Kevin's Blog Archive December 17, 2006 to April 27, 2007
August 9, 2009
March 24, 2009
In a recent email, I mentioned that we could see the forest fire on Mt. Longonot from our front porch.
Kenyan forces deployed for fires
Thanks, Cherie!
March 31, 2008 Life Above the Clouds
Rainy season has arrived in Kijabe and it is welcome. The Rift Valley which so recently was the scene of so much sorrow is now green and growing. Much corn (maize) was burned during the post-election violence. Now the Lord is giving us good rains to help replace what was lost.
There are still some political problems, if you believe the newspapers. So, don't stop praying for Kenya yet.
The pictures above shows the clouds rolling UP to our house on the mountain as the rainy season begins.
March 31, 2007 I Had The Most Fun
We came to Kenya at the same time as the Davis family and were all in Africa Based Orientation together. We've lived under the same roof for months with Rich, Stacy, Adam and Gabby.
I function as a kind of stand in grandpa for the Davis kids.
Recently, the Lord added Lydia to the Davis family. She was born in December, while we were in the States, so we were very eager to see her when we got back.
In February, we went swimming with the Davises. At least my family swam. I was doing something far more pleasurable. I had the pleasure (I'm not being sarcastic) of holding Lydia while she slept for FOUR hours. She hardly even stirred.
As you can see from the pictures, she did wake up finally and lit up the whole area with her personality.
Nothing is quite as nice as having a baby fall asleep while you are holding her. Especially if you don't get to have that experience every day.
January 22, 2008 Our House
We returned to Kenya after a month in the States. Many people asked how the house was doing, so I thought a fresh picture would be in order.
You can see the work of Peter (our outside worker) is blooming. Linda and I spent a half an hour walking around the house enjoying all the huge varieties of flowers he has found locally (all free and taken with permission!)
The view from our house is stunning, too. Friends have said that it would be a million dollar house in California just because of the view. I can look down into the Rift Valley. It is reassuring to see the traffic moving- it means there isn't a protestor's road block up at that moment.
Please keep praying for peace and justice for Kenya.
January 22, 2008 Yes, we're near the Great Rift Valley; Yes, we need your prayers; No, you don't have to worry.
When news reports mention a demonstration in the Rift Valley, some of our friends get worried because they know that we overlook the Valley.
I didn't realize until we were preparing to move here how extensive the Great Rift Valley is.
The Valley is 4500 miles long. Please read that again: 4500 miles long. It runs from Mozambique in the southern part of Africa to Syria, north of Israel. Something could happen in the Rift Valley, even in the Kenya portion of it, and we would be many miles away.
Don't stop praying, though, please!! We really need your prayer for us and for Kenya! THANK YOU for your concern!
January 22, 2008 Kenyan Rules Volleyball
They play to 25 points. You score whether you are serving or not. Head shots and feet are allowed. Kenyan volleyball is very different and a lot of fun.
Today some of the faculty played some of the students. We were beaten, but in close games. We play again tomorrow and hope to pay well enough to stay in the school tournament.
As you might guess from my choice of volleyball as a topic, things are not quite so tense in Kenya today. There are some positive signs of movement, but we still need your prayers for God to humble the proud and bring justice.
More demonstrations are scheduled for later this week in Nairobi and other places. Kijabe continues to be calm.
Thanks for your prayers!
October 12, 2007 Party in the New House
Last Friday we hosted the Moffat Bible College faculty and staff families at our new house. We had several purposes.
Not necessarily in this order: First, we wanted to fellowship with each other. Second, we wanted to have a party to honor Apollo and Lois Midigo, for their completion of five years on the faculty at Moffat. Third, we wanted to dedicate the house to the Lord and thank Him for its nearly complete status.
We expected about 50 people for a potluck dinner. It turned into 70! Many of the faculty had extra kids from RVA staying with them, since our party was over mid-term break.
More people made more fun (and noise!). We had a great time and look forward to lots more hospitality opportunities.
