with our powers combined...

I watched Captain Planet as a kid... and all I really remember from that show was the moment that all the kids with the rings and the special abilities from nature would put their hands together in a circle and shout: "with our powers combined..." and the out of now where, "I am Captain Planet!"


(Ridiculous reference, I know.... BUT bear with me)


Last week my bosses in the States (Ben and Liz) had the chance to go to a weekend conference in California where other social businesses were able to get together to collaborate and update one another on different sectors.... There were around a dozen companies there. Companies like TOMS Shoes, Krochet Kids, Ember Arts, and Sseko Designs (of course). These companies all do different things... They have different business plans, different products, different approaches to the way they think the principles of social business should be applied, but there is a common thread. When they all get together, something great happens. Captain Planet doesn't come bursting out of this circle of people, but with our powers combined, I think something truly great can take place.

I love that there are companies out there that are similar to ours, and that not only do they exist, but we actually get to rub shoulders with them. There is a movement starting in the realm of business, and it is so cool to watch it happen. Companies are starting to care. They are finding ways to be profitable and socially conscious. This is a beautiful movement.

And this beautiful movement, I am seeing more and more that the redemptive nature of the gospel is not limited to the "religious" realm. This world is a broken, dark, and messed up place. I got a really great e-mail from a friend this week who passed along this quote from a man who was explaining the concept of salvation to his son.... He said that sin isn't just about feeling guilty. It is about how the whole world seems broken into a million tiny pieces... And those pieces fight against each other. Against other people, against creation, against God, even against ourselves. But restoration is possible... little glimpses of it now, and one day in full. We can try to put together the broken pieces... when we do things like picking up litter, or sitting by the lonely kid at school, or providing a job for a woman who wouldn't otherwise have the opportunity to work, or something as small as buying fair trade chocolate chips at the grocery store. There are these little acts of restoration we can do everyday to fix the broken things in this world. And in the end, like Tim Keller says, it will somehow be greater for having once been broken.

Whether they realize it or not, these businesses are reacting to the brokenness that sin has brought into the world and seeking to do their part in it's restoration. I think in some way everyone senses that this world is not right, and I am glad that people and now businesses are acting on those feelings. And that they are drawn together... and as cheesy and idealistic as at may sound, they are moving toward restoration and building a more beautiful world together... powers combined.

whirlwind

The past few weeks have been pretty crazy to say the least... One weekend I was up in Gulu, the next I was camping on the Nile river and then flying back to the US. And now, a week and a half later, I'm back already. See... whirlwind.

I got asked a lot if I was having culture shock, and my response was always no, because they are like two totally different worlds. Its kind of like a parallel universe. Everything in the US was what I expected, and how I remembered. And Kampala is just the way I left it.

That was actually part of what was hard about being home... It felt like just the way I left it. I graduated from college and moved out here before most of my friends parted ways, so I wasn't around for the difficult departures and the reality setting in that the community I had built up over the past four years was splitting up. I guess I sort of just accepted the fact while I was over here. But when I got back, it was kind of like nothing had changed, and here's why: a wedding.

The main reason I went back to the states was to be a bridesmaid in my roommate Claire's wedding (which was great, by the way). The week before the wedding I got to see all my best friends... I got to laugh with them, pray with them, talk for hours with them, and cry with them. Everything with them just fits... its a truly beautiful thing. But while I was enjoying them, it also made me sad feeling like I was missing out on this beautiful thing that was happening without me... It wasn't until Sunday after the wedding that everyone started leaving town and heading back to their perspective new cities, that it sunk in for me.

As good as my week home was, most of it was like a false-reality. It was a taste of something I had, that doesn't actually exist anymore. Now Claire's married and moved to Dallas... Abbey's living it up in Austin... Tracey is headed out to Seattle.... Francis 307 has been vacated by all my roommates... the Hendricks just moved to Haiti for goodness sake! As hard as it was to realize this, it was so good to come to terms with. I feel like it freed me up even more to be wholly here, in Kampala. After this week, I know that even if I were back in the States, it wouldn't be the same.

And now I have returned, and it really does feel good to be back. Kampala is beginning to feel more like home.... and it doesn't hurt that my life here is pretty great. I mean, who gets to not only do a job they love, but also live in a place where they can go camping on an island on the Nile, get a first hand account from a girl in Gulu about her experience living on the run from Kony during the war, enjoy amazing weather (85 everyday... yes, please), experience a new culture while learning to examine your own, and go to a market where you can find literally anything you would ever need for a costume for under $2.50 (Owino is the best. Halloween 2010.... watch out).