Muslim Brotherhood Fields Presidential Candidate

In a reversal from previous statements by the majority party of the Parliament, the Muslim Brotherhood has now entered their own candidate into the Egyptian Presidential race, according to this article.

There are two ironies in this announcement, which you will see if you read through the article.  First, Khairat al-Shater is technically on criminal probation, which makes his candidacy illegal under current Egyptian law.  Secondly, one of the leading candidates, Aboul Fotouh, was removed from the party because he did not respect the party's previous position to not have a candidate in the race.

Meanwhile, revolutionary activist and presidential hopeful, Khalid-Ali continues to give speeches that speak of reform and actually actionable steps to change.  However, in speaking with a few Egyptian young adults today, they did not give his candidacy any strong chance against perceived Islamic front-runners.

One of those front-runners, Abu Ismail, is attempting to get one poster for each Egyptian citizen--and they're beginning to show up all over--so much so, that it is becoming a popular punchline to new jokes.  His likeness has also apparently been growing on the internet, as fun-loving and tech-savy Egyptians have been photo-shopping the image with their own clever slogans or casting the image onto blockbuster movie posters.  Here are a few...

Presidential Campaigns & Pulse in Egypt

Egyptian Presidential candidates have posters beginning to show up on any vertical service--from walls, to trees, to street and Metro signs.  With such a short campaigning time period, the rush to get themselves familiarized with the populace is imperative.

Here's an article about Abu Ismail's campaign. 

We are witnessing an increase in vandalism around our area as well -- but these don't appear to be the gang-type graffiti markings; I haven't been able to decipher their meanings yet, but I'll try to get a picture up soon with a translation.  (I haven't used Twitter--but if we secure a smart phone here, we would never have a shortage of material to tweet: humorous, challenging, curious, strange, sad, etc.)

We have also heard of some growing uncertainty by Egyptians relating to the state of the country--not from members of the CCF or Egypt ChoG--but from just various individuals in the community.  One said that their family was even considering a move to the U.S. if things don't seem to progress properly within the next year, despite their love of Egypt.

We have not witnessed any increasing violence, though warnings continue to be aware of demonstrations and places where demonstrations are likely to develop.  We have heard increasing gun shots in the evening hours--but again, nothing visible and no signs of danger around us.  We have neighbors who work for foreign governments and they're not spooked or taking any visible precautions.

While we grow closer to securing our visa, we have also heard of changing policies on the visas of other internationals.  Every trip to the Mogamma (the main government building) is an uncertain adventure.


Thanks for your continued prayers on our behalf; tomorrow we host a cookout for young adults and young families who are the children of many of the CCF we are serving.  We hope to connect positively and to gauge interest on possibilities for additional programs for these.

Meet Egyptian Pastors Raffat and Ehab

During my time at the Egypt annual General Assembly of the Church of God, I had the opportunity to interact with some great pastors.  Many of the Pastors had a much greater grasp of English than I had of Arabic, and they were kind of enough to look past my limitation.

I had met Pastor Ehab in February when the Executive Committee came to visit us in Maadi.  Pastor Ehab is one of the younger pastors in the country, and has a great ministry in Alexandria with the Camp Caesar Church of God.  Their newly renovated Church is pictured here; Pastor Ehab is a musician and has an artistic flair that came out in redesigning the beautiful facility.  Pastor Ehab teaches music and uses this as a gateway to connect new people to the faith.

Pastor Raffat is another one of the young pastors in Egypt; he and his family moved recently into the "country" to plant a church in the King Maruit area.  They currently worship in the House of Joel Conference Center that the Church of God owns.  He is pictured here in front of the building used for their church activities.  Pastor Raffat previously attended at Baptist seminary in Lebanon where he learned of the Awana program that they use to minister to children.