Thanks to all of you who gave toward the house project or came out to help build it. We are enjoying being in the house so much. We've been in the house for about a month and a half. Today, they started on the tile in the bathrooms, the last major project.
I just decided that I will use the blog to feature a room per day for a while, with pics. Check back soon!
September 23, 2007 Baboons come calling
Johanna couldn't get to church today. We had visitors.
Linda and I left as usual to play for the English service at AIC Kijabe Mission. Johanna goes to a worship service much later at Rift Valley Academy. So we left her at the house.
When everyone got back home this afternoon Johanna told me that she couldn't get to church this morning.
She started out the door of our house and encountered 50 baboons surrounding our house. She felt like discretion was the better part of valor; she just went back inside.
That was a wise choice. I would have done the same thing.
By the way, the baboons ate all the leaves off our aloe vera plant.
Sept. 1, 2007 Becoming a Child of the Great Depression
I have been trying to call my mother (shown above with our grandson Simon) for her 88th birthday for three days. On the first day, I worked from 7 AM to about 10:30 or 11:00 PM. It was a good day, but I didn't get to call her.
On the second day, the Kijabe phones were unable to call outside the station. The same on the third day.
It seems like I am snake bit. However, our daughter will convey my birthday greetings to her so she will know that we are thinking of her.
My mom and dad were children of the Great Depression. It affected every part of their lives. Having a job was the number one value for my dad. Saving everything was the number one value for my mom (who turns 88 this month).
When it was time for mom to move to assisted living, my sister and I cleaned out her house and found drawers (plural) full of used plastic bags. She never threw anything away. Her stint as an employee of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency deepened this tendency to keep everything and not throw anything away.
Oh, the junk we tossed out: old bent nails, plastic bags, used brown mailing envelopes, elastic bands made from cut up panty hose, plastic bags, random sizes of scrap paper, clothes she hadn't worn in many years, and plastic bags. We filled bag after bag with stuff that seemed to be just trash. Her save-everything compulsion from growing up in the Great Depression had been intensified by her Alzheimer's disease.
We recently had to move out of our temporary housing into the Moffat Guest House. As I was packed, I opened a dresser drawer and my heart froze.
The drawer was full of plastic bags and used brown mailing envelopes. My immediate reaction was, "Oh no! Linda has turned into my mother!" Then I realized, "Duh. When you live in Africa, it makes sense to save everything."
I save everything, too. Some things are not available here at all, so if you brought it, you had better keep it. Other things are available, but too expensive to replace. So you'd better save what you have. Other things can be gotten, but at the expense of a trip to Nairobi (an hour each way) to purchase them.
So, as a consequence, we save everything. I hasten to add that it is much easier for us here in Kijabe than for missionaries out in the bush. Even so, for a while, we saved every piece of tape that came in the house because we didn't have any otherwise. We've become children of the Great Depression. Or maybe we've become our parents. Or maybe we have just had to adapt to the new realities of living for us.
August 7, 2007 Linda drives!
About twenty years have passed since Linda last drove a stick shift car. I have been after her (ahem "encouraging her") to try driving here, but it really is scary at first.
Today I drove her up to the circle in front of Moffat and she drove us home. She did very well, though she's not ready to keep the roads warm driving between here and Nairobi yet. But it is a start.
Please pray for us as we continue to adapt to life here away from our families and almost everything we have known.
August 7, 2007 Grace Bible Church Team
The picture shows Tommie and Brenda Machalla, and Don Nettles and his daughter, Nicole posing with us outside Shayne and Tari Russell's house at the Maasai Mara. The two little ones in the picture are the children of coworkers of the Russells. The Russells are such gracious hosts. We always enjoy being with them.
We took Tommie, Brenda, Don, and Nicole all the way out to the Mara because that is one of the defining Kenyan experiences. You don't feel like you've been to Kenya unless you've been on a safari. Nairobi National Park is nice, and the Safari Walk in Nairobi is nicer, but nothing beats the mystique of the Mara.
We also wanted them to meet our dear friends, Shayne and Tari.
