By Carol from India,

Have you ever felt deeply connected to a country which you have never visited? In my case, the country is called as Rwanda. I spend a lot of time having discussions about Rwanda, its culture and about the people with my German Teacher Tom and my friend Dana.

Well this weekend I was with my friend Dana and whenever we are together, we always pray, worship and watch gospels together. She was a volunteer for a year in 2015 in Rwanda and some of her friends from Rwanda organized a youth worship and prayer session on zoom conference call called as “interstars worship service” which was held on 23rd august. She wanted to attend this service and hence, she asked me if I too would like to attend this service along with her.

So, we both logged in with different devices and waited until we were accepted in the conference call, few minutes later we both got accepted. The young people from Rwanda were singing, playing different instruments and were worshipping together in their own languages called as “Kinyarwanda”.

I do not understand this language but it sounds really sweet. I also know few words such as “Imana ikurinde – God protect you” and “Urukundo – love” which I find very interesting.  I can also understand “Our father prayer” in Kinyarwanda because during quarantine, my friend Dana, she has recited this prayer for more than 100 times. So, the point which I am trying to make here is that I haven’t ever been to Rwanda but I feel deeply connect to this country. I have also spent a lot of time having discussion with Tom and Dana about the history on Rwanda.

The services started at 12 pm UTC, the way young Rwandan people were praying and worshipping together was so beautiful. This worship was very intercultural, as I was from India and Dana was from Germany and the youth people were from Rwanda. After the worship session, one of a person from the youth shared a very beautiful message in English about “Recandling”. He shared 2 verses from the bible (2 Timothy 1 and Jeremiah 24:7) and said that we must relight ourselves again and should spread our light which comes from God in this dark world.

Honestly, it was a very beautiful service because no matter where we all came from, we all were one while worshipping and praying together to our God. I also learned “Imana Iragukunda – which means God loves you”. So, this is how I had a great time, worshiping in Kinyarwanda with my friend Dana and other Rwandan people.

Have you ever felt connect to any country like I did to Rwanda? If you have a similar kind of experience please do let us know in the comment section below.