As the exhaust seeps through the floor and windows of our Mozambican mini bus I find myself having hours of time to think and process (or in the Deaton family we call it decompose) our journey. You see we began this journey around 3am this morning in a small village called Dowa. We awoke early and packed up our muddy tents and were loaded and on the road in a work truck by 4 am. For some reason I was lucky number 4 in the front of the truck with the driver, Mama Rita and her youngest son Maratz. My other teammates and some Mozambican friends were in the bed of the truck for the cold and bumpy 4 hour drive back to Muturara. The road was kind of like you would expect of an old country dirt road but about 4 times worse and 4 hours longer.
Unfortunately as we arrived back in Muturara in cell phone service we were notified of the death of our teammate Rachel’s father. The plans we once had changed in a matter of minutes. We now needed to meet the needs of our sister and we put our cares and desires behind. We packed up the rest of our things quickly (which is a miracle in itself if you know me or my team) and were awaited by 20 or so bicycle men competing for our business to carry us across the 7km bridge over the Zambezi River. Some of the bikes carried our stuff and some carried our bums so that we could move more quickly. I kindly coached my peddler as he used his might to carry my grand-self the distance. Believe it or not we made it across the bridge. You see the last time I rode a bicycle I ended up in the hospital with a broken ankle. No hospital this time, I traded that in for an 8 plus hour mini bus ride.
I proceeded to buy some food for our team; we have made the mistake of not bringing food along on our African journeys before, it’s NOT GOOD, I’ll leave it at that! As I returned to the mini bus I found our 6 large back packs tied on top of the vehicle without a luggage rack. TIA (This Is Africa) I thought to myself and we began our next leg of our journey. About 15 minutes into the trip a bracing on the ceiling of the mini bus busted and hit a little girl in the head causing her head to bleed. Our bags were causing the roof to sink in significantly. After insisting that we stop we helped the child and the driver tied more rope to somehow keep the roof up. As we proceeded I kept my eyes on the sinking ceiling nervous that it might crash in on all of us, it didn’t Praise the Lord!!!
About two hours into our trip we made a stop to refuel, so a few of us rode down to the river with the vehicle to look after our bags. The men proceeded to fill up the tank with an old coke bottle (TIA). As we were sitting there two other vehicles boxed us in and shortly after a shouting and pushing match was going on with our vehicle conductor and someone else. I quickly rebuked satan and his plans and not long after we were off. Then once again on the road the two vehicles began a passing game with us and once again boxed us in. So I proceeded to rebuke satan once more and they gave up-Praise God.
After over 20 hours of traveling we arrived in Beira where we were picked up by Jaco, a South African missionary in Mozambique. Jaco had only slept about 5 hours in the past 4 days so I was elected to drive, being the only one on my team who drives stick shift. The crazy thing is that I had already taken some allergy medicine that night that causes me to be drowsy and sleep really well. At first I was weary of driving but after Jaco closed his eyes and swerved a few times I was awake! The Lord gave me supernatural energy to stay awake and He provided Nate and some of my teammates to talk to me most of the time. After 9 more hours of driving we arrived in Vilankulo, Mozambique to the home of Jaco and Maria at about 10 am. They so graciously provided us breakfast and coffee and we were so happy to have something in our stomachs. Later on that day we sent Rachel off in a plane headed towards home, we were beat but still moving on.
That evening after having been awake over 40 hours we found ourselves still awake and wondering why? We were in shock! The long crazy journey had all seemed like a dream. From the chickens tied up under my seat, to the roof nearly crashing in, to changing destinations everyday as traveling evangelists, to eating lots of random food (ie goat intestines), to some of my teammates being peed on by grown adults, and then to sending our sister home to bury her father.
Looking at it all this is precisely why I signed up for the World Race. I have been stretched beyond my comfort zones. I have been crammed in vehicles with 20 plus people for long rides. I have lived with 30 plus orphans. I have been served their best from some of the poorest people in the world. I have preached the Gospel and had the Gospel lived out before my eyes. I have lived in community and not been able to escape it because there was nowhere else to go. I have seen the Lord’s grace and provision in and out of crisis. And I have experienced the Lord’s joy and peace at so many unexpected times.
The Lord has provided and it’s amazing to watch the adventures he unveils daily!
