Day 5 in Senegal

First of all, Happy 4th of July! Obviously there’s no celebration of America’s independence in Senegal today, but we know what day it is and what it means. I seldom think of Independence Day without thinking about how dependent we are on God. There’s a Senegalese proverb that says, “The remedy for man is man” (nit-nit ay garabam). And while I think I understand what they mean by that, the only true remedy for man is God. We are dependent upon Him!

Today we traveled to the Cafac (pr. CHEF-ahk, “ch” as in cheese) village, the village that the men visited the first day. It is a “Christian” village, meaning that it is a Catholic village as opposed to being Muslim. The chief didn’t offer us beer today, though. The Catholic priest did! The village chief took us to his church and introduced us to the priest serving that parish. He was a gentle, kind Senegalese man…about my age. After a moment inside his parlor, he rose to retrieve something for us to drink. Our translator said something that we couldn’t understand, and the priest said surprised, “You do not drink beer?!?” He brought us water, and we had a pleasant meeting. I hope to speak to him again on Monday when we return to this same village.

We had to cut our day in the village short because they were having a funeral at 3:00. While I would love to have witnessed the lady’s funeral, our presence would have been intrusive…not to mention that their funerals can go on for days. But we stayed for nearly five hours and ate lunch with them. The dish was called “ceebuyap” (pr. che-boo-YAP, “ch” as in cheese), and was mainly rice with vegetables and meat. It was FaNtAsTiC! I came to Senegal expecting weight loss, but I’m not sure that’s going to happen with food like that!

We’re returning to the village on Monday in order to do what we’d hoped to do today—pray for the sick and the crops, play with the children, and share relevant Bible stories. The funeral prevented us from doing much more than visit and eat.

Becca and I were talking last night about how hard this trip is in some ways. Don’t get me wrong, it’s wonderful. The food has been surprisingly good…and the hotel is basic but adequate. But the language barrier is so hard. Wolof is unlike any language I’ve ever tinkered with; nothing sounds like any word we have in English. And I’m telling you the depth of lostness and the challenge of getting the gospel to the people is overwhelming. A basic concept like sin, for instance, can’t be taken for granted. And if a person doesn’t have a working knowledge of sin, there can be no repentance. And if there’s no repentance, there’s no lordship/soul surrender. Y’see where I’m going with that? And, further, when dealing with the Muslim villages, we have to be patient in building bridges through relationships in order to establish the context to share the gospel. The process works so much slower here than in other missions settings I’ve been to.

Pray for Jason and Dorothea Lee as they serve God and Southern Baptists here. Their task is big, but God is bigger. Being here and experiencing the work makes me want to pray harder for our missionaries and give more to missions. It makes me also want to share my faith back home more intentionally. There’s no reason, with the culture and language barriers gone, that we shouldn’t be far more deliberate in our evangelism. May God make it so…

I love you and miss you!