Both Pastor Ehab and Pastor Raffat were gracious enough to allow me to interview them on video; they were, however, increasingly nervous as we recorded as they began to stumble on their English a bit.  I tried to reassure them that they had nothing to be embarrassed about!  There's a lot of background noise; the camp was a busy place, but a neighboring camp came on their loud speaker as we began to record.

As you see these two pastors sharing, remember to pray for the work of God in the country and in the city--among addicts and among students--from a church plant as well as an established church.  Pray for their families, their integrity, their vision--pray that their leadership will produce fruit just as their following allows God's Spirit to produce fruit in their own lives.

Egyptian Railways, Cairo Station

We ride the Metro train from Maadi into Cairo regularly, but I had my first ride along the Egyptian Railways from Cairo to Alexandria last week as I traveled for the Egypt Church of God's annual General Assembly meetings.

I was told to get a "first class" ticket--having never had the opportunity to fly first class, I jumped at this opportunity, especially since the fare was less than 20 bucks roundtrip!  The train was not as nice as the first class cabins on an airliner, but it did have multiple beverage and food cart opportunities and comfortable seats that were wider than in the other coaches.  Overall, you really do get what you pay for :(

Traveling by train, at least here in Egypt, is not subject to any TSA scrutiny--in fact, there's nothing standing between you and getting on the train.  Well, that's not entirely true--this is my first encounter with a place that had no English on signs (with one exception, the "WC" over the restroom entrance).  The security guard could tell me where to go buy a ticket in English, but no one at the ticket counter spoke any English--in fact, I wasn't sure I was even in the right place when I bought the tickets in advance.  Fortunately, Egyptians are kind and love to help foreigners, so other patrons waiting in the area came up and helped to translate my itinerary.

When I arrived on the morning of my departure, I was able to decipher enough Arabic on the departures board to find my train based upon the train number.  My ticket said "Coach 1," but there were no markings or coach numbers on the train cars.  So, since I was "first class", I proceed to the first coach behind the engine.  There was no one to greet me at the train entrance, so I simply boarded--no attendants or stewards, just passengers.  I asked a passenger if I was in the right place--he looked at my ticket and pointed me towards the other end of the train; apparently, the first coach is the first coach you come to.  So, back down to the other end of the train.  But there was not anyone to greet me there either; as I boarded I wasn't sure because I expected more from "first class" besides the wider seats.  I found my seat number and tried to look for other clues that I was on the right train.  Others came on and got off right until the train started to pull away from the station.  That's when I nervously asked a nearby passenger to check my ticket--he said yes.  So, I waited.

It wasn't until 10 minutes into the ride that the conductor came to validate my ticket.  That's the only railway personnel or security I saw from arrival to 10 minutes into the ride!  When I boarded for the return ride in Alexandria, family members of fellow passengers came on board to help her get settled and just hang out before saying goodbye.  I have heard that this actually used to be common in air travel many years ago, but I had never experienced anything so lacking of security or official presence.

But the real story here is not the train, nor the anti-TSA environment, but the beauty of the train station in Cairo.  They should put some antiquities in this place and charge admission.  I attempted to take some pictures, but they really don't do the new station justice.

Here are some of the pics; and I will be posting more pics and video of my time with the Egypt General Assembly in the next few days.

What if...

The process of revolution and new democracy has historically been messy and filled with more "trial-and-error" than "triumph".  The new emerging Egyptian political future is coming to grips with its unrealistic expectations.

In this What if... article, the columnist outlines what will happen if a new president is sworn in by the end of June (the current plan) and there has not been a newly ratified constitution.  The new legislature is still in the process of appointing the 100 person constitutional draft committee--its March 23 and they hope to get 100 politicians to agree on a new constitution and have it ratified by the new legislature and population by June 30!

As for the potential presidential candidates, i've updated our list according to the news reports we're reading--you can access the Egyptian Presidential Candidates with that link, and we'll try to keep that updated.

