Grace House and Manning

The last two days have been a bit “challenging” as our Kenyan friends like to say.  We’ve not run into any trouble, but this respiratory infection (I guess) has really slowed me down.  We arrived at Ndhiwa Monday evening in tome for evening devotion, unfortunately I could not stop coughing long enough to properly encourage the kids.  The smoke from the wood burning stove cooking the orphans dinner was hitting me just right.  They were all quite concerned, I’m sure some of them thought the old mzungu was dying right in front of them! I slept pretty well though, and Tuesday morning we drove over to Grace House.

 

The road to this place is very bad, but Angton did fine and we didn’t get stuck.  Actually, to call it a road is being very generous; there are places where two cows can’t pass each other.  Yeah LandCruiser!  Grace House is pretty new, and Joseph, the manager, is doing a good job of keeping it that way.  He is a very kind and patient man from what I can tell, and very happy to be taking care of these kids.  He’s one of our unsung heroes in this work, the manager who quietly tends his flock of orphans while trying to make a living from the land nearby.  The little support that we send him is certainly not enough for his many headaches.  Imagine being father to 60 kids of every age in the middle of nowhere.  There will be stars in his crown, I can tell you.

 

We stayed through lunch, and I was able to speak for a few minutes before the coughing and wheezing took over me.  I hate being sick.  We drove back to Ndhiwa and after a two hour nap, I felt a lot better.  I was able to encourage the kids at evening devotion, and I think it went really well.

 

This morning I was even better, and we drove over to Manning Orphanage.  The road there was very dusty, however and by the time we got there I was feeling rough again.  We did stay through lunch, and I got to meet the new kids at Immanuel Feeding Station, which recently opened here.  Many of them came home for lunch, along with the orphanage kids.  They seem to be adjusting to each other just fine.

 

After we left, Angton decided to take a different road that the one we always use to see if it was shorter.  Kenyans don’t really use maps, I’m sure most printed maps wouldn’t have most of these roads anyway.  Sometimes the only way to know where a road goes is to drive it.  Unfortunately, this one went the wrong way for a long time.  By the time I figured out what he was doing, we had already gone 20 minutes in the wrong direction.  I was really feeling the dust, so I think I was a bit cross with him, OK I know I was, but I think he forgave me. We managed to get back to the tarmac road ok eventually.

 

We stopped to see our friends at Kisac Soapstone and check on the medals and trophies for Kick for Kenya.  They are almost done and look really good.  We will pick them up on Saturday.  For now we are in Kisii, at The Dados enjoying the 3G internet.  After many days of very slow, it’s refreshing for a geek like me.  Like some people crave the mountain air, so I crave the broadband! Tomorrow, back to the VTC for prepare for my Friday meetings.  Be Blessed!

 

Homa Bay Church of Christ

If this name doesn’t sound familiar to you, there is a reason.  Homa Bay is not one of the places where we are currently engaged with an orphans work.   It is however, where Alfayo Bodi, (our director at Ndhiwa, Grace House, and Manning) was living when he first became a Christian and helped start this church 13 years ago.  It’s also the home of our Stephen Owino, who is my assistant and good friend.  So today I made a special visit to encourage this church and the Christians there.

 

We arrived mid-morning at the new church plot.  The church actually meets at a rented building but has purchased this plot to build their permanent home on.  It may seem strange to us for a church to be 13 years old before having their own building, but not for this church.  They have been caring for widows and orphans almost from the very beginning, and have using their resources to help others instead of focusing on themselves. They have build a small mud house for the pastor to live in and are saving for their building.

 

They had erected a tent for my visit and many of the orphans and widows they are feeding and some church members were there.  It’s a town-church, so most of the members have jobs so it was a sacrifice for them to come meet with me.  The kids there literally had never seen a white person before, so they were a bit shy, but they sang songs and recited poems in honor of the occasion.  We heard testimonies from two orphans and a very aged widow about how the church had been caring for them.  It was very encouraging and humbling for me.

 

I spoke briefly, (very briefly since I am coming down with something and can’t seem to stop coughing), and we prayed together.  After sharing in their meal, we had a meeting time with the church elders and their personal stories were also very touching.  The church has been through a lot, as any church of this age has, but it has persevered.   One of the elders was an orphan himself and he feels very deeply for the orphans in his area.  I don’t know what God will do to help us help this church, but I am praying that he will send the increase we would require, as he has always been faithful to do. 

 

After our time at the church plot, we went to Stephen Owino’s house for lunch.  The ladies of the church had everything prepared and it was a fine meal of fish, ugali, pasta, veggies, and pineapple.  It was so good to see where Stephen lives and I can tell it was very important to him.  On our way out of town, we stopped at a hotel there to check it out for a possible mission trip hotel.  It may work out and would be a lot closer to Ndhiwa and our other orphanages near here than staying in Kisii.

 

Now we have arrived at Alfayo’s house at Ndhiwa Orphanage.  For the next two days we will se this place as well as Manning, and Grace House.  The internet is very slow here so I’m not sure I’ll be able to get pictures up, but I will try.  Be blessed.

Ongoro, Auto Repair, and Lee McGraw

“Ongoro” is a Luo word that means, “dry place.”  It’s aptly named.  The soil is sandy here and agriculture is tougher than in other parts of Kenya.  As a rule, the drier the place, the poorer it is and Ongoro is no exception.  Tobias Olweny is our director here and he is doing a good job. 

 

Friday night we shared the evening devotional with the kids, which was great as usual.  I was very tired by that time, so we turned in early.  Saturday morning we met with all the kids for a Q&A session, a tradition started by DeFore and re-established by my wife, Susie.  Susie has gone home, but she’d have been proud of us taking every question the kids threw at us.  We did it for two and a half hours.

 

Sometimes the questions were funny, “Why are mzungu noses pointed while ours are wide?”  And some turned into a lecture, “How is it that your days are longer and shorter at your place?”  That one took 30 minutes to answer, with chalk diagrams of the earth, discussions of tilt and wobble, and seasons and orbits.  I think I might have a latent ‘teacher’ gene in there somewhere.

 

We toured the place; Ongoro has a water well, which is in progress.  They reached the limit of hand digging with a poor result and are now waiting for a specialist to come and try to go deeper.  Everything else looked just fine.

 

After lunch we hit the road back to the VTC.  We made it fine around 4pm.  As I was talking with some of the students, a car passed by on the road and as it reached the front of the orphanage we heard a long crashing sound and it ground to a halt.  The left front suspension had collapsed and the wheel was sideways and flat.  I ran over to make sure everyone was ok, and they were.  They were four men and three women from Nairobi. They had been to a burial, and were on their way home.

 

I offered to send our mechanic instructor out to help and they agreed.  What ensued was a practical lesson in Kenyan roadside auto repair.  Paul, our instructor, and his students in their shop coats ran out and jumped in to fix the vehicle.  It took almost four hours and a trip to Sondu for parts, but they got it done. They were all so proud of themselves for the successful repair, and the visitors were very happy as well.  The episode was a good lesson for me, that God sometimes throws us curve balls; opportunities to do the right thing even when it will not profit us.  I shared that thought with the students and evening devotional and it was well received.

 

This morning we drove up to Lee McGraw Orphanage to worship with them.  I preached Tod’s “Forgiveness” sermon again, which was seemingly right on the mark for this place too.  I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that Christians everywhere struggle with that!  Now we are back at the VTC for am afternoon of rest.  Tomorrow we will go to Homa Bay, home of the famous Stephen Owino!  Be Blessed\

Adingo Kingsway

Today we visited one of our newest feeding stations at Adingo Kingsway.  This is a small rural church in the same valley as Dirubi, Lee McGraw and Adingo Opanga, but this one is under the supervision of Tobias Olweny.  Tobias is my age, so he’s the oldest of our group of directors.  He oversees Ongoro Orphanage and still serves as a WBS worker. 

 

The place looks really good.  He has constructed a nice kitchen, individual rooms for the two widows, plus room for two more in the event we convert this to an orphanage in the future.  There is a nice choo, (if there is such a thing) and the original church is serving as the dining hall for now, though it is a bit small. 

 

The church turned out to meet us in good numbers, which is a good sign.  This church membership is quite a bit older than most, with a high proportion of aged widows.  After we started sending money for feeding the orphans, the church has turned their attention to the widows, which is exactly what we want to happen.  They are providing meals for 10 of them here, all of which came to greet me.

 

We stayed for a while and spoke to all the kids and the church.  I encouraged them to continue the good work, and thanked them for their service to the Kingdom.  By 3pm we were back on the road to Ongoro.

 

Arriving here, all the kids in the primary school across the street were chanting Tim! Tim!  Almost half of them are from the orphanage, so they know me well.  I decided to crash their party and went over to greet them.  They decided to gather them all into the church building for a chance to sing for us and hear a greeting from us.  It was really cool.

 

Tonight, I’ll share a meal at Tobias house and then join the orphans for their evening devotional.  Be Blessed!

Kikitemo ­ 21 October 2013

Sorry for the delay in posting this, the internet has been a challenge.

 

Today we visited Kikitemo Feeding Station, formerly an Internally Displaced Persons camp.  This place has been the sight of some amazing miracles and has become for me, one of the symbols of God’s redeeming mercy toward his hurting people.  Think we usually believe in the west that miracles belong to the past.  We sometimes speak of healing miracles but rarely does anyone claim a true miracle.  I think that is because we have come to rely so heavily on our own abilities and possessions that we don’t leave room for miracles.  Here, miracles happen often.

 

These people were victims of tribal violence that caused them to loose everything they had, including many family members.  Imagine being forced from your home, able to take nothing, and having the one person you depended on for your daily living, your father, killed right in front of you.  You are a stranger in hostile land, with no one who is willing to help you for fear of being caught in the same situation.  You are forced to run, stopping only to beg for food, until you reach some temporary sanctuary with a good Samaritan.  It doesn’t last long before you are again cast out, looking for a way to survive. 

 

You come upon a woman who has been in the same situation as you.  She can offer you very little help, but she does invite you to join her group of similarly affected people.  They are mostly widows and children of all ages, over 150 in number.  Huddling together as squatters on someone else’s land, they are trying to get the government or one of the international aid agencies to recognize them and provide some assistance, but it never comes.

 

One day the government does show up, with trucks.  They load everyone up and carry you all away with promises of resettlement.  As night falls, you realize those promises are empty, because they dump you in the bush, near a small town, with no water, food, or shelter.  You and your new-found family have been officially abandoned.  All you have is your prayers, as you all try to find a way to keep warm for the night.

 

After some days, you group has managed to make crude shelters and some have walked into the town seeking casual jobs.  Your days are filled with longing for what you have lost and your nights with fear of the wild animals who live in the bush.  Eventually, from the least likely of sources, a leader emerges from your midst.  Like, you, she has lost it all but she retains her relentless faith that God will not leave you as orphans, that He will save you eventually.  She organizes everyone and begins to knit you together as a family.

 

After a few months, your group has managed to scape together enough to buy a small plot of land outside the bush.  It’s not very big, only a half acre, but with the help of some well-wishers you are able to move to your new place and set up camp, not far from a UN recognized IDP camp.  You can see the main highway to the capital city in the distance, and you watch as every day trucks arrive and depart the other camp, but continuing to ignore you and your forgotten family.

 

One day, a man arrives who looks like a beggar.  He is clearly poor, and a bit old, but you remember your culture of hospitality and you welcome him into the camp.  He has only words of encouragement for you, telling you that God has not forgotten you; that your redemption will soon come.  Given his appearance, it’s hard to take him seriously, but you join him in prayer as you wish him a safe journey home.  Unknown to you, God has heard your prayers.  The man is part of an evangelistic work backed by Mzungu (white people).  He writes to his friends and tells them of the desperate situation you are in and begs for help on your behalf.  The call is answered, and some money for food is on its way.

 

As you arise one morning, after spending the whole night in prayers with your extended family.  Your meager rations are all but exhausted and starvation is looming.  Only the unshakeable faith of your leader and some of the faithful widows has sustained you through the night.  You look to the road and see a small truck turning onto the dirt track that leads to your camp.  You dare not hope - there have been so many disappointments.  But when the pickup reaches your place, you can see that it is loaded with bags of maize and beans.  Salvation has come, your God has not forgotten you.

 

This is the story of a girl named Margaret.  In 1998, she was just 16 when the world she knew vanished overnight.  We got to interview her on video today and I can’t