Today we bade farewell to our
lovely Colorado friends, and drove across the Rockies to Utah where we will
spend a few days revisiting old haunts from when we lived here, and catching up
with more friends. Don’t worry, this won’t be a travel-logue of our journey,
but I know some of you are interested in our progress, so I’ll make the
occasional reference – just to keep you updated!
Anyway, this morning, as I sat
eating my final Colorado breakfast, I watched a hummingbird feeding at the
feeder just outside the window, and marveled. Such a tiny tiny bird, with wings
flapping so fast you can’t see them, and hovering above the feeder to take in
the coveted liquid it loves so much; a beautiful example of the exquisiteness
of creation, and God’s attention to tiny details.
As we drove across the Rockies to
Utah, we had views that showed the other end of the creative size spectrum –
although I guess if you start thinking about the universe and galaxies then
actually the Rockies is just a bit further along the size spectrum from the
hummingbird. Massive ranges of mountains going for miles and miles, under a
huge sky – definitely worthy of the word ‘awesome’.
So, how does that all fit with
Rwandan street boys? Well here’s the thinking:
The week we were in Rwanda
happened to have 2 bank holidays in it, and on the 2nd one, which
was Liberation Day, the Catch Up Centre was closed in the morning. Keen to
still make the most of the day, the team went with Pius and Theoneste to meet
some of the street boys.
Theoneste has a real heart for
the street kids, and his desire is to see them all given the opportunity to
come off the streets and reintegrated into family life with access to
education. Unfortunately, the Catch-Up Centre is currently full to bursting and
so Theoneste has stopped doing his outreach visits to the boys on the streets,
as he doesn’t have any alternatives to offer them. So, our visit was a bit of a
one-off.
We went to three different
locations, and met three different gangs. All worthy of a story themselves, but
today my thoughts are on the 2nd gang. They were ‘living’ on a small
rubbish site, at the end of the runway of Kigali airport. All came up to greet
us, except one, who was lying down apparently asleep. This guy looked to be
late teens, and when Theoneste asked the others about him, they said he wasn’t
well. Further questions established that he really was not very well at all,
and needed to have medical care. Not something easily available to a lad living
on the streets who has nothing to his name except the clothes he wears and the
ragged blanket he shivers under.
One of the other guys had an
injured eye that had been sustained as a result of him being hit by a
rock-wielding individual. He also needed medical attention, and so Pius took
them both to the hospital, to be seen by the relevant medics, get blood tests
done, and be prescribed the medications that would help both the lads with
their recovery.
Later that day I was chatting to
Pius about the incident, and asked what would have happened to the lads if we
hadn’t gone to visit them due to the Catch-Up Centre being closed. Would anyone
else have visited them and been able to offer them medical assistance? Pius
thought for a moment, and then admitted that the chances are that no-one would
have visited them, and if left untreated one lad could well have ended up with
a chronic eye injury, and the other would probably have just got worse,
potentially to the point of death.
It was a sobering thought, and
then Pius followed it with these words: ‘I guess God used your team to really
make a difference for those boys today’.
Wow! God of creation who makes
the Rockies and the hummingbird and everything in between; the all-powerful God
who could sort out everything on His own, chooses to use us to help make a
difference in the world. He is such a
loving God that he cares not just for the rich, famous and influential, but He
cares for the boys living on the streets, the prostitutes, the down and outs;
and He uses people like you and me to make a difference in their lives.
An exciting thought – if we are
up for the ride!
Your writing is lovely Helen - I think Mrs Sutcliffe and Mrs Gower would be very proud!
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