African Communalism and Psalm 51

Did you ever realize how much your cultural biases influence your understanding of the Bible? I hadn't until I started learning about the rich diversity of other cultures. In an article published today on The Gospel Coalition Africa website, I reflect on how the African cultural value of communalism helped me better understand the last few verses of Psalm 51. Go give it a read, then come back and leave your comments!

Covid-19 Update

On March 17, Namibia received its first two cases of Covid-19 and immediately declared a State of Emergency going into lockdown. After feeling the economic pressure of the severest lockdown restrictions, the government has increasingly been trying to keep those restrictions limited. Additionally, though our total confirmed cases has eclipse 11,000, our daily average of new cases has declined. Thus it is no surprise that 6-months later, when that State of Emergency was set to expire, they decided against extending it.

Many were celebrating, calling Sept 18th an "independence day" since we were free from lockdown. Others claimed the government is simply throwing up its collective hands and saying, "Let the best immune system win." Somewhere in the middle, I believe they are trying to do their best to protect both life and livelihood, because as they said, "Poverty also kills."

We have all now settled into the routine of preventative measures such as face masks, sanitizing, contact tracing logs, and social distancing. Those measures will continue. Group size is still limited to 50 people. But the airport has reopened and is welcoming tourists. Domestic travel is unhindered. Curfew has been removed. Contact sports are allowed. So basically we have determined to coexist with the virus and move on with life.

NETS is continuing with face-to-face classes. We have not registered any positive cases on campus. Students with symptoms or close contact with a positive case are asked to stay at home and we will make special arrangements for them. Our hope is that this remains the case and we are able to finish our semester unhindered in about 6 weeks.

Covid-19 Update

Covid has officially made itself at home in Windhoek. Up to now, our epicenter in Namibia had been Walvis Bay, our major port city on the coast. The government set a quarantine zone around the coastal cities. But apparently it was not very strict and people were traveling from the coast around the country and taking the virus with them. It has now spread to every region in the country with our capital city Windhoek being our new epicenter. To date we have nearly 7,000 cases with 65 deaths (check here for up to date numbers). But more importantly, we currently have the highest rate of increase per capita of any country in Africa.

As a result, the government has fixed another quarantine zone around the cities of Windhoek, Okahandja and Rehoboth. Travel is freely allowed within that zone, but no one is allowed to travel into or out of that zone. Additionally, there is a nation-wide curfew from 8:00pm-5:00am.

Despite the steep increase, schools and universities, including NETS (Namibia Evangelical Theological Seminary), are allowed to continue face-to-face instruction with health protocols in place. Class sizes at the seminary are already small. Everyone registers, sanitizes, wears facemasks, and sits at least 1.5 meters apart. The biggest adjustment we have had to make is to move evening classes earlier so everyone can be home before curfew. We are incredibly thankful that we can continue with face-to-face classes as it is clearly the better option over distance mode.

A Stingy Father-in-Law, a Loyal Prostitute, and the Gospel of Grace

This semester at NETS Chapel we are preaching through a series called "Stories Your Momma Never Told You". It will take us through a bunch of passages in the Old Testament that pastors rarely preach on. I kicked off the series preaching on the story of Judah and Tamar in Genesis 38. At first read, it seems like an odd interruption in the ongoing story of Joseph. It also includes some strange cultural practices, and often leaves the reader wondering what is this even doing here?! But it actually fits perfectly well in the overall story of God fulfilling His promises, and teaches us a valuable lesson in the exceeding riches of God’s grace. Check out the message here.

School in Session

Lockdown restrictions in Namibia have been lifted enough to allow NETS (Namibia Evangelical Theological Seminary) to return to face-to-face classes. Naturally, we must follow all the now-typical precautionary measures like registers, temperature taking, and sanitizer upon entrance, distancing of 1 meter, and wearing mandatory face masks (though apparently that doesn't apply when taking a group photo! 😂). Our class sizes are generally small anyway, so we are able to accommodate.

Thanks to our large hall we are able to gather for Chapel once a week. We play videos of worship songs but forego actual singing. This semester lecturers will be preaching through a series called "Stories Your Momma Never Told You," consisting of strange, obscure passages throughout the OT that we rarely hear messages on. Some of these texts include cultural practices that seem very strange to us today, and thus take hard exegetical work to understand. This was illustrated as one lecturer made a piñata of a treasure chest, which students beat until the candy "treasure" came out. Similarly, we sometimes have to do hard exegetical work to figure out the treasure of a passage.

Covid-19 Update

Across Namibia, our number of Covid cases had been fairly limited into June, so the lockdown restrictions were being slowly lifted. However, a few truck drivers escaped from quarantine and took the virus back to their homes in Walvis Bay. Since then, our numbers in that coastal town have skyrocketed. The government instituted a quarantine line around 3 coastal cities that allowed travel between those towns but not into or out of that zone except for emergencies.

To date we are up to a total of 1,775 cases with 8 deaths (see live numbers here). Most of those cases are in Walvis Bay, however, lately cases have been showing up around the country from people who have traveled from there. It appears only a matter of time before the outbreak hits Windhoek as well.

Our economy is seriously struggling. Hundreds of small businesses have closed and even more jobs have been lost. The government is trying to find that line between "preserving life and also livelihood," thus avoiding another total lockdown is a priority.

Winter Vacation

June-July marks the mid-year winter break for university students in Namibia. It also marks Namibia's prime tourist season. However, the closing of international borders since mid-March due to the Covid pandemic has been devastating to our tourist industry. So joining a few friends for a short tour to the south helped hit two birds with one stone: get some rest and relaxation during our break, and also help support the struggling tourist industry.

Our first stop was the small farming town of Stampriet on the edge of the Kalahari Desert. This town has rich water resevoirs not far under the ground if you can drill through the hard granite. It now provides fresh produce to stores and lodges across the country.

Our next stop was the Quiver Tree Forest and Giant's Playground just outside of Keetmanshoop. I had never visited these sites before and it was well worth the short detour. Apparently, this farm also has a few tame cheetahs(!) but they were MIA during our visit. 😢

Quiver Tree Forest

A dusky sunbird enjoying nectar from quiver tree flowers

Giant's Playground.
It looks like mounds of large boulders stacked on top of each other,
but really small cracks in the rocks have expanded into larger creases
that gives them this unique look.

After that, we continued west to the coastal town of Luderitz, where we visited one of my favorite places in Namibia: Kolmanskop. It is an old, abandoned mining town that has been taken over by the desert. In addition to the solitude, history, and vitage appeal, it is also a photographer's paradise!

On our way back home we passed by the wild desert horses near Aus, and stopped by the Fish River Canyon, the largest canyon in Africa and (by some measurements) second largest in the world.

Everywhere we went we were the only people around. One restaurant had had only one other customer that whole day. For one roadside stall, we were the first customer's they had see in two weeks. Needless to say, they were all very thankful for a few local tourists coming to help support their business. And we were glad to have the entire tourism industry catering just for us.