I want to try to summarize in a short amount of time some of the things that we experienced in Africa.  But I have to begin by saying that this is hard for me to write – It’s very hard to try to get my head around this 7+ month journey that has forever changed my life.  From writing the support letter, what seemed like a zillion vaccinations, dozens of meetings, the yard / ESTATE! sale, a 3 page packing list, long hours on airplanes, and 2 of the most meaningful weeks of my life – its hard to believe that I’m back in America getting ready for the Holiday season. 

They say that this is the hardest part… Coming home.  Not raising support, not the immunizations, not flying almost 24 hours, not being away from family for 2 weeks, but the coming home.  To be very honest, I was not prepared for the emotions that have consumed me upon my return. I’m grateful, yet, not satisfied.  I’m heartbroken, yet joyful.  I’m frustrated and begging for answers.  I’m lost, yet found.

So with that, I will try to summarize for you, from my heart, what was accomplished according to me! 

On September 27^th, 2008, we landed in Nairobi around 11:00pm – and after realizing that only one of our team bags was left in London, we stepped outside the airport onto Kenyan soil.  Immediately, it became a reality to me.  After many, many years of God laying Africa on my heart – I was actually there to serve His people.  My heart was racing, my hands were sweaty.  My nose had its first encounter with burning coal, dirt, diesel engines, and body odor.  Ahhh, the smell of Kenya. 

The next day we woke up and drove about 3.5 hours to the Cheppema Hope Center, where church was just getting started.  When I walked into that little church, hearing the Kenyan people singing praises to God in Swahili, tears welled up in my eyes.  What a blessing and an honor to be in the company of those people.  God touched me deeply at that moment.  Even though we didn’t know the words being sung, we felt like we knew the meaning – it was so beautiful that I couldn’t help but think of heaven.  To say that these people love Jesus is an understatement.  Their faith, in that moment, put mine to shame… God is so much bigger than the small box that I had placed around Him. 

Every day from Monday – Sunday, we drove the 30 miles from where we slept (Sunrise Acres) to the Hope Center.  Those miles were spent looking out the window at the amazing Kenyan landscapes, extreme poverty, and yet some of the most beautiful smiling faces I’ve ever seen.  Children would come running out of their huts to smile and wave to us.  When we reached the Hope Center, the children were usually just taking their first break time from school.  We blew bubbles, “skipped” rope, played games, and basically became children ourselves.  Life was simple.  These kids had more characteristics of Jesus than anyone I’ve ever met – yet, they really had nothing materially and only ate one meal a day.  It was incredible to be in their company because they were so happy and grateful for what they did have.

Usually, we would be asked by some of the children to come to their classrooms.  These children were so proud of their school and of the education they were receiving.  On 2 occassions, I was asked to help teach the Standard 8 class.  (Scary, I know!)  The first thing to note was their immediate respect – when I walked into the classroom the whole class (about 15 kids) stood up to acknowledge our presence.  Once asked to return to their seats, the questions began:  What’s it like in America?  What is your government like?  Have you ever seen snow?  What is the weather like?  What kind of crops do you grow?  What are America’s favorite sports?  How old does someone have to be to run for President?  How long is your President in office?  And they kept coming!  It was so amazing how interested they were in America. 

This is where I want to touch on relationships…  Not only were these children interested in America – they were interested in us – The Americans, the wazungu.  They wanted to know about our children, their names, ages, what grade they were in, what they liked/disliked.  They wanted to know what we did for a living.  About our homes, our friends, our favorite color, our daily lives.  And the best part… they actually listened INTENTLY for the answers!  Which brings up a huge cultural difference – in America, we say that we care about relationships.  But do we?  Really?  I honestly thought that I was really good about keeping in touch and caring about people, but watching them listen so intently made me question my myself.  Do I really listen after I ask a question?  Do I take the time to ask how someone is really doing?  Do I know my best friends’ favorite color?  Selfishly, more often than not, I talk more about myself and my issues than listening to others.  I’m prayerful that I’ll get better in that area of my life, especially during this time of year.

As I mentioned before on this blog, I made friends with a 12 year old girl, named Fredah Jeptoo.  She and her sister, Vivian, both attend the Hope Center School.  Fredah has one of the most beautiful smiles ever.  She would light up a room!  She is soft spoken, respectful, loving, and would seek me out every day I got out of our team van.  She touched my heart because she made ME feel special. 

