Today, we picked up our permits to go see the Gorillas, we ate Ethiopian food, we did some shopping, and some bird watching too. But it was a very heavy day, one difficult to put into words. Below, I want to share three things: something I wrote in my journal in the morning, a Bible verse, and something I wrote in my journal at night.
“Today, we will go to the Holocaust Museum here in Kigali. We will witness one of the greatest genocides this world has ever known. Help me, Lord. Help me to dare to see. But also to never let go of your promise. “The Lord will surely comfort Zion and will look with compassion on all her ruins; he will make the deserts like Eden, her wastelands like the garden of the Lord” (Isaiah 51:3). You are the God of restoration. And I believe you are already growing a garden out of this blood-soaked land.”
-written on the morning of Sept. 24.
“Therefore, please here this, you afflicted, who are drunk, but not with wine: Thus says your Lord, even your God who contends for His people, ‘Behold I have taken out of your hand the cup of reeling, the chalice of My anger; you will never drink it again.’”
-Isaiah 51:21
Love, my dear love Show yourself to be That more excellent way Answer the machete slashes Across the faces The fingers cut off The churches full of corpses Answer the innocents The little one Slashed to death While still in her Mother’s embrace Patrick, who was A quiet boy, but good And loved to ride His bicycle Answer the child’s sweater With sleeves cut off Doubtless the thin arms They housed as well Answer the child whose Hopes dare rise every time He finds himself in a Busy marketplace: “Will I see a brother of mine?” Answer too this child’s Raw statement of fact: “My parents, I will never see again. But the people who killed them I see everyday.” Love! Oh my dear love! Answer the hatred The explosion of evil You seemed to not answer When the pressure was building Hatred was spawning hatred And where were you? And what were you producing? You seemed to not answer In the eruption Had you but said a word Could not this land have Been spared the blood Of a million lives? And you seem to not be Answering now, when —though things appear to be Booming, thriving, in the mend— There is not yet resolution Much less reconciliation Love, my dear love, Show yourself to be That more excellent way
-written the night after visiting the Genocide Memorial, not really knowing what else to say.
Journey to Gentle Giants 
When so much of life seems completely senseless and evil personified, the words of a song come to mind – “There is a Redeemer, Jesus God’s own Son, blessed Lamb of God Messiah, Holy One. Thank you, O My Father, for giving us Your Son, and leaving Your Spirit till the work on earth is done.” Keith Green
Thanks so much Aunt Connie! So true, and I love that song.
I’ve never read such a deeply accurate expression of the unanswered question – where was God’s love, where was love itself that conquers all – in the genocide? Thanks for sharing this. It’s helpful to read an honest “I don’t understand” and knowing that somehow, still, our Father loves, understands & we’ll know a lot more when we get home!
i am so loving what i am reading. despite all, God will still be God and his love will forever endure. oh how i love JEsus