August brings with it sunshine and a few weeks of quiet. The summer trip has been and gone, our link schools here in the UK are closed for the summer holidays, and our partner schools over in Zambia are shut for August too.
Time to breath, think, reflect and look ahead to the rest of the year.
Today, I was looking back on my recent trip and thinking about the things that stood out to me, the moments that I remember now in the quiet of this month. It’s been interesting (but maybe not surprising if you know me!) to note that these moments all carry the heart of our partnership with the schools in Zambia.
Maybe it’s because I heard the High School Musical song randomly playing when I was in Lusaka last week but I can’t stop “We’re all in this together” going around my in my head! (Apologies that it is now in your head too!)
When Beyond Ourselves began, we wanted to make sure that we worked in partnership with local people, churches and schools in Zambia, that we didn’t “own” anything but that we would support seeing local people’s vision and dreams for their communities become a reality. That together we would see lives changed and communities transformed. We knew it wouldn’t be a healthy relationship if we created a dependency on us; instead we want to walk with the schools as they journey towards self-sustainability in the future.
And so the times that stand out to me over the recent weeks are when I have seen moments of the “future” happening. They are the moments that could perhaps go unnoticed by others but are significant all the same; the steady repayment of a business working loan we gave a few years ago, the free use of a vehicle (plus money for diesel!) for several weeks when the one I was using broke down and gave up; the school and church community working together to repair the fence around a school or to complete the new wall they need without Beyond Ourselves being involved physically or financially, the unprompted offer from one partner school to another to donate their water tank , or to provide the timber the other needs for their new kitchen area…
They are the moments when I can see five years of relationship gives us not only a strength in the present but a shared commitment to the “future”.
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