Truth, Insight, Alligators

Friends and Family,

I am sorry that my blogs are so long, I truly do try to shorten them, but there is always SO much to tell, and today is no different. This is been an eventful weekend, so I am going to start at the beginning on Friday . . . this might be a two blog weekend . . . we'll see what happens.

Do you remember the new girl I was telling you about; Godiya? The spunky one . . . well, she has a rather rapid change of attitude and heart this past week. The staff was alerted to her change in behavior and we all began praying about it and came to the correct conclusion that there was way more to her story than she had first told us. Godiya had told us that she was an orphan and so as far as we knew she had no family, so when she told us on Tuesday that she dreamed that her grandmother had died and she wanted to go and visit her to make sure she was okay, we were a little shocked and confused. Mamma Sate and the uncles decided that we had better take her to her village to get to the bottom of her story.

It turned out that Godiya's village, which was about an hour and half drive away was near the village of two of our older boys who are in the reconciliation process with their families. We decided we would take these two boys, Joseph and Nemiah to visit their since we were going to be trekking out that direction anyways. Joseph had not seen his family in over 4 years, and Nemiah hadn't seen is family in a year or so. So, Nicky, Pastor Jaygay, Mamma Sate, Joseph, Nemiah, Godiya and I all piled into Nicky's car to bring these boys to see their families, and get to the bottom of Godiya's story.

Taking these boys to see their families was an amazing experience. When Joseph arrived in his compound people didn't recognize him at first, but once they figured out who he was, all the women began screaming and crying and hugging him. They were overjoyed to see him. It was an amazing experience to be a part of this boy's homecoming and to see that all of these policies we are working on for the reconciliation program are really, really important.

Nemiah received a similar homecoming with his family. Although this home still has struggles this 16 year old boy wants to be reconciled with his family so that he can teach them about Jesus Christ. I was floored when Nicky shared that with me. He is only 16 and he wants to go back into a difficult situation so that he can preach to his family, what an amazing young man. God works in such amazing ways.

I don't know if there are words to describe what it was like to be a part of these boys’s homecoming. I was overwhelming and exciting. Please keep them and their families in your prayers.

So after drinking a HUGE orange Fanta (you all know how much I love pop) and peeing in the maize (corn) we were off, this time bound for Godiya's village. When we finally arrived in Godiya's village, she jumped out of the car almost before we stopped driving and ran to "her grandmothers" house . . . when we catch up to Godiya, we see that she is hugging this very confused looking crippled woman who is sitting in the dirt doing her laundry. Pastor and Mamma try talking to the woman, but she is just looking back at us very confused . . . after a few awkward minutes she doesn't respond to anything said and she goes back to doing her laundry. Godiya, starts in about how she wants to stay and take care of "her grandmother" . . . we are all thinking "we can't leave her here . . ." A few more awkward moments pass by before God greatly answered our prayers for guidance and wisdom.

Two school teachers from the village just happened to be walking by while all his was going on, and came over, probably at first because they saw white people. As the two teachers began to talk with Pastor and Mama, they quickly begin to put the scatter pieces together of what was going on. All of the sudden they grabbed Godiya by the arm and began yelling. Nicky and I were standing there very confused asking Pastor to translate, but he was just as confused as we were. The two women begin walking off with Godiya and the four of us with rather confused expressions on our faces, followed after. We begin to pick up a few words in English as we are following this crazy scene and we learn that actually Godiya has a family, just on the other side of the village . . . "A FAMILY?!?!" we were all thinking . . . "we were under the impression that she was an orphan" we told the two women.

Thankfully these two women began explaining the whole situation two us. Godiya is not actually an orphan. She is one in ten children, and both of her parents are living. As it turns out she ran away from home about a month previous to when we brought her back. Everything that she had told us was a lie and that woman that she has jumped out of the car to greet, wasn't even her grandmother, they weren't even related!!

While this story is unfolding THE ENTIRE village came out to see what the commotion was and then to stare at the two white people. It was quite the experience let me tell you. I think that two white people being in the village might have been bigger news than the fact that Godiya was back . . . People literally stood there and stared at us and followed us around. . . it was a bit like being on show. The two teachers took charge of the situation and took us all over the village, sharing the story of what had happened. We met the pastor and another woman involved with the Church who feed us lunch (which was wonderful because we were starving by then). I have to share this side note with you because I thought it was great . . . Nigerian food is really spicy, so after eating lunch I pulled out some gym I thankfully had in my bag and offered it to all the women in the room . . . it was hilarious sitting in this house chewing mint gum with all of these wonderful Nigerian women. It was a moment. :)

Anyways, we eventually met Godiya's mother and explained to her the situation. According to her mother Godiya was a pretty rebellious child and they had no idea where she was while she was gone. They hadn't really tried to look for her, because with nine other children it wasn't a priority. The mother thanked us for bringing her back and we left after praying with the family, or more accurately, we prayed with a random assortment of people from the village who some how become involved in the whole process.

WOW! That is a day for ya. It was crazy. It was hard to know how to feel. I was sad that Godiya had lied to us and confused about why she would have wanted us to go back to her village in the first place. Did she really think we wouldn't have figured it out and would just leave her there with that random woman? Why did she run away in the first place? I just had so many questions, and I still do . . . It is sad because Godiya never apologized for lying; she just wanted to make sure she got her clothes from us. When I asked her why she did it, she said it didn't matter and that she liked to be punished . . . the whole thing was very strange. I am thankful that God gave the staff such good insight and lead us to the truth so quickly, because she could have caused a lot of problems with our other girls if we hadn't gotten to the bottom of it. I know that God was protecting us, our ministry and the other girls by uncovering the truth.

Okay, so I just have to share this one last random story with you . . . I couldn't stop laughing. It is really common here for people to run up to your car and try to sell you things, like fruit when you are slowing down or coming to a stop. Well, on the way home, we were slowing down in a village, and of course a huge group of people run up to us trying to sell us fruit and olives. I wasn't paying much attention, when all of the sudden Mamma starts yelling "look, look!!" Confused, Nicky and I started looking around . . . searching out my window I finally saw what Mamma was yelling about. A man was holding a two to three foot long ALLIGATOR by the tail and he was trying to sell it to us (people eat them here)!! It was one of the funniest things I have ever seen in my life . . . (at least at that point in my life . . . Saturday brought a few more crazy experiences). I couldn't stop laughing! An alligator! I wish I would have had my camera so I could show you all . . . it was awesome.

Anyways, that was my Friday. See how hard it is to shorten my blogs! How could I possibly leave any of that out?!!?

Thank you for your prayers and encouragment! I am so thankful for all of you!!