By the way...
Right now, I'm at the Church of God Conference Center outside of Alexandria, Egypt.  This is an impressive facility for 12 congregations, and they have quite a vision.   I am here for the annual General Assembly meeting.  I will post pictures, video, and a better description of my time here later this week.

And, Grace returned safely from her week in the Sinai Peninsula--from what Keli reported, she had a good time.  I will try to get some of her pictures and stories to share, too.  She leaves early in the morning for a youth group retreat!

We're go, go, go here right now!  Thanks for your prayers...

Coptic Pope Shenouda III

At the conclusion of the Saturday evening CCF Bible Study, one of the ladies received the text that the Coptic Pope Shenouda III had passed away.  Many of the CCF family are Coptic Christians, a few who have had personal interaction and history with the leader of the Orthodox Christians in Egypt, and so his loss was taken with great grief and mourning.

That sadness was multiplied when former pastor of the CCF, Franco Santonocito passed away early yesterday morning, the very morning of Pope Shenouda's funeral.

If you missed any of the news stories regarding the funeral service, here's a brief video commentary from CNN.com

One interesting point of this video is that once the candidates are narrowed to three, a blindfolded child will make the selection.  I find this to be a beautiful merger of casting lots and the faith/innocence of a child leading.  What do you think?

Remembering Franco

Part of the CCF who gathered for worship on March 25; the service included a time or memoriam for Franco and prayers for the Santonocito family.

Early this morning, we received a prayer request from Italy for Franco Santonocito who was in the hospital and doing poorly.  We had been aware of Franco facing severe health problems related to his heart in recent months; within the hour and before we could send out the request for prayer to those throughout the CCF family, we received a follow up email that he had passed away.

As young adults, Franco and Bea were involved early in the history of the Cairo Youth Fellowship, which became the CCF.  They returned to Italy for health reasons in the 1970’s, planting churches.  They returned to Egypt to encourage the CCF and national church on a 2 year plan that became more than 5.  In addition to planting churches, Franco and Bea trained leaders for the national church, and assisted the development, leadership, and teaching of the Mediterranean Bible College in Lebanon.  

In addition to all of this, for those of you who do not know, Franco and his wife Bea are at the heart of why we are now in Egypt.

As a part of our previous ministry in Decatur, Alabama, we were leading the 6th Avenue Church of God to enter into “missional partnerships” with a church or group of churches on each continent.  These relationships were the international fulfillment of their mission.  It was during our first trip to the United Kingdom, specifically during our first glimpse of London, that we began to discuss, pray, and feel compelled that we needed to be in Cairo Egypt.  That was in 2006.  

We followed up that trip with initial inquiries into the national work and specific churches in Egypt.  This led us to email correspondence with Franco and Bea.  We did not meet Franco and Bea personally until the summer of 2009.  At that time, we made tentative plans to move beyond electronic encouragement to a visit in Egypt in either later fall or winter 2009/2010.

Before this visit could happen, Bea suffered a severe heart attack at the end of November 2009.  Franco requested prayer for her healing and recovery throughout the international church.  After this email, he sent an additional email specifically to Keli and I that read, “We fear this event will spur us to retirement faster that we had hoped.  Please pray about being our replacements.”  We thought he was crazy--we had not even visited Egypt at that point!

Before the end of 2009, we also felt the Lord directing us to serve Egypt.  The international Church confirmed that call and leading after a year long assessment, culminating in our appointment in January 2011.  As you know, we arrived January 2012.  A little longer than Franco may have preferred, but just as he had asked.

Franco told many of our coming as we prepared.  I have heard many say that they felt like Elijah commissioning their Elisha.  I know that he wanted to have a time where he could pray over us personally--that didn’t happen on this side of heaven.  We know that as they have prayed for us in the past, that he is praying for us now--praying OVER us--and he’s probably roped in Elijah and Elisha into that prayer circle, too.

