Guinea: Day #2 – Conakry

So, today was our first real day in Africa.  Our agenda is pretty full and Dan, our roadtrip guide is fairly disciplined at making sure we stick to our schedule.  This morning we began with a time of prayer and working out some details with regard to cooking and dishes, etc.  Then we went and met a lot of the people who work here on the compound, the C&MA shares the space here with a Bible translating organization.  Together they’ve translated most of the NT into 3 or 4 of the main languages here in Guinea.

After that, we set out on our journey into the heart of downtown Conakry to do some grocery shopping for our trip and to do some souvenir shopping.  If you think this was going to grocery stores and shopping in big box spots.  It’s not.  Imagine your closet, now double that space and call that a grocery store.  It’s basically a stand with some food on it.  Some of them are a little bigger but not bigger than a quickie or 7-11.

So we set out to do some shopping, pick up groceries and eat together.  I managed to pick up a few ebony wood carvings and also, my first African outfit.  You know the kind you see everyone wearing if they are from Africa?  It’s absolutely huge and neatly embroidered but made to be a one size fits all.  It’s like a size 48 at the waist and tapers to a normal sized pant leg.  Ha ha.  And the top is hilarious.  I can’t wait to wear it to church on Sunday here in Guinea.

Today as we were walking around at first it was very intimidating.  As Mike Linnen and I spoke we talked about how weird it is when you don’t know the systems.  Like how you buy and sell things, how you greet people, the expectations, etc.  It reminded me a lot of how people feel going to church for the first time.

We ate at a Lebanese restaurant for lunch, did some more grocery shopping in the afternoon and then came home.  In the evening we hung out with a family and heard all about their work here in Conakry.  We prayed for them and then, we hung out with Lisette Lavoie.

Lisette is the C&MA liaison to the national church here.  What that means is that here in Guinea they have their own C&MA church, just like we do in Canada or the US or Australia, and our international workers who are here work along side the national church to reach what we call least people groups.  85% of Guinea is muslim and so the field is still difficult and full of opportunity for IW’s to be involved.  It’s tough but possible to connect, share the story of Jesus with them and see whole families come to know Christ.  Lisette works to train and develop pastors and leaders within the local church here so that they can begin to share Jesus with their friends and neighbours and go into the ‘up-country’ to some of the areas that are still tribal.

The way they described it was like a building with scaffolding on the outside.  As you build the building the scaffolding stays up and once the building is ready, you take down the scaffolding.  The C&MA field team here is like the scaffolding.  The building is the local church and it’s still being built.

Anyway, Lisette told us all about her need for teams to come in and work with the local church to support and train and encourage them to live a life of holiness.  Even though people here are turning to Christ it’s a lot like the Corinthian story where it hasn’t really impacted their day-to-day living.  They acknowledge Christ with their lips but deny him with their actions.  I heard that somewhere.

It’s not at all unlike being in youth ministry.  How many times do I hear the story of people making unwise decisions early on that lead them down a path toward disaster.  The difference is that here, they don’t have a Christian history or parental generations that really know and understand holiness and what it means.  Maybe we don’t either.  hmmmm.

That’s some intense thinking there.

I am still stuck on Saint Patrick though.  I don’t have the time right now to really go into what I mean by that but the more I hear about the situation here in Guinea, with Animism and pagan Christianity the more I appreciate St. Patrick and how he worked in Ireland.  There is a model there for taking the gospel outside our common culture that I think we really need to pay attention to.

Maybe it’s already happening and I am just cluing into it.  I don’t know.  By the end of the day today I feel much more comfortable in Guinea than when I first began this morning.  One thing I learned is that Guinea does not have gangs the same way that Jamaica does.  There is still crime and corruption but it is very different than what existed in Jamaica.

The other thing I discovered about Guinea is that since the massacres of 2 years ago and the installation of a civilian PM, things have really started to calm down here a bit.  Security is still a big deal but there are police and military everywhere in Conakry.  You cannot take pictures of them, they don’t like that, but you can see them working.  I am sure not everything is above board but hopefully more of it is becoming so.

The problems Guinea faces are huge but there is no doubt in my mind that the people of Guinea alone must solve them.  Our aid, our workers, our ingenuity can help them out, but the real hope comes in Guinea’s ability and capability to move forward themselves and it begins with free and fair elections.  Okay, so I got a little political there.  I am sorry.  Guinea is moving in that direction and maybe there’s a little passion now to see this country succeed…

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