I am a man.

Start from the beginning.

When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. 1 Corinthians 13:11

I am a man, who once was a boy. That boy was sheltered and naïve, but I cannot put blame on anyone for that. They all did the best they could. So now my childhood rests in the past. It affects me every day whether I know it or not, but mostly I know it.

I wonder why you may perceive my being a man as being rebellious. You cannot keep me young and innocent forever. I could tell you story upon story of my innocence lost, those pivotal events that changed my life. Are you ready for them, or should I keep them contained?

Recently I’ve shocked you and I’ve angered you because you just found out a little bit more of who I am. But you haven’t talked to me about it. What are you afraid of?

I’m not fearless yet, but I’m learning to be afraid and still act. I cannot just sit idly and watch the world go by. Sometimes it looks like that is all I am doing, but it’s not the truth. True, I am sitting here, but my mind is racing with thoughts. I am not even watching you, or anyone else for that matter. I sit here with these books—reading, learning. You are always welcome to come and sit with me. We can talk. I want to know what you have to say. Let’s dialogue, and leave this place changed.

Find out where the story ends.

There is still hope for one.

In a family of judgmental conservative Evangelicals, I find there is still hope for one, and even that hope is dwindling because they want to brainwash him. Maybe not brainwash, that’s harsh, but they want to stop him from freeing his mind and seeing other communities that will open their arms to him, free of judgment. He needs love—not their “love” which consists of tough love and a world full of absolutes—but true Love. He needs choices, not the oppression of traditions and fundamental values that are so far from the mainstream. He needs to be able to create himself and share himself openly with the world.

He made a mistake. He asked the oppressors for help, and they think that means he wants to conform. What he really needs is a different kind of help, an advocate, someone who is on his side. Because there are sides to this, and maybe not sides where one is right and the other is wrong, but there are sides. And it doesn’t look like one will change the other any time soon. They need to agree to disagree. That will give him his freedom. But what sixteen year-old has ever experienced true freedom?

I experienced a kind of freedom at age sixteen, but it’s not the kind of freedom that I want him to have. He will still need guidance and direction. And I ask myself, “Where’s my place in all of this?” I want to be a part of his life, but I’ve lost credibility by not living up to their standards. And I know what they think of me is partially based on lies. The truth about me isn’t clear to everyone, and I don’t know how to set the record straight. And do I have to? Is that my duty?

The Mysterious One asked me why I want people to know me so badly. The Mysterious One is charming because I never know what he is thinking. But I can’t be that way. Even if I don’t speak words you seem to know what I’m thinking. My eyes give it away. But the Mysterious One can’t read eyes, so he waits for me to speak. If only more of you could be like him. Stop passing judgment on my eyes, and wait as long as it takes for me to reveal the truth about me. I have no secrets, but it will take time for me to tell you everything.

Zambia: a conclusion

“Life is a process of becoming, a combination of states we have to go through. Where people fail is that they wish to elect a state and remain in it. This is a kind of death.”-Anais Nin

This is where you decide what sympathy I deserve. The way I see it I have not failed, but I have lived. I did not merely survive this experience, I lived every moment. And even though I have died, I have lived. You may ask how all of this is a story about love. I can say without a doubt that love has come. Redemption has come. And I ask you this, are you willing to let yourself be a part of this redeeming work in my life?

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The following are sources for italicized quotes in this Zambia series. They are books worth your reading.

Achebe, Chinua, Things Fall Apart. Doubleday, N.Y., 1959.
Conrad, Joseph, Heart of Darkness. London, 1899.
Kingsolver, Barbara, The Poisonwood Bible. HarperCollins, N.Y., 1998

Zambia: part 9

Though we were spared once, we would not be spared again. Without time to defend ourselves, our removal from Zambia was planned and executed. The ten of us left so suddenly, an event that is one of the scars I share with my nine brothers and sisters. The other six were left behind, to endure without us. We would all have to escape Africa by a different route.

I don’t think I’ve ever had a strong sense of family. When I look at my own, I see one side that is a bunch of men-hating single women and the other side that says they love God but has these ideals of perfection that no one could possibly live up to. Thus, in neither side of the family have I learned how to truly give and receive love. I have only learned this from experiencing family in other groups, such as at camp, at college, and in Zambia. So I have had to grieve recently because I was reminded by one of my Zambian sisters that we, as a unique group, fit together in Zambia in a way that we could never fit together back home. Our Zambian family has broken up.

I think about those family members and wonder if they are grieving the same way I am. I wonder if she is trying her hardest to escape Africa and put it out of her mind. I wonder if Africa is calling him back. I have seen the changes in some, and for others I can’t quite tell what affliction Africa might have caused them. Africa might not affect some of us until years down the road, and although I’d like to know how everyone is doing, perhaps it’s not for me to know. I have to let it be.

Zambia: part 8

We will never know what we were spared from that night. The night was very quiet. It was always quiet except on moonlight nights. Darkness held a vague terror for these people, even the bravest among them. Children were warned not to whistle at night for fear of evil spirits. We were told there is an ancient African belief that evil walks at night. We walked at night. We, the emissaries of light, stepped out into the darkness and walked. Stepping beyond the white walls of the compound, we left the safety of our secluded hideaway and trusted the good of humanity and the quietness of Chomatown with our lives. We brought light into the darkness, white into black territory. It exposed us. We were bare, defenseless, naïve. We could not connect with the fear of this culture. We felt impenetrable. But ten muguwas with intellect and faith are no match for the brute strength and weapons of the evil that walks at night.

It was a sin—a sin born out of ignorance. Intentional or not, it happened…and I wonder what new, disgusting sins we commit each day, holding our heads high in sacred ignorance while our neighbors gasp, hand to mouth.

Zambia: part 7

Though work in the field was an attending to incidents of the surface, reality hit hard in our house. Community life was not the kind of community life I had lived before. Our house was a dysfunctional family. The Outsiders had control while the Insiders wanted it, and the other three floated in between. And I wonder whatever happened to true dialogue.

It took less than a month for our household to fall into chaos…and only six weeks for its total destruction.

Yet, we fit together. We fit together well, and it was not of our own doing or that of those who had organized our going to Africa. No, Someone else was responsible for knowing how we would fit together—Our Father. Together we succeeded and together we fell. It was bound to happen because there were so many things we did not know.

“The things we do not know, independently and in unison as a family, would fill two separate baskets, each with a large hole in the bottom.” – Adah Price, The Poisonwood Bible

Zambia: part 6

I believe in connectedness. I am certain that actions and people in this world are connected, that there is meaning in everything, and that meaning is only found by visits to the past. Life events don’t always make sense, and although over and over we may be told that what we are doing is important, if we can’t make sense of the meaning, we can easily lose heart.

In Zambia, we were uncertain of the meaning of our work. We simply did what was asked of us. We scooped porridge into bowls for children. We fetched water for a poor couple with AIDS. We swung our hoes into the wet earth to loosen the weeds. We dug holes with our hands for the fence posts. When you have to attend to things of that sort, to the mere incidents of the surface, the reality—the reality, I tell you—fades. The inner truth is hidden—luckily, luckily.

I have to accept that the truth is that somehow God used these seemingly insignificant actions of mine to do a great work and touch the lives of the people I served. Sometimes I must remind myself that it is the Spirit working in me, using this dead flesh to do good works.