I have spent the past week with a women group in Goma – DRC. Thinking about the Ebola crisis, the post election tensions was not exciting and infact postponing the trip was the best option I desired.
However the tension was another great opportunity to go to Goma to meet the 60+ women and start some great conversations with them.
What I heard in the room when I arrived was discouragement, giving up, regret and alike, and to be sincere this is evident in the DRC context and many have lost hope in this great nation.
From the extract of Nehemiah 2:11-17 , the group had to apply this story to their current context and I was privileged to be taught about the DRC in less than an hour from the skits that the women perfomed.
The skits had the following scenes: corruption, Ebola, unsustainable handouts from international agencies, robbery, domestic violence, sex trafficking and hopelessness.
In reality, these are the some of the scenes that describe the context of DRC today, yet their is so much potential in this great nation. The obstacles just can’t let people think beyond them, hope is lost and dreaming becomes very difficult.
These are the conversations I have had this week, but something great has come out of this;
Bringing back hope in a hopeless context and people starting to dream.
Locating themselves in these dreams and what they need to actually do to achieve these dreams.
A sense of urgency.
Obstacles will always be there, but the hopes and dreams will always triumph the obstacles.
The power of working in community , helping each other to achieve personal dreams.
The realization that whatever they have been doing was without purpose
And so on…
That is the power of VICOBA -plus in a context like DRC were so many things are happening, it is difficult to imagine the potential of VICOBA – plus, but yes the women mentioned it is something they needed as soon as yesterday and they are ready to use the knowledge from the training to inspire change in DRC.
These women champions are going to change DRC…