Hope

In Rwanda this week, children are out of school, some people are off of work, and they are remembering. Last Friday night (coinciding this year on the calendar with Good Friday), began the week's commemoration of the 1994 Genocide in Rwanda that stole nearly one million lives from the earth.

The country mourns for a week. They wear purple ribbons. They remember and they forget.

In Oklahoma, ten Rwandan students at Oklahoma Christian University asked their classmates and the community to share in this time. The kids and I attended OC's chapel on Friday morning where the Rwandan students planned and led the daily service. The song they chose to sing was "It Is Well." That evening Stan and I attended a service the students planned where the PBS Frontline documentary Ghosts of Rwanda was shown and some of the students shared and prayed.

It was an emotionally exhausting day and weekend, but also one of hope. I just can't describe how much these students mean to us. They are Resilient. Intelligent. Faith-filled. They are the future. Since they came in August, we have gotten to know them on the surface - slowly building relationships and we knew eventually their stories would come in their time. They all have stories. They can't help but have them. And when you consider they were all the ages of my own children when the genocide happened ... well.

This commemoration gave an entre for some of the stories to be shared, but still we will never know or grasp the full horror they experienced and what they lost.

Until God sends our family there (to visit or stay?), I am left to read books and watch videos and movies about what happened. The titles are not pretty and on their own, give a sense of the horror.

The Machete Season
We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families
Left To Tell
This Voice in My Heart
Ghosts of Rwanda
Sometimes in April
Justice on the Grass

One of the students briefly spoke in church Sunday (Resurrection Day!). She said that although she was asked to talk about the genocide, she would instead tell us that the genocide was in the past and so was the crucifixion. Jesus died on the cross and rose from the dead to save all of us ... and as Jesus forgave his killers, Rwandans must also forgive in the name of hope. Powerful.

Last Saturday, Alain traveled to Tulsa with us and we stopped by the praying hands at ORU. He was impressed with the statue. It is amazing. And the scripture at the base of the sculpture can be claimed by this group: Luke 2:52. And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men.