Lower Still

Papa God told me to start waking up earlier and taking walks with him and run to get exercise. Today was the first day to start. I want to share a little bit of what I saw and experienced as I walked through our little village of M'Padue.

6:00 in the morning during rainy season, gray cloudy skies with mist in the air, men walking along the side of the road on their way to work somewhere, mamas with babies on their backs sitting in the mud and selling random objects, goats and cows passing me on either side and splashing in all the mud puddles, young girls carrying huge buckets on their heads walking a long way to the river just to get water for the day, children playing, laughing, and waving their hands as an "Azungu" (white person) passes by them. Every person that I saw, stared at me as I walked past simply because they are not used to white people taking a walk through their village.

I could see such curiosity in their faces as they looked at me. "Why is this white girl here and what is she doing?" Not in a rude way but only because all the foreign people that are here in Tete are here for business and they live in the city with big houses and are wealthy and hardly ever step foot in the villages. They have never seen a white person move to their village only because of the love of Jesus.

The house that we are living in right now is in the village of M'Padue which is about 20 minutes from the city where our boys are living in the streets. The land that we have and are building the Shekinah home on is in this village.

It's all about becoming lower still. In order to love people where they are at, we must first get down to their level. This morning as I walked past all these beautiful souls, I simply said "Bon dia!" (goodmorning) and it put a smile on their faces. Something so easy can change someone's whole attitude and bring them joy. It speaks volumes to them that we have left everything we know and are comfortable with in the states, and are now living  here in this completely unfamiliar territory. No running water in the house, ever. Every night we have to fill all of our buckets full of water from our faucet outside if we want to have water for each day. No hot water for a normal shower. Only cold water to take a bucket shower. We are very blessed to have electricity and a TV but our power goes out quite frequently. I could go on for a while about the differences in how I live in the States and how I live here, but none of it really matters. The only thing that matters is if I am becoming as low as I can and loving my Papa God with everything I have in me regardless of my living circumstances, and if I'm loving the person in front of me like He does and getting on their level.

We are here to minister to our boys first, but we can still show love and share Jesus with our own neighbors here. Thats one thing God has been showing me. We can stop and love anyone we come in contact with. Lowering ourselves for love.