This week a few pals and I hired a local guide to hike to the historical site of Livingstonia. A wander through town definitely sheds insight on Malawi’s colonial past. The town was founded following Livingstone’s work in Malawi, not by himself, but by a legion of others who felt compelled to carry on the work of ‘saving the poor natives’. While the criticisms of colonialism are wide and deep, the Livingstonian Mission provided much needed medical care and the town became a thriving community that today still has more than 7,000 residents in the surrounding area (or so we were told).
This post however is not a comment on colonial history – or a debate about either the devastation or the good that foreign missionaries brought to Africa. It’s a post about a man named Wisdom and a Sunday walk up a mountain that made me feel as close to home as I have felt in the last three weeks.
As we were making our way up the mountain I was chatting with Wisdom and we were exchanging stories and questions about family, studies, and hopes for the future. I asked him about his siblings. One younger sister and one younger brother. And then I asked about his parents. I wondered what they did. They had both died, Wisdom told me. Years before. Due to illnesses for which medication was unaffordable for the family. And just earlier this week, Wisdom’s grandfather, who had cared for him and his siblings, had passed away. “We’re still in mourning,” he told me, “in case I seem down.” Here was a 23-year-old man, without a living parent or grandparent on the planet, now the sole provider for his siblings, still a student himself, working on weekends to guide tourists like my friends and I up the mountain, apologizing for being down. I know the orphan story is a familiar one across the African continent, but the familiarity of it should never diminish how we receive it.
I could go on and on about how struck I was by the contrast of my world in comparison to that of Wisdom’s. I could speak of the guilt I felt when listening to him, guilt for being born where I was born, how the geography of my birthplace had largely determined the privilege into which I was born. All those things are true. But I’m not sure how helpful it is to echo what has already been said so many times before. Instead, I’d like to tell you of the resilience and faithfulness found in a man named Wisdom.
As we were walking up the mountain Wisdom was singing. I was unsure of what he was singing but it was lovely to listen to. Eventually I asked him what the song was and he said, “it’s a song for God.” He then smiled and translated the lyrics for me. I told him we shared the same faith and the same God. We spoke about the goodness of Christ in our lives, about the hope that continued to be offered in places of uncertainty and hurt. It felt like silent prayer, those moments of walking up the mountain, like worship in the appreciation had for the landscape and beauty laid before us.
It was Sunday. I was missing my community at home, wondering what the morning gathering would be like in the little blue church in Vancouver. And yet here I was – and church services and gatherings of worship were happening in multiple places up the mountain. We’d pass by and Wisdom would translate the lyrics of praise for me. It was beautiful. Here was a man from whom life had taken nearly everything – walking up a mountain to earn a few dollars to support himself and his siblings, handed a list of responsibilities too long for anyone his age, still in mourning of the recent loss of his grandfather, and yet still singing songs to God. What a man. What an example of wisdom and praise. Here, halfway up a mountain in Malawi, my soul felt closer to home than it had in weeks.
This post however is not a comment on colonial history – or a debate about either the devastation or the good that foreign missionaries brought to Africa. It’s a post about a man named Wisdom and a Sunday walk up a mountain that made me feel as close to home as I have felt in the last three weeks.
As we were making our way up the mountain I was chatting with Wisdom and we were exchanging stories and questions about family, studies, and hopes for the future. I asked him about his siblings. One younger sister and one younger brother. And then I asked about his parents. I wondered what they did. They had both died, Wisdom told me. Years before. Due to illnesses for which medication was unaffordable for the family. And just earlier this week, Wisdom’s grandfather, who had cared for him and his siblings, had passed away. “We’re still in mourning,” he told me, “in case I seem down.” Here was a 23-year-old man, without a living parent or grandparent on the planet, now the sole provider for his siblings, still a student himself, working on weekends to guide tourists like my friends and I up the mountain, apologizing for being down. I know the orphan story is a familiar one across the African continent, but the familiarity of it should never diminish how we receive it.
I could go on and on about how struck I was by the contrast of my world in comparison to that of Wisdom’s. I could speak of the guilt I felt when listening to him, guilt for being born where I was born, how the geography of my birthplace had largely determined the privilege into which I was born. All those things are true. But I’m not sure how helpful it is to echo what has already been said so many times before. Instead, I’d like to tell you of the resilience and faithfulness found in a man named Wisdom.
As we were walking up the mountain Wisdom was singing. I was unsure of what he was singing but it was lovely to listen to. Eventually I asked him what the song was and he said, “it’s a song for God.” He then smiled and translated the lyrics for me. I told him we shared the same faith and the same God. We spoke about the goodness of Christ in our lives, about the hope that continued to be offered in places of uncertainty and hurt. It felt like silent prayer, those moments of walking up the mountain, like worship in the appreciation had for the landscape and beauty laid before us.
It was Sunday. I was missing my community at home, wondering what the morning gathering would be like in the little blue church in Vancouver. And yet here I was – and church services and gatherings of worship were happening in multiple places up the mountain. We’d pass by and Wisdom would translate the lyrics of praise for me. It was beautiful. Here was a man from whom life had taken nearly everything – walking up a mountain to earn a few dollars to support himself and his siblings, handed a list of responsibilities too long for anyone his age, still in mourning of the recent loss of his grandfather, and yet still singing songs to God. What a man. What an example of wisdom and praise. Here, halfway up a mountain in Malawi, my soul felt closer to home than it had in weeks.