It's a Death

Photo Credit:  R. Stoll

To be human is to hope, to set one's heart and mind on an outcome and to desire with all that I am to see it come to pass. 

It doesn't take long for us to learn to hope.  I ran into the Mom of one of my first graders from last year who told me that her son, all of seven year's old, has been shedding tears.  He loves Sahel and he had hoped to be there again this year.  He is grieving the loss of that dream because he knows Sahel is damaged by flood waters.  His five year old sister, an incoming kindergartner, is sad too because she's  been looking forward to being at Sahel with him.

On the other end of the spectrum, I think of one of my former first graders, now a senior, hoping to get a scholarship to play softball in college.  She had been diligently practicing and working out all summer on our softball field.  What will happen to that dream now that our softball field is underwater?

It's a death.  It's a death of the hopes and expectations of almost every student and staff member at Sahel.  It's hard and we are grieving it.

Paul's words in 2 Corinthians1:9 resonate.  "Indeed, we felt we had received the sentence of death."  But then, they go on to remind us of a glorious truth.  "But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God who raises the dead."

This school, this ministry currently underwater, belongs to God, who raises the dead.  Just like Paul said in verse 10, we, too, can say, "He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us again."  We went through this in 2012 and God brought our campus back to life.  Yes, it is far worse and deliverance may not come in exactly the same fashion - we have so many questions about the future but "on Him we have set our hope that He will continue to deliver us, as you help us by your prayers." (2 Cor. 9:10) 

This is key, we are being helped by your prayers - those of our community, those of our friends and churches in faraway places and those of our fellow international Christian schools.  Your prayers for us are sustaining us during a chaotic and overwhelming time.  As you continue to pray, we know that God will be our help.  He has helped us to locate and rent two school buildings.  He will help us to see the work on these two buildings, particularly the elementary, completed so that we can fully move in and bring some order out of the chaos.  He will help us, students and staff alike, to understand that He is a God who raises the dead, that in Him our hope is secure.  "Then many will give thanks on our behalf for the gracious favour granted us in answer to the prayers of many."  (2 Cor. 1:10 & 11)

On the left: circled in green you can see a small plaque placed after the 2012 flood to mark the waterline and commemorate the faithfulness of our God during that difficult time.
Bottom right:  Ken F. uses his canoe paddle to measure how far down the plaque is.  Notice that the rock detailing on the side of the building is not even visible.
Top right:  the plaque's apt reminder - 

I will never forget this awful time,
as I grieve over my loss.
Yet I still dare to hope
when I remember this:
The faithful love of the LORD never ends!
His mercies never cease,
Great is his faithfulness;
his mercies begin afresh each morning.
I say to myself, "The LORD is my inheritance;
therefore, I will hope in him!"
Lamentations 3:20-24

If you would like to help the school recover from this devestating loss you can do so through TeachBeyond, one of the organizations that partners with us to provide staff.

Flood 2.0

As a school and as a mission, we never wanted to relive this story again.  2012 was enough.  God had spared us in amazing ways.  He had helped us rebuild and come back to our compounds with safer walls that would protect us from the river's threat during rainy season. We were thankful that we could look back and recount all the ways that God had been faithful but had it been our choice that would have been a book we never reopened after the last chapter had been read.

But that is not the story that is being written. Instead we have had a very heavy season of rain and our team of guys watching the river kept seeing the water level go up and up, passing the level that caused the 2012 flood and going up.  They sandbagged. The dyke held. The water level went down and then back up. Our section of the dyke held.  But downriver from us water began pouring in filling the areas behind our walls, walls where a threat had not been anticipated in the past.

Sunday evening we sat on the steps of our Admin building trying to decide the best course of action.  We would give it one more night and reevaluate in the morning.  By 8 am on Monday morning the road to Sahel Academy was impassable by small vehicles and we were starting to enact our evacuation plan, going through the school and putting everything up waist high or more.  I worked together with our elementary team.

At 2:26, I took a moment to look out the window from the second story of our elementary building.  This is what I saw.

I could see all that water being held back by our wall and I could see houses in the distance where it looked as though the water was half way up the doors.  Honestly, it felt like it was only a matter of time, especially when we began to see water leaking through several of the seams.  We continued to work.

Around 4:15, the elementary principal came running around the building shouting that the wall had broken.  There were three of us in the same area and we hopped in one of our colleagues cars and we tore out of that area to one of the higher points on campus.  I didn't want her car to be under water.  I ran by the house of a family in quarantine to yell at them and tell them the wall had broken and then I ran towards my classroom where I had left my phone plugged in to charge. I grabbed it and my water bottle and waited for the principal who had run back to the area as well.  While I waited I watched the water pour in where the wall had broken.  This was not a story that we wanted to be ours and yet here we were again.  

When it was all said and done, we waded out to the front entrance in water that was up to our chests.  It is the first and the last time I hope to be taking a selfie in the Niger river!

I lay in bed Tuesday morning with a barely functioning brain.  Too tired to even open my Bible, God brought the words of 1 Peter 2:23 to mind.  I add a little more here for context:  "For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly."  As you can well imagine there are just SO MANY questions.  In the face of those questions, I have the challenge of walking the same road that my Saviour walked, one of continuing to entrust myself, my colleagues, this ministry and our mission to the Father.  He is sovereign and He knows what He wants to accomplish in this that will bring glory to His name.

Here are some things He has already done:

• In those last hours, He sent some strong young men who helped us move alot of things to our second floor where they are dry and safe.
• Just minutes before the wall broke, several men were standing in front of it inspecting the leaks.  When it broke, no one was there.
• He held back the water until the last bit of chemicals in our science lab were carefully stored upstairs.
• He gave one of our guys the foresight to turn off the electricity to the whole campus so that when water began pouring in we had one less thing to worry about.
• He sent some men in through the wall who stuck with us and helped us put up a bunch of last minute things in the elementary, computer lab and some colleagues' houses that hadn't had time to prepare.
• Passports, wallets and lost pets have been recovered.
• He has given us joy and laughter even in the midst of tears.

He is good and worthy of our praise.

School was to have started on September 1.  We are in the midst of trying to recover as much as possible from homes and the school and we need time to regroup and make decisions about the future.  We covet your prayers for wise decision making, for health and safety for those wading into the water and for God's provision of new homes and school buildings.  For several colleagues, this is the second time they have been through this.  Many of our leaders, including our SIM Niger Director, treasurer and the Sahel Academy Director and their families were all living on these compounds.  This means they are dealing with this loss and having to make important decisions about ministries simultaneously. Many of our Nigerien colleagues' homes are being threatened or have already been lost.  Please pray that all will know and experience the loving care of the Father.