Dear Friends and Family,

       I'm sorry that I haven't blogged in a while, my life has kind of been crazy lately. I am back in Wichita now, we ended up finishing our trip to Mali early. A quick update. We were in Mali till about April 9th because there was a coup (a coup is where the military takes over the government) in the country which made all of us have to leave the country because of some unrest with all of that. I believe that it was for the best even though it was hard to leave. We then went from Mali to Florida to finish our studies at the Heart Institute. We were discussing all that God had been teaching us and why we had to leave early. Our team was having a debrief time there as well.
    
      For one of my classes we had to write a final paper on our experience and what we learned.  I thought it was a good summary of the trip and wanted to share it with you all.
  
    I would also love to see you all at some point! Thank you for all of your prayers and support throughout this whole trip! God really used it for the best! I love you all, Rachel
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The Experience that Changed My Life

            This paper is a reflection on an experience that didn’t go according to my plans or my expectations. However, isn’t life like that? You will never know exactly what will happen, you just have plans, but plans change sometimes and that’s ok too. We were to be staying in Mali, West Africa at IBR, a seminary in Bougouni, hosted there by Joseph Camara. We also would be staying with our host Mama Sako in Bamako. We were there a total of eleven weeks. Shorter then the five months we were expecting but like I said, life doesn’t always go according to plans.

 For my first time overseas, my teammates and I left the airport in Omaha Nebraska with tears, hugs, and the expectations for quite the adventure. I had never been out of the country and not only was this my first trip, this trip would be six months long. Quite a long first trip if you ask me, however, I could not be more excited for all that I was about to learn and experience over the next six months. We spent three weeks in Florida at the Heart Institute to start off our trip. Upon arrival, we had no idea what this place was, what we were going to learn, or what stories and good times we would have. In the three weeks we learned how to eat cactus, gut a fish and kill and gut a chicken, use the bathroom in a hole in the ground, shower in solar showers, and many other things. We learned a lot about third world living and how to use things like fish farms and gardens. We met many people that had been missionaries or had studied overseas before, so they had a lot of insights for us. Heart  Institute was a good experience for us and I felt more prepared for Mali once I had been at the Heart.

            We left the States the end of January and we were off to see what we could learn. Upon arrival in Mali we were met with our hosts, Mama Sako and Joseph Camara. I knew when I met them that they would impact my life on a very deep level and they will teach me things I had no idea I needed to learn. I was in a way relieved to see them even though I had never met them until this night. Our first impressions of Mali were different then I thought they would be.

            When we arrived at the Sako’s house, we were greeted with warm welcomes and wonderful food! They were all so glad that we would be staying with them for the next month or so. We were shown our rooms and I was surprised at the concrete block of a room. It was a room with four plain concrete walls and it had two beds. That was all that was in the rooms. We had mosquito nets and a roll of toilet paper on our beds as well. I looked at it oddly but kept going with looking around. There was a big metal door on each of the rooms that Uncle Sako told us to lock every night when we went to sleep. I didn’t think much of it but soon would realize how thankful I am for that door.

            We found the bathrooms and showers. They were both again four concrete walls with a door, without a lock and no roof. I already knew it would be an experience by just what we view, as normal things like a bathroom in America, are not so normal for us in Mali. I saw why I received a roll of toilet paper, because they didn’t supply any in the bathroom. They also gave us a bucket and a cup for our showers since they didn’t have running water at all. I looked at the bucket and my first thought was that I would need two of those buckets for one shower! I was already being challenged by the culture and way of life and we had only just arrived.

            Another thing I was very skeptical about in Mali was the food. Much to my surprise and delight I fell in love with Malian food! I love it and have actually learned how to make some and am cooking it here in the states as well. Communally, Malians eat meals with one big bowl in the middle of everyone. They cool it off a bit with a fan, and then everyone starts eating. Thankfully the Sako’s and Camara’s understand that Americans don’t do that and are not used to that, so they were gracious with us. However, I learned to love eating with my hands and I didn’t always have to eat with a plate or silverware. That came in handy when we would go and visit pastors in villages or when eating with large groups of Malians.

