As summer in the northern hemisphere reached a crescendo, I boarded a plane in Nairobi late one night and crossed half the globe on my way back home to Oklahoma. My work as a photographer in eastern Africa had come to an end for the time being, and I was ready to be back stateside and celebrate summer. Once I recovered from jetlag, I kept up my track record of not staying in a place more than a week, and six days later was already back in Colorado with my lover. It was a relief to be back with him, after two months and eight thousand miles apart.

A few days later, Jacob took me on a hike to Ice Lake near Silverton. He told me it'd be a grueling trek, but worth it. "The wildflowers are supposed to be nuts!" he told me, and then said he hoped I still loved him by the end of it. It was a good thing I did, because once we reached the summit of the hike, he got down on one knee, held out a sparkly diamond ring, and asked me to marry him. All I remember after that are smiles and kisses, and the surprise bottle of champagne that he'd hidden in his backpack. 

Two days later, we drove across the entire state of New Mexico on the way to south Texas for Jacob's family reunion. Jacob's parents and sister stayed up until midnight to welcome us, and we all hugged each other tight. In the darkness of that night, everything seemed so surreal and impossibly wonderful. My left hand remained bare until we had time to get the ring resized, and I had to keep reminding myself that I hadn't imagined the events of two days ago. 

At the river, we spent the entire week outside and I gained the most ridiculous tan lines as I was schooled in proper Texas summer etiquette (including, but not limited to, no makeup, constant eating, and tubing down the river). I felt so grateful to be marrying a man and subsequently gaining a family with such sweet and beautiful traditions. Jacob's parents threw us a surprise engagement party one night and it caught us off guard in the best way. We'd forgotten that things like this happen to people after they get engaged. 

Back in Colorado, the gentle slope of the mesas and the wide open pastures already feel like home, and I have that curious sense that perhaps home is something we can create, just like love. A choice. It’s sobering, being betrothed to a man and feeling so sure and at peace about your decision, but also having the normal, human thoughts of, am I sure? is this “it?" it almost seems too easy. A few weeks ago, my dad put down the deposit on our wedding venue, making everything all the more real. Until we marry this winter, I remain in a kind of transitional limbo, but this man I am marrying, he is so good and kind and I know I will not regret choosing to love him every day. 

So I guess that's how it happens. Four years ago I met a boy, he moved away as I developed a crush, I lived my life in between, and now--surprise surprise--that boy that I thought was so out of my league is going to be my husband. Here are some film shots* from the month when it all happened.

* all images shot on a pentax k1000

The aquamarine waters of Ice Lake

Jacob pointing to the rock where he proposed

The view hiking up to Ice Lake

Gas station scenes in New Mexico

Evening light at the Frio River

Four year old Morgan passed out after a long day of tubing

My lover cookin' something unseen

Gretta pouring champagne into hand-embellished plastic cups

JP demonstrating his rock skipping skills

Cousin love

She has the right idea

Jacob, master breakfast maker

Gretta soaking up the evening light on the banks of the Frio

Intense Catan battles

The owner of the campground, Greg, who's lived his whole life in the Texas hill country 

Jacob and Morgan in the river

There are times in life—perhaps when you’re bumping down a dusty eastern Ugandan road, or peering into a schoolroom made out of mud and sticks—when you feel quite far from home. But in order for these feelings to carry any weight, there must be a definition of “home.” If home is categorized as everything that is familiar—not necessarily only what one has grown up with—then perhaps, despite your initial inklings, Uganda really isn’t so far from home. You get to a point where you have bumped down more than a few dusty East African roads, and peered into more than a few mud-and-stick schoolrooms, and though they are so different from what you knew as a child, they are no longer completely foreign. When home is everything familiar, then suddenly the world world is at your feet, because there is familiarity to be found everywhere.

