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Welcome to the blog website for First Presbyterian Church of Bellevue. Below you will find the most recent posts from all of our blogs. Learn more about blogs or contact us.
Most Recent Posts
Finding my way “home”:
Posted to Your StoryOne day recently I was having a sort of mini-meltdown, and went home to rest and muse. After some time (next morning, actually), I was encouraged and strengthened by an insight I want to share: I had been nearly overwhelmed by an unfortunately frequent hassler named Self-Pity, and though I recognized him, and rebuked him, and he in fact did slink away, I needed to get a better understanding of what he is generally up.. (Read More)
New housemate
Posted to Your StoryI’m very pleased to have a housemate for the next 5 months! My expenses have been very close to outstripping income, and I’ve been praying for a person to share my big house since I moved there in December last year. Now Mark Grayson from First Presbyterian Church, Bellevue has come to work with children (mainly, his vision is to PLAY with them!) at the Center for Champions in Rwamagana, where he will commute by.. (Read More)
Open air classroom:
Posted to Your StoryMy usage of Kinyarwanda is ramping up a bit, as I’ve been teaching a group of boys (teenagers and early twenties) whom Network member Theoneste has rounded up from the street. He put 19 boys in a couple of rented rooms and brought them to study at his Catch-up School. He invited me to come weekly and teach them from the Bible, so I have been doing that for several weeks. They find benches from.. (Read More)
…a quiet and powerful reminder
Posted to Your StoryIt was a quiet and powerful reminder to me of the way so many of the people live, in tiny mud huts with a bit of a garden, perhaps a goat, and very little water (they can seldom wash themselves or their clothes). It may seem picturesque, but it is really squalid. In the city of Kigali, it is easy to get lulled into the idea that things are ok in Rwanda. It’s neat, clean,.. (Read More)
Rwanda, A day in the countryside:
Posted to Your StoryWith the kind assistance of a church member I have been helping Martin, 16, for the last few years to get medical treatment for a badly diseased leg. He is now much improved, but after a period of mingling with bad company in Kigali and not doing well in school, he made the decision to live with his grandmother in the village and attend school there. I recently had the opportunity to drive out to.. (Read More)
"the problem of pain"
Posted to Your StoryI have, as a gift from God, a love-burden for the people and country of Rwanda. The burden is growing stronger—I almost said heavier, but that would be too much emphasis on me; I need to remind myself that Jesus is carrying the major portion of it alongside me. “The LORD hath laid on him the iniquity [and grief] of us all. (Read More)
Beauty... makes me weep!
Posted to Your StoryI look out from my wide porch upon the view of green valleys and clusters of houses on the hillside, interspersed with terraced fields, and am deeply touched by the beauty of this country, and it makes me weep! I think of Jesus, and about what Isaiah wrote about him centuries before he lived on earth: Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of.. (Read More)
I wept for Canaan
Posted to Your StoryI have been weeping off and on all morning. I went out to greet Sam, the young man who works for me, whose father was imprisoned for 12 years having been falsely accused right after the genocide. This man, whose name is Canaan, had not only not been complicit in any killings, but had managed to help some 17 of his Tutsi neighbors to escape by.. (Read More)
Weep and Pray
Posted to Your StoryI fed the small kitten I am taking care of for a few weeks, then sat with him and my journal and Bible to read and pray. At first, the kitten was urgently seeking my attention, needing to leap and scratch and bite. I kept gentling it with stroking and little sharp taps on its nose when it bit, and eventually it settled a little, but was.. (Read More)
Rwandese Remember
Posted to Your StoryApril 7 This day Rwandese observe a nationwide official day of mourning and commemoration, remembering the same date in 1994 when so many people were killed by their neighbors, friends, church members and even families. The date is one, unfortunately like many others, that will “live in infamy” as President Roosevelt said of the date Pearl Harbor was bombed by the Japanese. I feel somehow moved to write.. (Read More)