If you are or plan to be in Italy this week, funeral services are as follows:

Thursday, March 22 at 10:00 a.m. (Italian time) at the

Chiesa Cristiana Evangelica,

Via Costanzo Casana, 249

Osita Lido (Rome)

ITALY

If you would like to send condolences to the family, post a comment and we will forward them.  

Pray for Grace

Grace begins a busy week in the morning; she will begin at Al-Karm Ecolodge in the middle of the Sinai Peninsula, and near Mt. Sinai (see map).  This is for week of spiritual, team-building adventure at this beautiful facility with most of the middle school classmates.  This is a really cool adventure for a young teen as she gets to not only go to the Sinai, but also learn more about the ecolodge concept, connect on a different level with classmates and teachers, and trade with Bedouins!

After 5 days, she will return with just enough time to leave one bus to hop on another for a local church youth group trip to another part of the country for an annual spring retreat.  We are happy that she is connecting and creating some good friendships here, so much so that she is willing to go sweaty and gross onto another trip immediately ;)

The speaker for this retreat is a youth pastor from a different community church in another part of Cairo.  His name is Weston and our relationship is a strange but true "6 degrees of separation": Weston is my in-laws' best friends' niece's son.  Let me explain: Weston is the son of Virgil & Lois' niece;  Virgil and Lois are college best friends of Keli's parents Frank and Pat.  For nearly 20 years, I only knew Virgil and Lois by stories and a few brief email exchanges; last fall, when I traveled out west to raise funds, I had the opportunity to stay in their home in Fresno.  While there, they showed me a prayer card for Weston and his new bride Amber and told me we should connect!  Well we haven't personally met Weston and Amber yet--but Grace will this week. :)

Egyptian Presidential Candidates

Whereas the US seems to have nearly continual political campaigning, the Egyptian process is far more brief.  Hopeful candidates are to register from March 10 through April 8.  There are only 21 days of official campaigning that are set to begin on April 30.  The elections will then be held on May 23 and 24; if necessary, a runoff will be held on June 16 and 17, with the final results being announced by June 21.

As of yet, from what I can find, the Muslim Brotherhood have yet to endorse a candidate.  Imagine either of the main US parties not endorsing a candidate with such few days remaining until the election!

According to this REPORT, more than 500 have applied to be a candidate in the upcoming election.  But, there are 8 leading candidates that I have been able to discover; each name also represents a link to articles from one of the local newspapers that introduces the candidate with a nickname:

Selim al-Awa
Abdel Moneim Abouel Fotouh
Amr Moussa
Mansour Hassan
Ahmed Shafiq
Hazem Abu Ismail
Hamdeen Sabbahi
NEW: Abul Ezz al-Hariry
NEW: Omar Suleiman UPDATE: Omar
NEW: The "Outsiders"
Khaled Ali

The last in the list doesn't yet have the official write up like the others.  I know that one newer Egyptian Christian that we have talked to is very interested in the possibility of supporting the younger Ali.  The former in the list are older, more established politicians.  Everyone is, of course, attempting to connect themselves to the revolution and the young revolutionaries that have made all the news in the past year, while simultaneously attempting to disconnect themselves from the former political regimes and the current SCAF (Supreme Council of the Armed Forces).  Each of the candidates are also similarly seeking to make bold statements of ending foreign (US) dependance and charting a new, independent Egyptian government and military.

Whether or not the masses have a clear sense of a unified vision and desire for the result of the revolution is unclear.  As revolution hopes to birth renewal, it will be interesting to watch and see how this political process plays out.

Pros and Cons--Peyton's Decision

For those of you who could care less about Peyton Manning and the drama, i apologize -- but like Reality Show geeks, we're glued to the "will he or won't he" in every city.  Anyway, we came across this ESPN.com Page 2 listing of what Manning's notes would look like if he was a dumb college jock considering each of their cities.  Here's the link to the full set of notes by DJ Gallo, but here's a sample from Denver, Arizona, and Seattle...

If I See Paul McCartney...

...and other random thoughts...

