BRYAN BOAN

I looked at the land stretched before me.

 With my eyes I saw an empty plot of dirt and weeds. But with my heart I saw a thriving church full of my own people of South Sudan- people whose souls were being fed the richness of the Gospel.

I thought back to the journey that brought me to this very spot where I was standing. In the middle of a refugee camp, this isn’t where I ever imagined being a pastor. When war came to my region however, like the stories of thousands of others, I gathered my family and what friends I could, and we fled.

Walking into camp with not much more than the clothes on your back, is humbling. My wife is a certified nurse and I’ve been a pastor for 15 years, serving as a chaplain in the same hospital. We had a home, a career, a life together. But I knew if I wanted my family to live, we had to leave. My children are safe now and are able to continue attending school.

As I look throughout the camp at the hundreds of other refugees, It’s easy to feel paralyzed. Where do I start? How do I pick up the pieces and begin again?

But God has given me this vision. Although the steep cost of being able to cross the border is $400, God allowed me to bring not just one, but 18 more of my people to safety. And this week, we begin construction on a place where I can gather with my people and share the beauty of the Gospel.

As I stood on that little plot of land, I picked up a handful of soil and let it sift through my fingers. That soil representes the fertile ground in which God has planted for me, for this moment in time.

Is this a dream?

I held my lifeless son in my hands, not sure I could accept what just happened. Losing my husband and child in the same day didn't seem real or possible. 

But the gunshots firing through the air reminded me that it was all too real. I didn't have time to think. I had to make decisions quickly. Forced to leave my blind father behind, I gathered my other there children and we ran into the bush to hide. But we couldn't survive there.

So we walked for seven days, we wandered by foot until we reached the border of Uganda.

Now at this refugee camp, sometimes I wake up, and still think it's all a dream. I think about my little business I used to run back home, selling things in the market to sustain my children, while my husband was a teacher.

Everything we worked for is now gone. I have no home to call my own, only a shack barely staying patched together.

In the midst of my tragedies however, God sent a pastor and his wife to help look after us. My Rock, that has been the one constant in my life, is God's Word. My children and I find comfort in it's steadiness when the world crashes around us. 

This Rock is what we have and what we will continue to stand on when I feel I can no longer stand.