            Uncle Sako is involved in CEF (Child Evangelism Fellowship) in Mali. He is one of the representatives and his passion for saving the lives of children is evident. We were able to go to a few of his meetings relating to CEF while in Bamako, so that was very interesting for us. He is also a part of the EEPM. The EEPM is one of the two church groups in Mali. It is an organization that is over many churches in Mali, kind of like a church denomination. Uncle Sako and Uncle Joseph are both involved in the EEPM along with one of our other professors who at the time was the president. After we left Mali, Uncle Joseph got elected EEPM president. Now, he is going to be taking that position and his family will be moving to Bamako to be able to better serve there. He will be turning IBR over to another man that will take on his past role as director.

            We were able to take some language classes from Uncle Sako as well. We learned some French, which is the official language of Mali and some Bambara, which is the most widely spoken language in Mali. About eighty percent of people speak Bambara in Mali. Once we left Bamako, after our language classes ended and Uncle Joseph was ready for us, we packed up our things and headed to IBR in Bougouni. Little did I know how much I would love Bougouni and all the people that lived there. It would soon be referred to as home.

            After arriving in Bougouni, we were shown to our house and introduced to all the students at IBR. Most of the students were sent to the seminary by their districts. A lot of them were there on scholarships, because they could not afford an education like the one they were receiving. There were four families and three of them had children. We would be able to work with them, learn from them, and become their friends. I couldn’t wait to learn even more. Our Bambara was not very good but they didn’t mind. They would help us out along the way and encourage us to keep learning! We learned more and more by just living with them.

            After arriving in Bougouni I also met Tanti Mart, who is Uncle Joseph’s wife, their three children, Ba Musa, who is their grandmother, and the woman who helps them, her name is Rebekah. I would come over and talk with Tanti Mart, ask her questions, and learn how to cook Malian food. She is very wise, patient, and you can tell she loves the Lord with her whole heart. In Mali, the women are not often sought out and asked for their opinions by their husbands or other people. However, Uncle Joseph always sought Tanti Mart for her opinion or wisdom on something. He would tell people he would talk to his wife first before making a decision on something. To me, that was very important on the way their relationship was. Even though culturally women don’t share their opinion, as Christians their marriage was not like traditional Malian marriages.

            I gained much from all that I have learned from Tanti Mart and I was also blessed to be able to develop a friendship with Rebekah. She became one of my close friends in Mali. She taught me many things and even though I couldn’t understand her very well, we would laugh at language mistakes I would make or she would laugh when I didn’t do something the way they did. We would spend afternoons in the garden watering plants and trying to talk. I would always ask her what things were called and she was always concerned that I would get sun burned. (I did many times but didn’t care.)

            One of the things I loved the most in Mali was getting to spend time with the people. I would get to help the women in the morning with sweeping and cooking breakfast, and then we would just be able to talk. I helped the Kulibali family, in particular, Anna who was the mother of four children. We could not communicate much but I had been given the same last name so we had that in common and she was taking classes from the seminary. She was the only woman taking classes with the men. Typically woman do not go to seminary, but she did so that she could better help her husband in the church by counseling women or whatever she could help with. I would also go and just sit and talk with Ba Musa, Tanti Mart, and Rebekah in the mornings we didn’t have class or in the afternoons. I loved just talking and living life with these women. They taught me many things and I wish I could have spent more time with them.

            While being in Mali I learned so much about the culture and the wonderful people that live there. However, one thing I learned a lot about was myself. I had lots of time to sit and think during my time in Mali. In the first month and a half when we were in Bamako, there were many days I would sit and read a book, journal, spend quality time with God, or just think. We would have class in the mornings and have the afternoons for naps, teatime, or personal time. Often times I would spend hours journaling and spending time with God. Not at first, but over time I longed to spend time with God. Some days it was a hard day or difficult to even get through without my time with God. I’m not saying that because I am super spiritual because I’m not. But I am saying that because the more time I spent talking to God and in his word, the more I can not function without him.

            Many people said it would be hard to live in community while on this trip. I thought that was true but I had never really spent this much time somewhere unfamiliar with a culture I knew nothing about. My teammates were really great for me. We had daily reflection times together while in Bamako over what we had been learning. Not only was it fun to see what other people were learning through their time with God. It was also a personal challenge to be in the Word daily, because your day was coming up to share what you had been learning. It seems like that’s a bad reason to be in the word, however, for some of us that was our accountability. We had each other and learned a lot from each other as well. Having that accountability was very good for me. It was a good way to get in a rhythm of spending quality time with God and also making it a habit by spending time daily.