Fredah’s mother, Eunice, is 40 years old and has 8 children.  I got to meet Eunice and many of her children.  She has a daughter, Karen, that is 2 years old and another daughter, Mercy, that is 3 months.  On the last day that we were at the Hope Center, after church, Eunice handed me baby Mercy.  Holding her in my arms was very special, but when Eunice looked at me and asked me to take her baby to America – it broke me.  While I have never actually given birth, I have 2 very special children that I get to call my own, that I love more than life, and I can’t imagine how hard it must be to ask a complete stranger to take your youngest child to America for a better opportunity.  My heart is broken that I couldn’t bring that baby home. 

When I got into the van to leave the Hope Center, and looked over my shoulder with tears streaming down my face, I saw Fredah.  She had her back to me and was wiping her eyes.  The dear friend, that I fell in love with, was crying.  As I sit here and type this note, I’m crying just thinking about that sweet girl.  Until that very moment, I really felt that Fredah had done more for me than I could have ever done for her that week.   I jumped out of the van and ran over to her and just held her.  I stepped back, saw the huge tear stains on her dirty shirt where she had been crying and all she could say, was “Please come back!” 

So with that, I’ll try to end this note…  Seeing life from this new perspective during the holiday season is pretty intense.  There are so many things that I am wrestling with now that I’m home.  My perspective – it’s just different:  I’m grateful for the many blessings that I have, yet, not satisfied with what I’m doing with them to help others.  I’m heartbroken that there are children in Africa that only eat one meal a day (especially knowing that I’m getting ready to eat huge portions of turkey and ham on Thanksgiving and Christmas), yet joyful knowing that there are opportunities for us to jump in and help.  I’m frustrated because my life is different in so many ways and I’m begging for God to give me answers on how to make those changes meaningful.  I’m lost in America, yet found in Africa. 

Finding Gratitude in the Little Things,

Elaine* Miller Bahr

First, as you know, I almost didn’t get to go on that trip because my passport literally got back from the Kenyan embassy an hour before I was to meet the team in the airport terminal. My passport had been to Mexico, China and then to Miami for pages to be sewn in and then to DC for my Kenyan visa, all in a matter of 5 weeks.  All the time, I kept telling myself if the trip was meant to be, then I’d go otherwise I wasn’t going to get upset if I missed that flight that day.   I feel now that I went that I was meant to go and if I don’t expand that experience outside of my own mind then I do a discredit to having gone in the first place.

Before I left, I never really thought about all the things we have here.  Simple things, like hot, running water, toilets, safe meals, insects that don’t normally carry pathogens that could kill us, heat, shoes, textbooks, medicine, on and on.  Even down to where we all live, imagine a cow dung hut instead.  That was all until I got back from Africa.  Now I look at every single thing in life with a new set of eyes.  We live like kings in this country, but we are no happier for it than the people I met in Kenya who have none of it.  There was a peace in those people that we all should strive to achieve.  I will never forget the smiles and laughter from the children, just happy because we brought bubbles and blew up balloons for them to throw around their playground.  These kids were so intelligent and they asked us great questions, a thorough desire to learn was in each one of them.  They were everything we should be, they were kind, loving, compassionate, thoughtful, inquisitive, considerate.  Some of them had shoes where the toes were cut out so they could keep wearing them. One boy made a toy out of a water bottle and a string, ran around the playground laughing.  The kids during recess would take a stick and draw shapes in the dirt and play games.  For a soccer ball, they took a bunch of plastic bags and bound them up with string.  I’m telling you all this because seeing how they could make joy out of nothing was one of the key changes that happened in my heart during that trip.  How completely insignificant our so-called troubles really are compared to only getting one meal a day and only getting meat once a week.

So with thanksgiving coming up next week, I wanted to share the sermon from today with you all.  It goes along with my Kenya notes and seems appropriate to share.   I won’t give the whole thing, but the part that ties is that the degradation and disappointment we think we experience in our lives – whether it be inside ourselves or in our relationships with others – is that we are not outwardly grateful for all the things we receive.  I’m not just talking tangible gifts, though gratitude of those things is important too.  I’m talking about all the things that people do for you every day, when they make you feel special, when they make you feel loved, when they think about your feelings, when they say, “sorry sorry” when you trip on a twig like the kids did for us on our hike in the Kenyan mountains near the school.