Haven't posted in awhile, because we've been busy--not crazy one event after another busy, but busy nonetheless.

The kids continue with school, and as you know, we walk them there and then back home.  Once we're back home, we have about an hour and a half before we then walk & ride to our Arabic class--we're there 2 hours--then, walk & ride back home.  Fortunately, this is only about 15 minutes one-way, but we only have  about an hour before we're out the door again to walk to and from school for the kids.  This is our new Sunday, Monday, Tuesday schedule--and it's exhausting on these days because we have homework in addition to their homework.  Sundays get a bit crazier because when we  get hime with the kids, we have 3o minutes before we need to eat, then rush out the door for our 10 minute walk and 25 minute train ride to Church; then, of course, we get that 10 minute walk and 25 minute train ride back--see, exhausting!  The trains, particularly at those times are packed like sardines, so we're not sitting--we're standing at those times.  One further note about the train to church--this won't improve when we're able to get a car, because the minimum drive time is an hour and half--minimum!  So, we'll be doing the train thing unless half the traffic in Cairo vanishes.

See, all this coming and going is what keeps us busy...

Well, you may think, the other days can't be that bad.  And, you're right, they're not as bad; except,

• Keli has Mokattam (Garbage City) on Wednesday, which takes up most of her day as she travels to and from there to teach a beginners English-as-a-second-language to 20 ladies.
• Wednesday is youth group night, so I get 2 extra round-trip walks to the community church to take Grace there.
• Wednesday and Thursday become my only days to try to meet with others, prepare and work on other leadership tasks.
• Fridays and Saturdays are the weekend, and we're catching up on household chores, keeping the kids from being couch potatoes or whatever else comes up.

The weather has moved from cool, what the Egyptians have claimed is the coldest and longest winter that they can remember, to more than warm.  We had been around 22C, which is around 70F -- that is until yesterday when we unexplainably just jumped to 34C, which is like 94F -- that's one big jump!  Today, we're back to around 25C (78F) and we're going slowly down for the next couple days, but still a moderate and wonderful Spring temperature.  Spring and Fall are not really seasons here, so any bit of transitional time is very much welcome.

Of course, the warmer temperatures that we have now have followed times of misty rain just a few weeks ago--this combination has led to many beautiful blooming flowers throughout the garden and community.


Arabic classes are going well; Keli and i are used to studying together and helping one another because we did this for a shared major in college.  We each pick up on different things, so we can help each other.  We have 2 different teachers for our three days of classes--not only are they different ladies, but they are COMPLETELY different in styles and responsibilities.  One focuses on our conversation and vocabulary, the other focuses on our writing and reading.  The conversation teacher wants us to help each other and ask questions, and encourages us to write lots of notes--this is great for our learning style.  The writing and reading teacher wants us to devote complete attention to her, not write many notes, and NOT talk to one another or help each other--Keli and I got separated within 10 minutes of our first class with her last week--and there are only 3 of us in class :(!  The see-saw between these two styles and two subjects is a mental challenge in addition to learning a non-Latin based alphabet and language!


The kids continue to do very well.  Grace has a spiritual, team-builiding adventure next week with most of her classmates in the Sinai peninsula--though previously dreading this wilderness adventure with limited shower possibilities, she has since gotten a little excited.  She will be completely exhausted from this because as soon as she returns, immediately, she hops on a different bus to go with the local youth group to another part of Egypt for their annual Spring Retreat.  The school and the church are connected ministries--but neither leader talked to each other in this planning process and each had made non-refundable deposits.  But, Grace is greatly excited about both--and that makes us happy.

Titus is following the Peyton Manning drama, and we hope we can move forward from that in the coming week.  He is also excited about transferring schools in the fall, though we found out that he will not have the opportunity to take German as a foreign language as we had hoped.