The first month in Mali was really hard for me because I missed my family a lot. I didn’t realize how much I needed them and loved them until I did not have connection to them except once a week. For me, that was another thing that pointed me towards Christ. He took away something that was very important to me and had me rely on Him for my strength and encouragement. I also learned to rely and confide in my team, without my close-knit family around to me. Through that first month we did not have a lot of team conflict but we had some hard personal times adjusting to the new rhythm of life.

Once we arrived in Bougouni is when community became hard. We had to come up with a system for cooking, cleaning, and other things that had to get done. We didn’t have someone telling us what to do and we had some personality clashes. However, we learned to work together and we ended up having teams of two for one meal cooking and one meal cleaning everyday. We also would rotate the people on the teams so that we all had the opportunity to work with everyone. Some weeks it was very smooth and other weeks it was a little more of a challenge to work together. Through those times for me, when it was hard to be with my team and I didn’t have a connection to home, I would go to God. Not just because I had no one else to talk to, but because I could not say or do the right thing without him. I read First Corinthians 13 daily for months because I had to learn how to be kind and loving to my teammates.

I have always thought of myself as a kind, loving, and joyful person. I have always thought I could get along with anyone and I had lots of friends. Why couldn’t we be friends, I was a great person to be around. Little did I know how unloving, not kind, and definitely not joyful I could be! There were times when I just would not talk to anyone who spoke English because I knew if I talked to my teammates I would not be kind. There were also days that I just didn’t make time for God and I was a mess. I would be rude, upset, not lovable, and definitely not joyful. I’m not saying the days I did spend with the Lord were always perfect days because they weren’t, but I continued to seek God and his plan for me while I was there.

I did notice how different I was if God was driving me. If I tried to control things, my life was slowly falling apart. When I give my day, attitude, goals, and really anything else to God to control, he would take it and I would know He would help me to deal with things in the right way. I’m not saying it was perfect but it was not controlled by human power but God power. I wrote in my journal daily, where I would pray that God would take control of my life, dreams, and my day. It wasn’t something that I just prayed once and it was fine. It was a continual thing, because I love to control things. My strength had to come from the Lord.

From the time at the beginning of the trip at Heart to the end where I’m back at Heart again, I feel like I’m a different person. Not necessarily physically but emotionally, spiritually, and globally. I don’t just care about clothes, my car, what people think of me, who I need to impress, but rather, what I can do in the world, who I am in Christ, what He has called me to, and that I cannot live a life of passivity. I have to live an active life that is God focused and global driven. As one of my teachers said, I will be ruined forever after all the things I have learned while on the Edge. And it is true! I can never look at the world the same again. I see hurt, I have lived with people who are just like me and are longing to have a place in this world. I have met people who are poor, rich, sick, healthy, and they are just like me. Created in God’s image and dearly loved by him. If my Father and Lord can love these people that are half way around the world from me, and he cares about the wars and famines there, why shouldn’t I? Why should I ever be ok with an easy life?

I was deeply challenged, while in Bamako for the second time, during our Local Theology class to not settle for a simple and easy life. I was in the middle of culture shock; I wanted to go home, see my family, drink milk and eat cheese, I wanted to sleep in my soft bed with air conditioning, I wanted to be able to wear shorts and speak English all the time, I wanted to be viewed as competent and able to do things and not be at the level of most Malian children, both linguistically and with cultural ability. I was hot and tired. Was I going to quit? Was I going to just tap out and go home?

When all the political tension started happening and we woke up to gunfire one day and then later found out there had been a coup. We could leave yes, but what about everyone who lived in Mali? What about all the lives that could be in jeopardy of becoming increasingly harder as the political tension rose? Could they just tap out and leave? No, they couldn’t. What if God is calling me to a life where I won’t have nice things, where I won’t speak English or have air conditioning and quite possibly not see my family for long periods of time? Am I willing to go if he says go? Will I be able to trust that God’s way is better then mine? I hope I can, and the more time I spend in the Word, the more time I want to do whatever it takes to feed God’s sheep!

In John 21:17b-18 Jesus is talking to Peter about following him and dying to himself to follow the Lord. He says, Feed my sheep. I tell you the truth, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go. Do I love the Lord enough and want to serve him enough to go where he wants me to go even if it’s not easy? I think so but I pray daily that He will take over my life and lead me where He wants me to go.

