Day 4 - A Day at Migoli

Bwana Yesu asifiwe (Praise the Lord!) – Amen

Pastor Carrie and Pastor Dale preached at Migoli and two preaching points, Changalawe and Izazi, so I (Kim Clark) offered to give them a break and draft the blog today. I didn’t quite know what I was getting myself into as I volunteered too early in the day to realize how hard it was going to be to summarize today, but I’ll do my best.

I’m not sure that I’ve ever been as excited to go to church as I was this morning. This was the whole point of traveling 20+ hours in an airplane and a 12-hour van ride to Iringa. It was another 90-minute drive out to Migoli, and our van was greeted about a mile from the church with a piki piki (motorcycle) that was decorated with white ribbons. Quickly other piki pikis joined, also adorned with white ribbons. The riders waved branches and the drivers honked their horns loudly. It was a little like a Palm Sunday procession and a little like how we did Peace during COVID in the St. Paul Lutheran Church Parking lot, although think louder and more boisterous honking. Everyone in the village knew we were close by. When we pulled up to the church, we were greeted by several people singing, dancing, shouting, and clapping as we climbed off the bus. Overwhelming doesn’t near describe the feeling.  What a celebration for just simply us, travelers from Wyoming, MN.

I was given a branch to wave as well, and I got to join in the party happening in front of me. As I stood there, with my palm branch in hand, the feeling of realization began to wave over me – I have been praying for the people of Migoli since we joined St. Paul Lutheran in 2014, and all of a sudden I’m here, shaking hands, fist bumping, and high fiving the members of one of our sister parishes. Here we were, all of a sudden, sharing the love of Christ with joy, together.

We were moved from the bus into Pastor Agripa Mgaya’s home, where there was an abundant spread of food in front of us for breakfast. These people have so little, and here they were sharing food for 16 people. Breakfast also included Mandazi (similar to donuts). I’m not sure what the current count is, but as of this morning, Caleb has eaten 15 Mandazi, and Sam was up to 10. 

Pastor Agripa’s home is situated right next to the church. There is no glass on the windows, so the joyful prelude music spread over us as we ate. I was tapping my feet with the music, ready to join in the dancing. Clearly, I have an opportunity back home to bring the energy level up on my prelude music to get people up and dancing before church! 

Before entering the church, we got to spend some time with the secondary students from Migoli. They were easy to talk with as their English was fantastic. They wanted to see pictures from our home. We showed them our frozen lake, and they couldn’t believe we can walk and drive on it in the winter.  Several of the kids touched Nova’s and my blonde hair. Nova joked that she felt a little like Jesus with how many kids wanted to touch her.  

The church was packed. We sat up in the front, off on the side. Looking towards the back, at least half of the church was filled with youth from the secondary school. The other half was full of families with several young children, and only a handful of people were potentially old enough to be grandparents.  When you picture Migoli as we pray for them, imagine a church filled with youth. The people that we partner shoulder to shoulder with represent the future of the church.

The service was filled with different groups of people singing and dancing. Some songs were acapella, but most were recordings run through a small sound system, and the singers sang loudly, covering up everything on the recordings except the instruments. The music was loud, the dancing and smiles were huge and genuine. There was joy radiating out from the people in front of us.

Pastor Dale and Pastor Carrie gave a combined sermon that was translated by Pastor Msigwa. Their sermon was about our mission statement – Sharing Christ’s Love with Joy. When Pastor Dale had a former student (Ezekiel Ole Sisine) translate this statement yesterday into Swahili, he changed it slightly, and meaningfully, to Sharing Christ’s Love with Joy, Together. That’s what we did today, we shared Christ’s love with joy with the people of Migoli, and the ability to do so was indescribable.

The service ended shortly after the Lord’s Prayer, which we said in both Swahili and English and somehow, when we spoke it synchronously, we got to the “Amen” together, an unexpectedly touching moment of the service.

Following the service, the adults stayed in the church, and Caleb, Gabe, Sam, and Nova went outside to play with the other children. They got out the soccer ball and frisbee that we brought with. The soccer ball is special – it’s a One World ball. It isn’t filled with air so it can’t pop. That matters because the soccer field behind the church was just dirt and was filled with rocks and burrs. All of the kids had a fun time playing together. There was a lot of laughter despite the language barrier as the younger kids did not yet know English. We left the ball and frisbee behind for the children of Migoli to continue to play with. 

Inside the church we shared updates. Migoli has 562 Christians between the church and it’s six preaching points. Some of Migoli’s goals in the next three years are to build a kindergarten in Changalwe (preaching point) to serve children from the Maasai tribe for their first 3 years so they do not have to walk as far to school, to complete construction of a church in Izazi (another preaching point), and to build a church in Nyamahatu (also a preaching point).  

We shared that we had called Pastor Carrie to serve our church last year, that we now have a preschool (St. Paul Lutheran Discovery Center Preschool), our bridging the gap financial goals, and our church’s joys and heartache through baby David’s life.

Following the meeting, they served us yet another amazing meal for lunch. One of my biggest worries about this trip was not knowing what Gabe, a notoriously picky eater would eat. Turns out – he eats everything!  That says volumes over how great the food tastes.

After lunch, we said farewell and asante sana (thank you very much) to the church members, gave more handshakes, high fives, and hugs, and got back on the bus. We then had a chance to visit two of the preaching points – Changalwe and Izazi. We were greeted with more waving branches, singing, and clapping at both sites when we got off the bus. They shared more songs and dances with us – the Maasai at Changalwe had an incredible shoulder shake that they did while they sang songs of praise.  At Izazi, we prayed over the foundation of the church, which has been dug at the site of what will be there new church.  
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It was truly a day of worship, joy, and praise with new friends that we met at Migoli and it’s preaching points. What incredible love we witnessed today, and what a gift this trip has been to share Christ’s love with joy, together.