To a westerner arriving in a place such as Uganda, initial culture shock can be blinding, causing one to see only the foreign and strange. But if you are able to stay in a culture long enough for the shock to ebb, you can begin to adopt a different perspective. Where culture shock (or, let's face it, ignorance) may lead one to think that “poor” defines a person in a third-world country, taking the time to invest in building relationships will show you that these people do not exist simply to be pitied by westerners. No, they are, just like you may be, a teacher, a pastor, a small-business owner, an agriculturalist, and first and foremost, a child of God. And here, there is incredible familiarity, a sense of home even though it may initially seem foreign.  

In Uganda, we attended a church that meets, for the time being, in a primary school classroom (class Primary Two Blue, according to the chalkboard lettering). Sitting at a wooden school desk on a sweltering Sunday morning, thousands of miles from where I grew up, the pastor began to chant the same liturgy that I grew up with in a small Oklahoma church. The pastor chanted The Lord be with you and we responded and also with you, and cultural differences ebbed as I found myself subconsciously slipping into the familiar lilt of the liturgy. I thought, here I am at home.

Children peering into a building that serves as a church as American missionaries talk with local church leaders.

Eating a mango on a hot afternoon

Rev. Shauen Trump showing his boys the local flora and fauna.

Missionary kid life

Ugandan pastor Rev. Raymond Kaija showing Rev. Jonathan Clausing a cassava field. 

A worker on the construction site of the new Lutheran seminary near Jinja.

Holy Communion in a primary school classroom.

Rev. Raymond Kaija photographs the construction site of the seminary.

Sunset in Busia

When flying from Nairobi to Lodwar, Turkana, the landscape swiftly morphs from lush green hills to rocky, sandy desert. Hot air slaps you in the face as you deplane and head to the airport, scarcely more than a landing strip. After collecting my luggage and declining the offer of transportation from two young German men, I was picked up in an old Land Cruiser and ushered to the site of the clinic in the small village of Nataparkakono.

It had been two years since my last visit at a Mercy Medical Team, and it was a welcome change to be back without the riddling of culture shock. When I arrived, a thunderstorm storm began to roll in over the mountains and everyone smiled at me and thanked me for bringing the rain. As the first droplets began to fall and the wind whipped a beautiful chaos, the broad, dark faces of the patients standing in line split into wide smiles as they hurried to shelter. I ducked inside the calm of church-turned-clinic where American and Kenyan medical professionals worked side by side providing desperately needed health care to the inhabitants of this remote area. Their vitals already measured, the patients inside rested their heads on the cool of the cement walls, clutching their crumpled medical forms as they waited to be seen first by a doctor and then the pharmacists. Tirelessly, gently, the patients were cared for, free of charge, or taken to the local hospital for more advanced treatment.

Trying to be as invisible as possible, I crept around the site taking photographs. One of the volunteers in the pharmacy remarked how dignified one of the men looked, and I agreed. These people may lack monetary resources, but they are by no means without dignity or self-confidence. I consider myself blessed to have been allowed a small glimpse into their lives.

A patient waits to be seen by a doctor at the clinic

A group of women sit together outside as they wait to be seen 

A beautiful Turkana man

Patients reacting to the message being shared in the evangelism tent

Career missionary Sarah Kanoy hangs an IV bag in the window of the church as patients wait outside.

The view out of malaria testing tent

These women got a kick out of taking a picture of me while I was photographing them.

One of the Kenyan nurses in the eye clinic

Patients waiting in line to be registered

Dr. Jeff Pruitt from Ohio works with his Kenyan counterpart to treat a patient.

A Turkana woman who guessed she was around ninety years old.

A woman chasing children back to school

Children from the village left messages for us on the road

Career missionary Shara Cunningham talks to the children playing around the clinic site.

Shara comforting a woman receiving an IV line

A woman pauses from building a hut to listen to a pastor speak.

This man walked fifteen days to visit his family in the area and to come to the clinic.

Sarah speaks reassuringly to a little girl receiving IV fluids.

MMT volunteer Brian Lund records the weight of one of the patients.

Children gathering to watch backflips in the courtyard

It takes a long time to get to Villa de Sena, Mozambique. If, like me, you live in the United States, you have to first get to Africa. This is no easy trek—in my case, traveling to Nairobi is a laborious 30-hour journey by plane, train, and automobile. From Nairobi, you spend another day airborne until you reach Beira, Mozambique. From Beira, it is a slow, arduous 12-hour train ride until the screeching halt of brakes signals that you have finally, finally arrived in Sena. 