Zeke has been busy with our zoo.  Yes, zoo--we arrived to a facility that already had 4 tortoises, we bought the cat for Grace (who is doing well), and Zeke bought two cockatiels.  In addition, there are no shortage of cats in Cairo, and a stray recently had kittens just in front of our villa in burrow she made in the ferns surrounding the palm tree.  Zeke and Titus have always been allergic to cats and dogs--Zeke usually worse with dogs, and Titus worse with cats--but, amazingly, both have been just fine.  We think this is because their bodies are fighting so many new pollens, dust and pollution that they don't have time to worry about all the pet allergens that are around.

anyway, that's some of the random coming and goings from our part of Cairo...


...oh, back to Paul McCartney...
I keep track of the blog stats -- who is viewing, what are they looking at, and so on.  The blog has proven to be quite a popular resource for staying connected and keeping people informed.  Through this stat watching, i have been surprised that the most viewed page by a mile is the one from last September saying, "That's not me on the cover of Rolling Stone" and has the picture of a long-haired George Harrison.  Apparently, "George," "the Beatles," "Rolling Stone," and "long-hair" are all popular search items, and as a result, we weekly get viewers of the blog through a search of one of (or a combination) those key-words.  I figure that Paul has to be more popular than George, right?  So, this is my experiment: will this page now become more popular?  We'll let you know... :)

Say It Isn't So...

Even across the globe, our blue hearts are a different shade of blue today at the news that the Colts will part ways with franchise quarterback Peyton Manning.

Being a sports fan, i've always admired great athletes and remember several farewells: Walter Payton waving farewell to Soldier Field, Michael Jordan's various retirements, Cal Ripken, Jr.'s farewell to baseball, and others.

Growing up in Indiana, there has always been an inferiority complex when it comes to major sports; the small market Indianapolis versus the big city guys.  There's a decency and a handwork ethic that carryover from the agricultural sectors that dominate the state, and so, the sports teams were always expected to field the good guys, too; but good guys don't always bring the wins that often accompany the so-called "killer-instinct" and bravado of great players.

Indianapolis has been indebted to two future hall of famers in the past 2 decades: Reggie Miller and Peyton Manning.  Reggie brought a tenacious, trash-talking, make the last shot, in-the-other's-guy-face-leadership that helped the underdog Pacers basketball franchise move from the cellar to contender.  Though Reggie never brought Indianapolis a title, Conseco Fieldhouse is there because of the post-season success of the teams Reggie made great.  Reggie got to say farewell to Indiana in a Pacers uniform, coming up short against the Detroit Pistons; as the stadium gave Reggie his due appreciation in applause and cheers, Coach Larry Brown of the Pistons (in one of the most classy acts of sportsmanship) took a timeout to extend the applause and allow his team the opportunity to stand and cheer as well.

Even with an amicable press conference today, Peyton won't get that kind of send-off.

You can't really write any more than what has been written by numerous journalists from the Indianapolis Star newspaper to the sports media empire of ESPN--it is universally understood that without Peyton, the Colts may not have ever risen out of the cellar, there would never have been a Lucas Oil Stadium, and the city would not have hosted a Super Bowl, much less have a Lombardi trophy.  Yet, even more than that, Peyton has contributed to countless charities and events throughout the state, and funded a large part of the Children's Hospital that bears his name.  Beyond the dollars, he represented the small-town, hardworking, above-board ethics and values of the populace that not only made him the Colts' quarterback, but one of Indiana's adopted sons.

And so, within hours, the guy who has done all that will get a pat on the back and shown the door--he'll play and win somewhere else next year as the Colts draft their next quarterback.  In time, Peyton will be welcomed back to the city for a retirement of his jersey and his name in the ring of honor, and some other stuff.  But the changes that come today dramatically affect the relationship, and even with a big event in the future, it will not likely reach the same level of appreciation and respect as it would if he retired as only a Colt.

As Colts fans ourselves, we'll continue to root for the team and the new guy, and we hope that whether it's Luck or someone else that they can live up the hype.  But, for the first time, we'll also be adopting another team soon--just as soon as Peyton gets signed somewhere else. 