None of us would ever want to be called ungrateful, but yet that is exactly how we come across when we do not express gratitude to one another.  Unexpressed gratitude communicates ingratitude.  I can’t explain why we have so much “stuff” in America and they have so little in Africa.  I can say that if I had to choose who had more peace in their hearts, it’s easy to choose.   So as you gather this holiday with your family and gorge on that huge meal, try to really take some time to think about the person who prepared it and thank them, hug and kiss your family and friends and show them how you feel.  Make a list of the things you are grateful for, as I’m sure that list will be longer than the short list of things you think you “need”.

I’m most grateful for, in no particular order :
1) My health, including my sight, hearing, mobility, immunity, all of it.
2) My family that I love so very, very much.
3) My friends and all their nutty ways.
4) My income and having a home with a heater/AC, toilet, running water, carpet, refridgerator, washing machine.
5) My church and bible study group and the peace in my heart for coming back to God.

Of course there is so much more to this story, but I’m sure I’m lucky if you guys read down this far.  Thank you for your love,laughs and kindness over the years. I am equally guilty of keeping my gratitude pent up, but I plan on remedying that in the near future and going forward, I hope you will as well.

Anyway since I am awake I thought I would upload one of the last team pictures we took in Kenya.  This one was taken at Lake Nakuru National Park.  The lake is home to thousands and thousands of flamingos so we snapped this one before leaving.

I am fairly certain that we have many gigabytes of photos to share and we’re planning on uploading the best of them to an online service for everyone to see.

For the families meeting the team at the airport, we are scheduled to arrive around 2:25pm but will take some time to get through customs.

See you all soon…

Today was a hard day for our group.  It started with a visit to Kibera, where some of the worlds poorest are known to live.  It is estimated that 1 million people live in squalor here in a piece of land the size of Central Park.  It smells.  It is slimy.  Grimy.  Heartbreaking.  Intolerable.  Confusing.  It is very difficult to swallow that people actually call this place home.

It has left many with emotions that cannot be put into words.  Fears that cannot be explained.  Frustrations that can only be given to God, and hopefully move us into action.  

All of us have seen the world differently for the last 10 days, and as I (Pam) write this, 16 of us (I am staying an extra day) are boarding the plane as people who are different than who they were when they left almost 2 weeks ago.  They see water differently.  They see a plate of food differently.  They understand wealth and poverty at a completely different level, this new level having faces and names to associate with the phrases “the poor” and “the suffering.”

Pray for our group as they make their way back to the United States.  They arrive in Raleigh around 2pm Wednesday afternoon.  Pray for the group as they try to rectify their new view of the world with the world that greets them at the airport.  Pray as they wrestle with whether or not they should stop at starbucks or use that for the poor.  Pray as they try and figure out how they can be a part of the solution to world poverty.  Pray for their broken hearts and changed spirits as they try to live differently knowing what they know about how so many people are forced to live in extreme poverty.

 What I’ve come to realize is that as much as we are here to help these children, they are actually touching us and reaching into our hearts to save our souls.  I’ve come to realize that these children are as close to the embodiment of Jesus as any human could be.  They have shown us that it is possible to love, nurture, have compassion and kindness, experience joy and peace in any condition.  They do not need anything they don’t already have on the inside.  I also realized that it could be that in God’s wisdom, he starts us as pure and innocent as a child so we can see just how close we are to heaven and the life we’re meant to live on earth.

 After being here two weeks, hopefully we all walk away not only appreciating what we have been blessed with in the US, but also using new skills in taking life in stride, loving on each other unconditionally as these children have shown us is possible.  I can still see their smiles and hear their laughter, enjoying every little detail of life and I personally am changed for having known them.

Matthew 18

Who Is the Most Important Person in the Kingdom?

 1 At that time the disciples came to Jesus. They asked him, “Who is the most important person in the kingdom of heaven?”

 2 Jesus called a little child over to him. He had the child stand among them. 3 Jesus said, “What I’m about to tell you is true. You need to change and become like little children. If you don’t, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. 4 Anyone who becomes as free of pride as this child is the most important in the kingdom of heaven.

To bring you up to speed…

After an evening of rain on Saturday, we were quite worried that the road to Cheppema would be washed out and we wouldn’t be able to make it up to the church on Sunday morning.  After walking a bit up the road we decided to take the chance and slowly made our way in the 3.5 kilometers to the church.  It was awesome to celebrate with our Kenyan friends (church lasted 2 hours and I can assure you that the message wasn’t the longest portion of the service since it was me who spoke).

