adventures in Lohutok

last week, i visited a friend who works in the Lopit Mountains, in a village called Lohutok. it was my first time in any place in Sudan other than Yei. i thoroughly enjoyed my relaxing visit, consisting mostly of movies, reading, and much needed conversation. Lohutok is a beautiful area comprised of several villages neatly nestled into the rocky mountain side. to get around, one must navigate steep stony paths. it's quite a demanding and exhausting task, especially in the heat of the afternoon sun, but not for the children, who are so accustomed to this terrain that they effortlessly run up and down the mountain.

my favorite past-time was going to what the people call the "river" (in reality, a stream that runs down the bare rock and gathers into a pool about thigh-deep at the bottom). the people come here to bathe, wash clothes, and generally cool off. it was so refreshing to lie in the water gently trickling down the rock, and sliding into the pool with all the kids was a lot of fun.

the children of Lohutok are a lot like the kids i know. they love visitors and immediately learn new people's names. within a few days, most people knew i was Irina, and the kids made up a funny, cute song and dance that they would perform every time they said my name. the long-termers there are given Lopit names that reflect something about them. my friend was named Iyodo, which means "the one who's stomach is missing" (because she's thin). most of the villagers are accustomed to white people, as missionaries have lived among them for years. but some toddlers still have not gotten used to the sight and would wail hysterically every time we approached on the path. their older siblings loved messing with them and would carry them right up to us, exacerbating their hysteria. it gave us all a good laugh.

the several missionaries working here live in simple houses among the people right in the villages. spending 10 days there, i realized how difficult this is and began to appreciate anew living on a secluded compound. people talk, children play, radios blare until late into the night. roosters begin crowing at about 3am, and there are hundreds of roosters. the people are up and about at 6am. it's loud all the time. there is no town and no market. the missionaries have their food flown in from Kenya by missionary airlines once every 3 months, and they can only get things that won't spoil without refrigeration. the Lopit people are largely unreached. there is a lot of witchcraft and witch doctors, theft, fighting. one of the villages' main industries and sources of income is beer production, and consumption of it is completely normal, even for young children. i thought living in Yei was hard; this is much harder. i gained huge admiration and respect for the missionaries that live and work here, some who have been there for 4+ years. their faithfulness, patience, boldness, and commitment to the Gospel is truly astounding.



the Lord is doing great things in Lohutok. a good number of people have come to Jesus throughout the years and have left lifestyles of sin behind. these ones are shining lights and examples in their communities.

i flew out on one of the missionary planes and got a little tour of Sudan on my way to Yei. the pilot had to pick up pastors and their wives from various cities and bring them to Yei for a conference. we flew all the way up to Agok, which is about 20 miles from the North-South border and the land of the Dinka people, the largest tribe in southern Sudan. it was really cool seeing different terrain and different-looking Sudanese. it got hotter and hotter as we went further north, again causing me to be grateful to live in Yei, which has the coolest climate of all of Sudan. (dry season is pretty brutal for me here; i can't imagine what it must be like in these areas). the pilot let me sit in the co-pilot seat and even allowed me to fly and land the plane! no joke; it was so fun.

i returned to Yei and was warmly greeted by all the children and staff throwing their arms around me as i exited the car. it felt good to be loved. i am glad to have spent some quality time with my friend and to have seen some more of this land that i live in. and i am grateful to live in Yei and have a new appreciation for this town and our compound.

(see Facebook for photos)

free

one great thing that is/has happened to me in this hard season is such freedom from obligation and pressure. i didn't even realize i had lived like this for so long until i got so tired i could not sustain it anymore. ever since i became a Christian, i've led Bible studies, done outreaches, discipled people, held prayer meetings...i've always been doing something ministry-wise, i'll call it official ministry. i loved Jesus and i wanted to make Him known to others. i read His commands and wanted to follow, to please Him. my heart was sincere. but most of the time, i felt obligated to do the official ministry stuff because i was a Christian and this came with the package. there was not much enjoyment in it for me.

once i came to Sudan and the comforts and legitimate pleasures i was used to were removed from my life, i just could not keep doing ministry. obligation alone, my own self-inflicted pressure, was not enough to keep me going anymore. there were so many times when i would say to myself, "ok Irina, do a Bible study for the kids tonight. they love Bible studies and they'll grow from it, just do it." but the evening would come around and i just could not pull myself together to do it. i was too exhausted in my heart. i was not being poured into, filled up, encouraged because my friends were not around to talk to, i couldn't access IHOP webstream, and i couldn't drive down the road to an amazing worship meeting...when these sources of strength and infilling are present, even if i truly don't want to be doing a certain ministry thing, obligation is a strong enough prompting to cause me to do that thing. even though doing the ministry things did not feel life-giving most of the time, because i was filled up in my spirit and prospering in my heart, i could manage to exert the effort necessary to do it. out here, obligation lost its power. i completely stopped doing everything official, organized ministry - Bible studies, outreaches, prayer meetings. once i stopped it all and completely removed myself from it, i understood the pressure that i had been living under my entire Christian life. i came back to Sudan and all i wanted (and still want) to do in the area of ministry is talk with the older kids and play with the little ones. that's it. i have no desire and no energy in my heart to do anything else....and i realized i don't HAVE to. Mike Bickle said an amazing thing in his Song of Solomon teaching that i'm currently listening to: "Everything you do won't ultimately matter if its roots weren't found in passion for God. The biggest ministry means nothing if it wasn't flowing out of love for God." this was the most freeing statement i have ever heard. God, you mean i don't HAVE to do weekly Bible studies? i don't HAVE to go on outreaches and evangelize? Exactly, i don't have to. i am loving simple, life-on-life ministry these days, the kind where you just talk with people, laugh with them, tell jokes, talk about Jesus. i am not at all saying Bible studies, outreaches, etc are not valid. they are totally necessary and good and Jesus clearly calls us to disciple, preach, teach, minister. but if it's not coming out of desire and true enjoyment of what you're doing, if the majority of the fuel is obligation to the Gospel, then it's just not worth doing. it will make you tired, unhappy, and anxious for the thing to end.

i feel very free. every day i do what i want to be doing. of course issues and conflicts arise that must be resolved and of course no one ever wants to deal with that stuff. of course there are things daily that i have to do that i may not feel like doing - that's life. what i'm saying is, in my work and ministry, i only do what i want to do, what makes my heart happy, what gives me pleasure and satisfaction, what feeds my soul. this is a much better way to live, and i think i'm gonna keep it.