After going to Mali, I have learned so much! I have learned a lot about myself, and how selfish I can be. I have learned even more about how deep the love of God is. And I have seen how supportive my family is of whatever God calls me to do, even if it’s hard. I have experienced the love of people that do not share my language or know me from anywhere but we are connected not only through my host families but also through Jesus Christ! I have been blessed to be accepted into people’s families who share my Malian last name, and through their willingness to show hospitality to me.

One example of being able to share together was church. I have not been to a traditional American church service in about five months and that has been alright. I have had the privilege to be involved with a body of believers that worship the same God as we do in America! They might be half way around the world but we worship the same God! They have different styles of music or not speak my language, but they love the Lord and sing praises to Him! They have one type of hymnbook that most of the churches sing from. They are a lot of the same traditional hymns that we have, however, they have an African twist on them. Church is expressive, loud, active, and creative. They all know how to dance! I am a white woman and cannot do half the stuff they did. I looked ridiculous trying to even move the same as them let alone sing the words correctly. But even though I messed up the words and look silly trying to move to the songs like they did, they loved me anyway.

 During my time in Mali I learned to laugh at myself. There were so many times I made cultural and linguistic mistakes and I just had to laugh because they would laugh at me. They don’t judge, they know you are learning and will help you along even if it’s funny at times. Church was one of those times that I was challenged a lot spiritually. I was not challenged because I was not being fed, but because through all the services I went to I couldn’t understand the words, however, I had the references to the passages they preached and God spoke to me. Through all the singing, all the moving, and even in the sermon times God spoke to me. He addressed things I was dealing with and addressed things I needed to focus more on. He opened up new meaning to passages they would preach on, and prove to me over and over that these where His people as well! We might do things differently or live in different places but He loves them just as much as he loves me. They may smell, sing different then I was used to, or they may be breast-feeding in church but they are on the same level as I was. My Lord loves them and made them in his image.

I was challenged many times when being in Mali to be humble. The Malians would cater to us a lot. They would give up their chair, meal, car, or spot in line for us white Americans. They would do special things for us and pay us special attention. Some times I would catch myself expecting it after a while. That was hard for me, because we were constantly reminded of either how different we were or how honored they were trying to treat us. I would get upset within the first months of being in Mali by being catered to. They wouldn’t let us cook, clean, or help with anything. They served us on hand and foot. I see now and after having some more classes that they were trying to show us the upmost honor and respect they could provide. They would see us and immediately act differently. I wondered if it would always be that way, and that was a hard thing for me when thinking about possibly going back to serve full time as a missionary. I don’t know if I’m called to Mali but I feel God’s leading to a similar situation.

Through my experience in Mali and all that we went through there, I believe that God is really challenging how I view missions. While there, we lived and learned with the Malians. They taught us how to do things and I was able to learn under some of the highly respected church leaders there. They showed me how they viewed God and how they worshipped Him. They showed me what it was like to live in community and work and live together. They showed me that they didn’t keep track of giving, but would give if someone were in need because they lived in community together. They were like a family unit and really cared for the wellbeing of each other. I was challenged with how I could live in community as well. How did I treat my team members or the Malians? How do I treat my family back home?

I believe that through this experience, God has really been touching my heart and challenging me with the need around the world. There are ways I can help and there are ways that I can benefit by living in a culture other than my own. I feel called to Medical Missions. I want to become a nurse and somehow use that to help improve the wellbeing of others, while preaching the gospel. Seeing the living conditions and the sicknesses in Mali challenged me. I can help; I can use the gifts and talents that the Lord has given me to help others.

God has given me a passion for the hurting. I don’t know if that’s in the states or a different country, but I do know that I am called to be the hands and feet of Christ, however that looks. I am called to use my talents for His glory and honor. Romans 10:13-15 says, Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. How then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!”

I will be attending a nursing school this fall to study and receive my Bachelors in Nursing. I am anticipating working as a CNA throughout nursing school and using my job as a tool to show Christ’s love to the hurting. I know that I can make a difference and I know that God has given me a special passion for people. I am excited to be able to start working that way in school. I am willing to go on any trips overseas in the future to help prepare me for what God has called me to. I am excited to see where I will go in my life but I am leaving that in the hands of the Lord and following where he leads. Mark 16:15b says, Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation.