"I felt very encouraged," Gary Vanderet says of his five-day visit to Monrovia, Liberia's capital, in January. Vanderet is a pastor at the Peninsula Bible Church, which has strong ties with Liberia.

"She spoke powerfully of hope and staying power," he said of President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf's inaugural speech.

The Liberian government initially invited Vanderet, who lives in Sunnyvale, to attend the ceremony--also attended by Laura Bush and Condaleeza Rice--to give the convocation. Although this did not happen due to a miscommunication, the trip still opened Vanderet's eyes.

"There was unbelievable poverty, and no sanitation or running water," he says, estimating that 85 percent of the country does not have toilet facilities.

"It was very dirty, with trash piled along the road and much squalor and destruction," Vanderet said of Monrovia. "Even many of the major government buildings had been burned."

The dilapidated conditions extended to the inauguration. Vanderet said the ceremony was simple, held on a dirt plot that lacked toilet facilities for the guests.

Such conditions are perhaps not surprising given that Liberia ended two decades of civil war in 2003 that left about 250,000 dead and roughly 1 million people in exile. Sirleaf's election is a rare sign of hope for the beleaguered nation that was founded by freed American slaves and has been independent since 1847.

"Sirleaf spoke of the character [building] that comes from that suffering," Vanderet said of the speech. "She spoke powerfully about corruption and confronting it."

Corruption has long played a role in Liberia's decline, with many politicians viewing public funds as personal piggy banks. According to the United Nations, even a transitional government put in place after the end of civil war in 2003 helped itself to about half of Liberia's $30 million national budget in 2005.

The war has also left the country's industries, including its many rubber plantations and infrastructure, in ruins.

Sirleaf hopes to change this with a unique program aimed at cutting off corrupt public officials with the help of international monitors.

Vanderet hopes his church can also help Liberia, which has an average life expectancy of just above 40.

Vanderet's church is collecting school supplies to ship to Africa. He and members of his church are also planning a trip to Liberia in February 2006 to help volunteer at a training college.

With the help of Vanderet's longtime friend, Liberian Bishop Augustus Marwieh, the Peninsula Bible Church founded a similar college at a Liberian refugee camp outside Accra, Ghana in 1997. There, Liberians were trained in agriculture and water sanitation and other skills designed to make them self-sustaining.

Marwieh has since bought land in Liberia to establish a similar facility.

Vanderet is optimistic about it succeeding.

"I am amazed by the Liberians' strength of character," he says.

He is also realistic, though, about life on the ground in Liberia.

"The peace is fragile," he says. "Sirleaf has an unbelievable job ahead of her."