Lovemore
Lovemore navigated the bus along narrow roads I’d never traveled in my many trips to Malawi. When he parked, the sixteen of us on the combined Malawi-LJPC mission team got out and gazed up at cone-shaped Nkhoma Mountain a few miles away. For the teams’ R and R day, we’d decided to climb it, a first for me. Women coming down the trail balancing bundles of sugar cane on their heads looked at us as if we were crazy. Why would anyone walk for fun?
The trail zigzagged up the mountain. Those in front would find a vantage point to wave and call encouragement. Every time I came to a difficult place, Lovemore would be there to help me.
After around 90 minutes, the last climbers reached our destination. As we rested, Synthia, the praise band leader, started singing. The Malawians joined her. She switched to call and response, and all of us sang…or at least hummed along.
Surrounded by my teammates, looking over the Malawi landscape, I was filled with gratitude that God continues to call me into community in this place with these people. For some reason known only to God, God has chosen to break down the barriers of distance and culture between Malawi and La Jolla. To paraphrase Colossians 3:11: “Here there is no Muslim or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, Malawian, American, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.”
May God often call us to experience community where it stretches our minds and expands our hearts.