...to every blood-washed one

One of the foundational pursuits of the Church of God is unity, best and most often summarized by the hymn lyric, "we reach our hands in fellowship to every blood-washed one."

Egypt has many Christian groups that, as we understand it, have not always partnered well or even recognized each other significantly.  One result of revolution and the formation of new democracy is that the various Christian groups recognize they are the minority; they can not afford to ignore each other, but rather connect and have one voice.  We have witnessed various results of this realization in the past several months, but this one made a headline in one of the local papers:
Egyptian Churches to Form Council to Unify Views on Critical Issues

Forward re: Discipleship resource

From the desktop of Bob Edwards, Global Missions Director for Church of God Ministries, comes this message in our weekly update...
"New stuff. It is coming at us even when we don’t know what it’s all about. Take this symbol below for example:

It’s called a QR code (Quick Response code), and you see it increasingly in magazine advertising, in markets, and believe it or not even on billboards. (For a thorough explanation go to www.wikipedia.org and poke in “QR code.”) Although it was developed for tracking the process of manufacturing automobiles, it is in greater use today popping up in all kind of places. If you own a smart phone you can download a QR Reader for free. When the code is scanned with your QR Reader it will take you to the web site of the creator of this particular code.

Try this one above. When you do you are going to like what you find. It takes you to the <nextstepdiscipleship.org> web site. This particular web site was developed by a group of concerned church leaders who are passionate about evangelism and discipleship. They believe that evangelism is the first step that must be followed by spiritual growth in the new believer. It moves hand in hand with our Focus 40 emphasis of leading 25,000 persons worldwide to a salvation experience.

The question was asked, “So when they come to the Lord, what next?” For this generation of tech savvy, smart phone and tablet carrying individuals, it meant discipleship through media that they understand and that makes sense to them. When you lead a person to the Lord, what are the next steps? Well, this is one great possible resource. While you are still on your knees in praying with them have a card in your pocket and give them this QR code: 

Three ways to get there.

Actually there are three ways to access this great discipling material.

• The QR code
• Going to the web site itself: www.nextstepdiscipleship.org
• You will find that the site includes a short intro video, a lesson and a downloadable exercise that speaks to growth in the Lord.

• or (now this is really cool) through texting the following (US ONLY???):
• Text: NEXT
• To: 96362

If they sign on to the text messages, they will automatically receive daily text messages for the next 10 days. Give it a try.

**Scripture

Then Jesus came to them and said,

“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

Therefore go and

make disciples of all nations…” Matt.28.18-19

**African Proverb

“Cattle are as good as the pasture in which they graze.” Ethiopian proverb"

Egyptian View of American Presidential Election

As we have traveled, we have been amazed at how well-informed, interested, and down-right opinionated many international citizens are about American politics.  Honestly, we have never really followed politics very closely for a number of reasons: one, we know several that do and they often give us a pretty good set of headlines to follow; and two, we are often too involved with people and addressing their own change issues to spend too much time worrying about what is or might happen in the larger political realm.

We have since moved to Cairo, which is in the midst of their own political transformation--trying to keep up with what is or isn't happening here is a real challenge.  Meanwhile, apparently, many Egyptians have also been distracted away from what is happening in America, according to an interesting article on CNN.com today.  Click here to read this article.

The article has several interesting statements, but what is ironic is that the interest in the new political process and work of the newly elected parliament seems to be becoming as distant from the ordinary citizen of Cairo as we are to America.  Occasionally, we will hear someone speak of what is or isn't happening, but more than anything, we hear requests for prayers for divine intervention and work in whatever is happening.  Many Egyptians that we speak to want this all to end and get back to the light-hearted, fun-loving, and welcoming Egypt that seems now to be a distant memory in the light of the chaos, need, and uncertainty that is the backdrop of trying to continue "business as usual".

