A God Appointed Conversation

Have you ever had the experience of walking away from a conversation knowing that THAT was no accident? Have you ever been on the receiving end of a conversation, a phone call, a message of some sort, and you just knew that what was just said was from " God's lips to your ears" ? I love it when that happens. I have a friend who says there is no such thing as as "coincidences" but only "godincidences". I believe this to be true......I believe that God speaks to us in a myriad of ways. He speaks to us through His word. He speaks us to through music. He speaks to us through His creation. He speaks to us in prayer. And he speaks to us through our fellow human beings. Late one night around a dying camp fire in Uganda, I am certain I experienced a God appointed conversation with a young man from Kenya.



The fact is, I should never have been there. As I have said, chronic exhaustion was pretty much the norm for this trip. The SLAM people seemed to have a philosophy that life is too short to waste any of it sleeping! They pretty much kept us on the go from 0600 till after 11pm every night. And to top it off, I had lots of trouble sleeping. I think I'm probably too old for sleeping on the ground anymore. I just never could get comfortable in that sleeping bag on the hard packed earth. I tossed and turned a whole lot. So, generally speaking, I tried to turn in as early as I could- knowing that the odds were long that I'd get any rest at all. This particuar evening, I decided a different approach was in order. I thought maybe I would just stay up until I was falling down exhausted and then turn in, hoping that the exhaustion would work for me instead of against me. I decided to sit up by the camp fire and write in my journal.


As always, the Africans were up late, sitting around the fire, and talking. They too were from the school of philosophy that humans need little sleep! As I was writing, the young man sitting next to me struck up a conversation. As I indicated, he was from Kenya. His name was Naman.


Naman began sharing some of his life story with me. He is the last from his family. In January of this year, his only remaining sibling, the eldest brother named David, died tragically, suddenly, unexpectedly. David was 53 years old. He simply fell ill and died. Naman does not know why.

David was the classic case of the eldest child from a family made good. He lived and worked in South Africa as a director and trainer for legal services. An educated man, David held a PhD. He had been planning his retirement and his move back to Kenya for many years. At age 55, he would have been able to do this and then work full time for his foundation, which was his passion.


David, was a man of God. He worked tirelessly for the people of his village. He used to tell Naman that too many Africans were concerned about improving their houses. Until one has built a house for God, he said, there is no need to worry about your own! David built God a house in his village. Naman has promised to send me pictures of the church his brother established in Kenya.


David wanted to help his younger brother. He had seen to his education. Naman wants to go to seminary. David had promised to send him. He was to start this September. In the meantime, he was back and forth to Kenya from South Africa tending to his foundation which looks after the welfare of over 180 widows and orphans in their village. Then suddenly, his life ended. An unfinished life from our perspective, perhaps. But David's work and his dream go on.


For Naman, life has changed. His plans for seminary are shelved. He is now responsible for his brother's widow, really his only remaining relative now- and the responsibility for all those widows and orphans? Now resting on his 26 yr old shoulders.....


He said to me "I don't know how, but I know that God will provide. This much I know. I want to tell the stories of the children. I want to see if I can arrange sponsorships for them so that they can go to school.". I told him of the child in Uganda that I sponsor. He was very attentive and interested. He gave me his brother's business card and asked if he might contact me thru email after the trip. I said of course. We exchanged contact information. I told him that my church was a big place and that I have many friends in the US with whom I would share his story. I told him that God does indeed provide, and that help would surely come to him because of his obedience in taking over his brother's work. Because care of the widow and the orphan is God's highest calling, God will bless the work of his hands. He is already doing so.....


I believe that God nudged me in my exhaustion to sit up late that night. I stayed up past 1 am talking with Naman.  It is the only night I didn't turn in shortly after our final evening meeting. As he was speaking of his work with the widows and orphans I had the thought "this is why God put me around the campfire this evening. He wants me to hear this story. He wants me to be moved by it. He is arranging help for Naman". This is the way God works. He has every piece of the puzzle and He knows exactly how they fit together and are interrelated. He brings them together in ways we cannot begin to imagine. It is my hope that I will hear from Naman soon. God arranged for a woman from a distant land to be sitting in a field in Uganda next to a dying campfire to hear a story from a young man from Kenya. Two people who had not a snowball's chance in hell of ever meeting, but for the grace of God. I recognize the hand of God in this. I am anxious to see what the next step will be..... PS: that night was the first decent night's sleep I had had in 6 days! Shalom!