During my recent trip to Nueva
Guinea I learned a most interesting story that explains the dotted
line on the map between Nueva Guinea and Bluefields. Over breakfast
one morning my friend commented, “Did you ever hear about
the road that was built between Nueva Guinea and Bluefields?”
He proceeded to tell me that in the early 1990s the Nicaraguan
government decided to build a road the 102 kilometers between
the two towns. Road crews from Nueva Guinea began working towards
Bluefields, and road crews from Bluefields began building towards
Nueva Guinea. In a short time, the two roads met and as soon as
they did, everybody who had a car drove from Bluefields to Nueva
Guinea, and everybody who had a car in Nueva Guinea piled family
and friends in and drove to Bluefields. They wanted to see what
it was like on the other side. The Nueva Guineans had heard about
the Coast: the Atlantic Ocean, the Creole language, food cooked
with coconut milk, the predominance of Black African culture.
And the Bluefielders wanted to see what Nueva Guinea and the Pacific
part of Nicaragua was all about. My friend packed his children
and a couple of friends in his car and went to see what Bluefields
was all about. I could imagine the excitement they must have felt
as they sped along to see this place that they had only wondered
about.
His family made it to Bluefields and back, but just barely. The
road only lasted five days. It lacked adequate planning. “You
see,” my friend told us, “a number of small rivers
cross through the land between Nueva Guinea and Bluefields. The
plans for the road apparently didn’t contemplate the construction
of bridges, and when the first rains fell five days after the
road was completed, it collapsed in a number of places. Cars from
Nueva Guinea were left stranded in Bluefields, and cars from Bluefields
were left stranded in Nueva Guinea. The cars had to be shipped
back to their respective towns on boats by river,” he told
me.
This story says something to me about how we relate with one
another. In my work with partnership through the Nicaraguan Council
of Protestant Churches (CEPAD) Nehemiah Program, we facilitate
15 relationships between churches and presbyteries in the United
States and churches and communities in Nicaragua. It is always
challenging, beautiful, and interesting to work with these people
from North and South, who have a desire for adventure, an urge
to see what another part of the world and another culture is like.
They want to see and appreciate the differences but also see how
they are one in Christ.
The way we relate with one another across borders must be based
on something more than just the desire to be together or the excitement
to “see what it is like on the other side.” Planning
helps partnerships a lot, allowing us to grow as brothers and
sisters in Christ on more stable ground and with a framework for
action that is spiritually empowering and enriching. As partnerships
work together to determine who they are and what their goals are,
a stream of commitment flows forth and the road is paved for people
of different cultures and economic strata to walk together as
equals.
May your road in Christ bring you to encounters with people who
are different, and may God’s grace give you the courage
and strength to build bridges and foundations of equality.
With love,
Ellen Sherby
The 2004 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p.
254
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