There are many active voices--the problem is that there is so many active voices that it becomes like white noise, static.  Everyone has an idea and a cause, and many are good and with noble intent--but the ones offering these are not the ones that have been elected.  So while everyone not elected seems to be offering plans of action, there isn't real certainty of any action by the elected.  Almost unanimously, no one wants the military to continue to rule, and though there is a newly announced process and dates for the presidential election, there doesn't yet seem to be consensus leading candidates or any compelling visions encouraging the populace.

And so, Egypt continues to wait, and apparently their own political waiting has led them to lose interest in America's political process.

Arabic Unit 1 Day 1

In Kindergarden, way back in the day (1978), I was invited to an experimental program to introduce foreign language at an early age.  The language was Spanish, and though there were many age-appropriate activities, I don't think I retained a lick of the brief introduction.

In 7th grade, the age of "Back to the Future" and "Miami Vice", I had the opportunity to take three languages over the course of 18 weeks: German, French, and Spanish.  Then, choosing one, I would continue for another year and a half before High School.  My dad strongly encouraged me to take Spanish--but in my mind, there were two things wrong with that: one, as i argued with my dad, "When am I ever going to use Spanish?" (-- allow the irony of that to settle in for a minute...vision, as for any middle school student, was not yet my strong suit).  And, two, the teacher was awful; seriously, in 6 weeks, I barely learned the numbers and couldn't say the alphabet.  To this day, I can only count to 10, and wouldn't know how to begin the alphabet--but I can tell you countless stories about her mother in Chicago. :(

On the other hand, the German teacher was effective, but boring.  I only had 6 weeks in the 7th grade, ages ago, but last fall in Berlin, I could remember and apply some of the pronunciation.  But, I didn't choose German--I should have, but I didn't.

Yes, I chose the dying language of French (apologies to the Parisians and those in Quebec).  Why?  One, because the French teacher was fun and oddly cool for someone so old.  And two, I had dreams of going to Paris and seeing Europe.  And three, perhaps the greatest reason for a middle school student, all the cool kids were going to take French.  I continued in French, even hosting a French foreign exchange student for one summer, until my junior year of high school--that's when my multiple school transitions from Indiana to Alabama to Louisiana, and lack of application caught up with me as I was simply too far behind my 4th High School's French class to catch up.

Since then, learning to effectively and concisely communicate in English has been my focus as i prepared for and served in Ministry. (Note, I really didn't have to take a language in college because I went the Biblical Greek route, in which the spoken language was not the focus).

Until today, in Cairo--Welcome to learning Arabic.

Though we have been very slowly picking up words and phrases in our nearly 2 months in Cairo, we are now applying ourselves to language classes where we are simultaneously attempting to learn how to converse, write, and hopefully read Arabic.  

Honestly, we really covered a lot for a first day--and without a lot of practice, I'm likely to forget a lot!  I had quite a slow start as we quickly transitioned from a brief English greeting to greetings in Arabic with repetitions.  One of the challenges for me is that I am a visual learner--I learn best when I can see things in relation to each other and begin attributing abstract concepts to visual representations.  And, at this point, all of Arabic is abstract--the letters, the sounds and the connection between them are all unknown variables to me.

Fortunately, we have a really good teacher--she used a lot of hand gesturing to help us catch the differences in accents visually as well as orally; she used the marker board and various colored markers to demonstrate different words and accents; she gave us flash cards to write and use as we practiced with each other; and she was light-hearted and fun rather than harsh in her correction.

And like the benefit we had in sharing a major in college, Keli and I have a built in study partner 7 days a week.  We also have the benefit of applying the language in a living laboratory, and have the added benefit of many patient and encouraging native speakers ready to help us as we stumble through.  So when the locals laugh at us, we can go to someone from the CCF and find out what we said wrong.

So, continue to pray for us to gain a gift in this new tongue--and for patience, encouragement, and diligence along the way.  Thanks!