PS: Lightning struck our email server recently, and it is still struggling, so it you have tried to contact us and haven’t gotten a response, that is likely the cause. Please try again, and sorry for the problems.

PSS: Not everything that we do here is uniquely African. Ben & Katie have wanted me to teach their Sunday School class for several years, so this year I agreed. They have a great class of 20 fifth graders. We have been working through an allegorical book called “Tales of the Kingdom,” which I just love. The junior high students here just performed a drama based on the book on Friday, which kind of spoils the ending, but being a junior high drama still leaves plenty of room to refine the ideas presented!

This week’s chapter was entitled “A Girl Named Dirty.” It was a busy week, and I didn’t have as much time and energy to prepare as I wanted so I really had to rely on the Holy Spirit (I know, I should always rely on the Spirit …) to help communicate the tricky theme (tricky especially for 5th graders) on how you sometimes feel dirty inside either because of things you know you have done that you shouldn’t have done or because of lies that somehow have been whispered into your mind and heart.

We read the story together and discussed that one of the reasons Jesus died on the cross was to cleanse us from that inside dirtiness. I wasn’t sure how much the kids really “got it,” but I ended the lesson by giving each child a sheet of paper and an envelope and asked them to write a letter to Jesus sharing something that maybe they had never shared with anyone else that made them feel dirty inside and asking Him to cleanse them, or to thank Jesus that He had died so they didn’t feel dirty inside. I told them they could put the letter into the envelope and seal it and then do what they wanted with it:  share it with a trusted adult or just tuck it into their Bible for now. I expected the usual litany of fifth grade questions and comments, like “I don’t know what to write” or “Do I have to do this?” Instead, the room fell silent as they all went to work on their letters. As one young boy worked intently on his letter tears fell silently to his desk. “Oh, my,” I thought. “Holy Spirit, you have surely shown up.”