![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/97\/2013\/04\/Ariel-e1366638887579-225x300.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nAriel selling her goods.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Every morning, I walk down the \u201cmbala mbala\u201d, the big dirt road that takes me into town, where I find my motorcycle\u00a0taxis. Every morning, I pass the same vendors of peanuts, sugar, salt, tea, and coffee, all wrapped in little plastic\u00a0bags costing no more than about 5 cents. These vendors don\u2019t often sell in quantites larger than this because\u00a0most can\u2019t afford more than 5 cents worth of sugar at a time.<\/p>\n
Through these trips, I have come to know Ariel, who will be having a baby any day now, because I often buy\u00a0peanuts from her. Three of her children are registered for sponsorship through World Vision although none of have\u00a0found sponsors yet. When the World Vision International Leadership team came about a month ago, we asked if\u00a0Ariel would open her home to one of the US executives named David for one night. World Vision believes in the\u00a0importance of even the top leadership fully comprehending the day to day challenges that Gemena community\u00a0members face. The local office in DR Congo wanted the US office to \u201clive it\u201d.<\/p>\n
When I asked Ariel how it went, she laughed as she told us how David pounded \u201cmpondu\u201d (cassava leaves) with\u00a0her and her neighbors. Usually this work is left only for the women, so to see a big white American man accomplishing\u00a0this task was a memory she won\u2019t soon forget. David also carried water on his head from the river to the house,\u00a0and he slept on a bed made of bamboo. I asked if he was afraid during the night and she answered with a\u00a0resounding, \u201cYes! He thought that lions would come attack him!\u201d We both roared at that, knowing there are a\u00a0grand total of zero lions in this entire region.<\/p>\n
Ariel was honored to host a visitor from the US in her home. But more importantly, she was able to build a\u00a0connection with World Vision to not only learn about their programs, but get to know the kind of people that want\u00a0to help her community. It is not often in Gemena that executives of large international non-governmental\u00a0organizations humble themselves enough to sleep on dirt floors and sit on low wooden stools to labor alongside\u00a0the women.<\/p>\n
But this is the example World Vision is setting, and this is the beginning of a deep and committed relationship to\u00a0these people.<\/p>\n
Hope can be found in the smallest of things, even in a sleepover in a mud home under African stars.<\/p>\n
Report This Post<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Below are stories from Congo on hope and resurrection written by Christine Buettgen, a short-term missionary in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). If your church is interested in receiving these materials weekly via email, please email us at covenantkidscongo@covchurch.org and request them today. \u201cIs there any encouragement from belonging to Christ? Any comfort from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16695,16701,16696,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2072","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ground-update","category-hope-resurrection","category-missionary-update","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
Stories of Hope & Resurrection: Week Four - Covenant Kids Congo<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"http:\/\/blogs.covchurch.org\/covenantkidscongo\/stories-of-hope-week-four\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Stories of Hope & Resurrection: Week Four - Covenant Kids Congo\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Below are stories from Congo on hope and resurrection written by Christine Buettgen, a short-term missionary in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). If your church is interested in receiving these materials weekly via email, please email us at covenantkidscongo@covchurch.org and request them today. \u201cIs there any encouragement from belonging to Christ? 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