Before and after the safari, this team from Grace Bible Church worked HARD to get our new house livable for us. They completed the work on the kitchen, finishing out and adding a few revisions to what Jason and Jennifer Burtz began.
Tommie made a beautiful picnic table for us to use as our dining room table until we find something we like better for that purpose, then we can move it out onto the porch overlooking the valley.
The team painted ceilings and the downstairs bathroom, finished the kitchen, built shelves in the laundry room (happy thought indeed!), framed in closets in Johanna's room, hung doors, and generally encouraged us like crazy.
The church was very generous with us, and sent several gifts that made the work possible.
We are so grateful to GBC and to Pastor Wayne Martin and especially to Cathy Nettles who didn't come this time, but did the organizational work that made it possible for the team to come.
Word has it that they are all ready to come back again soon. I hope they will.
August 7, 2007 "He is our fortress; we will never be shaken!"
We felt tremors here from an earthquake in Tanzania last month (in July).
Here's the funny part: we were practicing music for Sunday church, in the middle of singing a song that goes, "He is our fortress; we will never be shaken!" All of a sudden the lamps start swaying and the chair that Linda is sitting in starts rocking side to side, and the house is being shaken!
There was no damage here in Kijabe and our new house didn't slide down into the valley.
August 7, 2007 Moffat Graduation
I have to confess. I wasn't looking forward to it. Most graduations seem overlong. And hot!
Back in the States, as I packed my master's hood and robe to bring them to Kenya, I was dreading sitting through an interminable graduation ceremony in my robes in the stifling heat of July.
Whoops! July is the middle of winter here below the equator and it was actually comfortably cool. Not only that, but the speaker, Dr. Titus Kivunzi from Nairobi Evangelical Graduate School of Theology (NEGST) preached a very forthright and interesting message. Everything went so smoothly that our vice principal for academics was wondering if he forgot something.
Overall, it was a very positive experience (I enjoyed it more than either of my own graduations!). The church hall was full of families and well-wishers. Two graduates were honored by having the choirs from their churches give presentations (back home we would say "specials") during the graduation ceremony. ANY choir presentation here is worth watching and listening to. I hope to video one for you sometime so you can see the choreography for yourself.
So, on July 21, 2007, Moffat sent 29 new graduates out to serve the Lord in Africa. I know some of them pretty well. They have hearts that love Jesus and His church. They know how to handle the word of God. They are not afraid to sacrifice for His work. Please pray for them as the Lord launches them into their new ministries.
July 3, 2007
As I write, Linda is in the Masaai Mara with the Fellowship of Christian Optometrists team, led by Kia (Eldred) McGee and Tara Studer. They came to Kijabe to do eye exams and to help us work on our house.
The young people on the special projects team were a special delight to everyone here and to their team mates. All of them displayed an excellent spirit. Their parents should be proud.
It did my heart good to see old friends again: Lee McGee and Kia McGee, Lou, Marsha and Kyle Bezold (you should hear Kyle speak Kiswahili!), and my dear sis Susan Alderman. I almost cried. Dr. Joseph Parker a hard working and self sacrificing team mate from our last Kenya trip was along again. Also, Justin Ward, Tara Studer, and Lindsie Gerber, optometry students whom have become very important to me through my association with the FCO at University of Houston College of Optometry.
It was great to make new friends, too: Nikki Polnick, Sara Mercer, Linda Dolven, Jeanette Wong, and Krista Beach with the FCO. These guys all worked such long hours and worked so well together! The Guinn family (Andy, Beth, Daniel and Grace) brought along their friends, Mallory Cook and Garrett Hull. Andy has been Lee McGee's best friend since high school. It is easy to see why.
Each of these precious new friends has made a strong impression on Kijabe and on Linda and me. I am deeply grateful for the team's willingness to invest in the health of Kijabe and in the housing for my family.
In the meantime, Shayne and Tari Russell, more dear friends, are hosting the team out at the Mara and they examining school kids and going for game drives.
July 3, 2007
I recently got an email from Kijabe's Environmental Committee. I thought that I could share it with you for your prayers. Would you mind praying with us about this?