After tears and long good-byes, we packed up and headed to Lake Nakuru for a day of rest and game drives.  I am not going to give you any spoilers as I will let the team tell you what we saw when they get home.  All I can say is that I have been doing game drives for 8 years and I have never seen what we saw yesterday.  We have about 50 gb of pictures to share with everyone (not counting the videos).

The plan for today is that we are going to the Special Ministries office in Nairobi and greet the staff who work there.  Then it is onto Kibera for a walking tour of what Special Ministries is doing.  They are providing great hope to the children who are down there.  Kibera is about the size of Central Park and is home to over 1 million people.  It’s heartbreaking to see but Special Ministries is providing hope.

We head home tonight at midnight (4pm Cary time) for our flight to London then we’ll be home at 2:25pm Wednesday.  We miss you all and appreciate all of the prayers.  We have truly felt them this week.

Blessings…  Rick

Our plan on Friday was to complete the volley ball court and football pitch (ok, soccer field for American crowd). The field was mostly level, but it took longer than expected to put in the volley ball posts.

So now it is late Friday afternoon as we work on the football goals. They are made of 4 inch galvanized steel plumbing pipe that we self threaded. They are not going together quickly and it is getting late. In spring time in Kenya (Sept-Nov) the rains come in the evening. But Friday they arrived a little early. We tried to work as long as we could, but you cannot stay in Cheppema after the rains start, or you will be trapped there for the night. The dirt road is not able to be navigated when wet. Or so we were told. It was not something we wanted to test.

All of this meant that the men working on the goals were needed Saturday morning bright and early to finish the job before the big celebration that afternoon. So no sleeping in for us.

Now it’s Saturday morning. Very, very early on Saturday morning and have just made the turn on to the dirt road to get to the Hope Center. What we didn’t know is that the rain had lasted most of the night. This is good for a water starved region like Cheppema, but not so good for the dirt road. We were headed for a ditch within a 100 feet of turning onto the road.

Instead of risking crashing the vehicle, we decided to walk the 3 kilometers to the Hope Center. This meant that we were not going to get there early. We were not going to have as much time as we wanted to work before the big celebration.

Often it seems that our best laid plans end up in a ditch somewhere.

The first half mile or so was pretty slippery walking. Our shoes were caked in heavy, wet mud. But after that difficult beginning the ground hardened up a bit. Walking became a little easier. And we started meeting villagers walking along the same road. The very villagers we wanted to come to the big celebration. Terry had a bag of sweets with him, so he started passing it out to kids.

At one bend was a man and his children herding cattle. We stopped to talk with him and hand out candy. He asked where we were from. He laughed when we said North Carolina and asked if we knew we were now in Kenya. But he had not heard there was a big celebration and wanted to come with his family. Over and over we met people, shared candy, had conversations and invited them to come to the party.

None of this would have happened had the roads been clear.

And in the end we did finally get there. We finished the goal posts. We got them set in the field. And we had a fantastic time that afternoon celebrating with the community, playing volleyball and football on the new court and pitch, and laughing with the villagers about our muddy walk-about. This was a far better plan than the one that ended up near the ditch.

I guess this all stands to reason, because the plans that are truly the best laid plans are rarely ours.

Amani (peace in Swahili)

Dave Loomis

PS – Today I ate mbuzi (goat), ugali (some kind of corn meal mush), lentil beans, chipati (a heavy flour tortilla) and drank a Stoney’s (a very strong ginger-ale). I need to thank my wonderful wife for teaching me how to try new foods. Had she not convinced me over the past 20 years to try new things, I probably would have looked at this meal and moaned. But most of it was fantastic. Thanks Kris! And Jack – try something new today, just for fun (but you might want to stay away from the mbuzi).

Sunday we will be attending church at the Cheppema Chapel as we prepare to say farewell to our new friends.  The week has been amazing.  All of our projects have been completed as the two soccer goals were installed today prior to the community celebration.  The team is tired as we have had many early days and late nights this week.

Please know that we covet your continued prayers as we make preparations to leave our friends.  We have many kilometers to go before we board our British Air plane on Tuesday evening.  Thank you for everything and look for a wrap-up of today’s activities shortly.