William Least Heat-Moon, once wrote, I'm not sure what to make of it, but I think a dream can set you on another path.

In the living room of a simple house built with sticks and mud, near the equatorial rain forest of southwestern Ethiopia, I asked my host sitting across the table, "What dreams do you have for your children?"  Yedetta's face was barely visible in the room illuminated by a 25 watt bulb but I could see that the question startled him. This man who has spent his adult life helping to realize the dreams of others, was not comfortable talking about himself. Over the past twenty years, he has been beaten several times by local government thugs and held in jail without any charge other than the one that threatens totalitarian governments everywhere: preaching the gospel of Jesus. It's the same news Christians everywhere celebrate at Christmas: Emmanuel, God with us. A more accurate meaning for Emmanuel is God will save us!, which, of course, means that no government can ever have ultimate power over us; bad news for every dictator since the days of Herod.

From the earliest Christian martyrs across Europe to Jan Hus and John Knox, from China to Africa and Latin America, even in the United States, the simple message of Christianity has always threatened unjust governments.  Yedetta took us to a village where twenty years ago he had been dragged to the town square, spit upon and laughed at for preaching the Christian faith. Now, in this same village, there is a parish with over a thousand Christians, many of whom endured persecution for their convictions. Since the Marxist regime was overthrown in 1991, the Ethiopian Evangelical Church of Mekane Yesus, built upon the early missionary efforts of mainline Lutherans and Presbyterians, has emerged from the underground - joyous, confident and courageous. Congregational leaders are convinced that their suffering has made the commitment of the people deeper because the risks of faithful witness were greater.  

An ordained minister, fluent in English, Amharic, and Oromo, Yedetta was not comfortable talking about his personal dreams. He preferred telling the stories of people from the villages and towns, whom he described as living hand-to-mouth, while building sanctuaries, developing clean water systems and planting fields, all with a vibrant and courageous faith. Yedetta has walked over hundreds of miles preaching, teaching and helping these people. Clearly, he loves them. I persisted until he spoke about his own dream. "I hope that I'll be able to send two of my five children to a good high school where they will have a better chance to graduate and get into college. My wife and I have talked about this many times; two out of five is all we could ever afford."      
The best high school in the country was established over seventy years ago by missionaries from the United Presbyterian Church in the United States. The teachers are now an unlikely mix of Presbyterian, Roman Catholic and Lutheran missionaries, from Finland and United States. The dean of the school is an Ethiopian man with a college degree. He is a graduate of the school he now directs.  Yedetta explained that the government primary schools simply do not prepare students well enough to pass entrance exams for either High School or College, where English proficiency is required along with mastery of other basic skills.  

The literacy rate in Ethiopia is 40 percent. (Of course this is terribly low; but if you want some shocking news consider this: according to the Washington Post, 46 percent of the High School graduates in Maryland will enter college with an 8th grade reading ability. In Florida the number is 60 percent.  Most American educators fear that the literacy rate in this country is decreasing at an alarming rate. This in a nation where the amount of money given to sports entertainers could educate the whole continent of Africa, vaccinate every child in Ethiopia against polio and reduce infant mortality by half.) The World Bank estimates the annual poverty level in Sub Sahara Africa to be equal to 365 dollars. In Ethiopia, the annual income is now 108 dollars, more than two-thirds below the poverty level.  Life expectancy is 44.5 years for men, only slightly more for women.  Infant mortality is nearly fifty percent.     

I asked Yedetta what it would cost to send his children to the Presbyterian school. "Thirty dollars for ten months." Three hundred dollars. My partner and I were carrying camera equipment whose price would fulfill this father's simple dream. In the United States that amount will be spent on movies, sports and family vacations. Yesterday I noticed a full-page advertisement for cable television at the cost of only three hundred dollars a year.

Before our conversation ended, the electricity went out, a regular occurrence. We sat in the dark as I thought of my own children and felt a deep intimacy with my host. Connected by dreams for our children, this intimacy carries a burden of responsibility that I am now struggling to understand.  Jesus says, to them who have much, much is required. But what exactly does that mean; what precisely is required of me? Money seems an obvious answer, but much too simplistic to address the larger question about the direction of long development in Ethiopia.  

Listening to Yedetta, this large blurry question comes into a sharp particular focus.  If the whole country can't be raised up, at least one, maybe two children can be given an opportunity.  Two by two.  Who ever knows? Maybe this opportunity will be the key to future leadership. It could happen.  After all, Moses was once a child saved from certain death who went on to lead his people from slavery to freedom. Remember the leader in this country who came from the bottom up to tell the world: I have a dream.

I don't know the answers. I do know that the dreams I have for my children are now mingled with Yedetta's dreams, and our dreams are mingled with the dreams of fathers and mothers all over the world. No dream that is worth dreaming can ever be realized until the dreams of God's people everywhere are realized. This hope was announced by shepherds long ago in a poor Judean village that looked like the one in Ethiopia where we shared our dreams one night.