You might step off the train into the dust of central Mozambique without any real idea of what to expect. After all, the only things you have been given beforehand are plane and train tickets, a few brief emails advising what to pack, and instructions to photograph the trip. When you arrive in Sena, it is dark, night having fallen five hours prior, and forty seminarians and pastors greet you with singing and dancing. You shake each of their calloused hands afterwards, one by one, and it is not until the next morning that the layers of mystery slowly begin to peel back.

First, you are warned not to get too close to the Zambezi river because it is home to crocodiles, hippos, and other unseemly snaking and slithering things. With a significant look, you’re told that it's not uncommon for people to disappear while fishing or gathering water. You gulp and nod. It seems they have already figured out you're prone to wandering. You also quickly realize that the water in your bathroom is cold river water, but you are thankful that there is at least a shower head. The language barrier then presents itself broad and vast, and your first order of business is to learn the Portuguese word for "thank you" (it’s obrigado). It might set in then how far away from home you are—think of how long it took to travel here!—but somehow you don’t mind.

Later, as you get to know the people of this remote place, more of the shroud of mystery will be lifted. You are here with the LCMS as a photographer to capture the rapidly growing Lutheran community in Mozambique, and you never cease to be surprised by the people you meet through your lens. Seeing the astounding spread of Lutheranism in Mozambique, you can't help but be reminded of the early church as it is recorded in the New Testament. You read through Acts on a quiet night and swear it is describing the present. In this small area in Mozambique, there have been 21 new churches planted in the past year (each filled to capacity), divided between only eight pastors. So hungry are the locals to hear and be nurtured in the Gospel, the stories almost don’t sound real: two young men bicycling forty kilometers just to meet with a pastor after stumbling across a Lutheran congregation; twenty-one men, women, and children walking 14 hours in order to meet visiting pastors and missionaries (that is, us); truck drivers so impressed by an ordination service they'd attended that they rushed back to their village to start their own congregation.

All these people you'll meet and stories you'll hear will remind you that while yes, poverty is real, it is somehow not the main focus. On this trip, there are no building of orphanages or painting of churches or poverty porn, but instead the warmest fellowship with strong, young, passionate brothers and sisters in Christ. They are generous and enterprising, resourceful and smart. If you go to Villa de Sena in central Mozambique, you'll without a doubt be humbled, but you'll also be astonished by how much you learn from these strong, hard-working, resilient, welcoming, joyful people. You'll be surprised by the camaraderie and love you'll feel, even though you can barely communicate through language. And at the end of it all, you’ll realize that, cultural differences aside, there's no mystery to any country when you’re being surrounded by the body of Christ.

A young boy looks into the church building of St. Matthews Lutheran Church in Kapesseni.  

The main street in Sena

The most stunning young woman in Mutarara

Young and old, women everywhere carried at least one baby or toddler on their back at all times.

We visited this church in 3 de Fevereiro late in the afternoon and the light was nothing like I've ever seen. Here, mothers and their babies are illuminated as they listen to a message being given.

These two young ladies posed on their own for a portrait when they saw my camera.

This congregation is still saving up for a church building, so in the meantime, they meet for services in the open air.

Rev. Shauen Trump baptizes a child during a service in São Paulo Lutheran Church in Sena. Fifty-nine people were baptized all together that day.

A local pastor addresses his congregation in Chemba.

Members of a congregation are so excited to see us that they meet us on the road, then run singing alongside the truck until we reach the church.

Music in central Mozambican churches consists simply of drums, shakers, and the human voice.

Yours truly receiving a chicken and a squash from the congregation in Muanda, Mozambique.

Two young boys collect the offering during a service at São Paulo Lutheran Church in Sena.

Most of the congregants are young women and children. Here, they are saying goodbye as we head to our next congregation.

A baby moments before she is baptized.

Standing room only at the back of a church building in 3 de Fevereiro.