It's been one of those days.

It’s amazing how life can just be happy in a normal way.

 Like the moment a 7th grader finally understands diagramming.

No more randomly placing words on lines with not a clue there is a rhyme or reason.

I don't know whose relief was greater - mother's or son's.

Sometimes a normal day can hold so much more.

It can end and you have so many more questions than answers.

God uses our days to send reminder after reminder that we're simply depending on Him.

**

My phone rang this morning.

I was so glad he had actually called like we told him to.

Just as planned the workers in Agape Ministries met him on the street.

They took him to their office.

Layer after layer they sifted through the pieces of his story.

I think they are still sifting.

The truth is that he's not a orphan but the son of a struggling widow.

He does go to school most times but wants to find a way to get the fees to continue his schooling.

So he walks on the street and sniffs glue.

Not really the best of choices.

He has a list of other bad choices too.

They told me that its obvious God chose to lay him on my heart on Saturday.

His actions cry for connection and help.

There has to be a reason.

Maybe I’ll find out the rest of the story tomorrow.

I have so many questions.

**

After the phone rang a young friend of ours knocked on the gate.

 I was glad it was still during our morning break.

 He wanted to tell me that he’s not going to school anymore.

He said it was too far for him to walk.

He also told me he wasn't coming to our church again either.

He didn't even give me a reason.

Sometimes he comes and tells me he's going to go live on the streets.

At least he wasn't saying that this time.

He didn't like walking home from school in the afternoon when it was raining.



I didn't have much to say.

I wouldn't like that either.

I asked him what he wanted me to do.

"Say nothing."

Was his only response.

I told him mama's aren't usually quiet when they hear that someone's going to just stop going to school.

He also told me to delete his mom's contact from my phone.

I asked him why would I want to delete her number.

I might want to talk to her sometime.

I wondered if he could find out how much a bike costs.

Maybe we could pray for God to help him get a bike to ride to school.

He told me he didn't want a bike.

He left and I just had questions.

***

One of the girls who lives down the street knocked on the gate just before lunch.

She had asked me if I could help her get ready for the Form 4 exams coming the end of November.

Form 4 is the last year of high school here.

She really wants to get her certificate.

It would be to her benefit if she could get her certificate.

The problem is she's not going to school at all right now.

Sometime after her year of Form 3 she got pregnant.

Becoming a teenaged mother means she’s never been able to go to school since.

With the baby tied on her back she handed me a math book.

It didn't matter if I held it right side up or upside down.

The method of teaching eluded me. Though the text was English it felt like a foreign language.

It didn’t make sense.

I really didn't think I could be the help this girl needs.

Thank God for online teaching videos to explain the technical to a learner.

She left after an hour.

My head hurt and I couldn’t even think of the questions I should have been asking.

**

Not too many minutes after she left our friend who didn't like walking in the rain returned.

I asked if he needed us to take him to school.

He ignored me.

Then he told me he didn't know which bike he should get.

There were so many.

Maybe I could go look and see all the prices.

I didn't bother telling him he had said he didn't want a bike.

He also wanted to make sure I knew one of the boys down the street was using drugs.

 I was to be sure not to talk to him because he had attacked his own mother.

I didn't doubt the possibility of his story.

That boy goes to church with us every Sunday.

I had noticed something strange about his eyes.

I told him I'd watch and ask God if there was something He wanted me to do.

By now I was tired.

I didn't want to have any questions.

**

Some fellow homeschooling moms came to see me this afternoon. They understand the Kenyan school system much better than I do.

So I asked them how you help someone prepare for the Form 4 exams.

They just looked at me sympathetically and shook their heads. 

They were certain it wasn't possible for someone who missed the last year of school to be ready for the exam in 2 months.



Learning here is mostly a matter of memorizing.

Lots and lots of listening and the exams reflect that.

I obviously don’t have any idea of the material they need to know.

Even if I could actually figure out a way to teach her what she needed to know till then it was really besides the point.

She needs to go school for her last year to prepare for those exams.

I'm so happy she wants to finish.

But I really don’t know how to help her.

 I'm talking to Jesus and I have so many questions.

***

Our supper visitors were telling us their interesting conversation with our friend who needs a bike.

He knows all the neighborhood lore.

How they say animals used to lived in our chimney. And you could see dogs with shining eyes when you looked in the gate.

That’s just a few of the stories from the years our house stood empty before we came.

I've heard some of them before.

He also told them how

Some in the neighborhood fear us and some come close just out of curiosity.

"They say you are possessed."

He's obviously one those who doesn't mind coming close.

By now I didn't know if I should laugh or cry.

I wondered where I could go with all of my questions.

**

“In times of stress, the best thing we can do for each other is to listen with our ears and our hearts and to be assured that our questions are just as important as our answers.” Mr. Rogers

Today was one of those days.

I'm left with so many questions.

Sometimes it feels like there just isn't enough to reach around to all of the needs.

But I know the God we serve is greater and bigger than everything.

I’m so thankful He knows all the answers.

“We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure.

This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves.”

2 Cor. 4:7

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