Email begins:
We are writing to you about a matter that we consider to be very urgent and serious.
Email ends
Thanks for praying!
June 17, 2007
It is seventeen years old, but it seems perfect to us. The Lord has finally brought a car to us.
After looking for months for usable Land Rovers which could be scavenged to make into one good car, our friend Bruce Kinzer had to give up. We really appreciate all the work that Bruce put into looking for Land Rover "donor" vehicles for us. All the used Land Rovers have been bought up by Kenyan politicians to send their representatives out into the bush to drum up votes for the December election.
So we have a Toyota Land Cruiser which will seat nine, has been very well maintained and has two pop-tops (like the tourist vans) so passengers can stand to view animals at the game park when we take teams out.
The price was very reasonable (which is also unusual here). The Lord has provided everything we need for it, and we praise Him.
Thanks to each of you who prayed and gave toward this need. We hope to transfer the title on Thursday, June 21, 2007.
We are very grateful to Drs. Kevin and Karen Shannon for their kindness to us. Once we get the title transferred we will be sharing the vehicle with the Shannons until they go on home assignment in July.
June 11, 2007 You never know who your kindness will save.
Sunday we had a very frustrating day at church in the band. I didn't have any guitar picks (mine have been lost or misplaced during all our moves), Linda wasn't as prepared as she wanted to be because she's playing bass, but we don't have an amp at home.
All of this conspired to make me absolutely determined by Sunday afternoon to get into Nairobi the following morning to buy an amp and picks. (This morning.)
Sunday night, we had the pleasure of entertaining Dr. Phil Kaiser and his family. Phil is a new co-worker of Nate Smith in the AIDS program here. Nate had asked us to welcome the Kaisers because Nate and Kim and family had to be out of town. We took the Kaisers to Mama Chiku's restaurant for supper, then over to our house for guitar playing and visiting. Phil is fabulous guitarist, and his wife sings, so we traded songs for hours while his two college age sons had a blast with our kids and Sean Nelson. In the course of the evening, I mentioned my frustration about picks, strings, and amp to him and that I was determined to go into Nairobi first thing this morning to get them. He said, "I have a little practice amp at home that I never use- let me bring it to you."
We'll it was a genuine offer, and he would be able to use it too when he was here, so I agreed to his kind offer and decided that I didn't need to go to that part of Nairobi this morning.
This morning, a bomb went off down the street from the music store...
I don't think anyone knows for sure what happened there on Moi Avenue this morning, but if I had gone there today, even if I had not been injured, it would have been an unimaginably bad experience.
You never know what your kindness will do for others. Phil's kindness may have saved my life.
June 4, 2007 Building out the kitchen
Jason and Jennifer Burtz have come to help us finish our house. They are working together to build out the kitchen and an upstairs walk-in closet before they have to leave this coming Friday.
Jason and Jennifer come from one of our supporting churches, Lighthouse Chapel in Ohio.
June 4, 2007 Back in The Saddle Again
I have been appointed Associate Pastor at AIC Kijabe Mission. This is how we are fulfilling AIM's requirement for African church involvement for theological educators. I need to learn about the church here, and I will have the privilege of working under Pastor Simon Kingori (in the picture above) and learning from him. He wants me to reach out to the missionary community here at Kijabe, so now I am a pastor again, but this time to missionaries. I also still have all my other responsibilities at Moffat:
The blazer that I am wearing in this picture used to be so tight on me that I couldn't button it. Now I can overlap the front so much that it looks like a double breasted jacket.
May 25, 2007, Crash-testing the House
Well, we know it's sturdy! The truck pictured above was delivering stones for the retaining wall behind our house when the brakes failed.
Pretty minimal, huh? The bricks have already been replaced, though I don't think they needed to do it.
May 13, 2007 part 1
Today Linda and I both had a chance to play in the local AIC church. As usual, I made mistakes on every song. However, it seemed to go well. We discovered that two members of a singing group who were helping lead worship today (Ann and John) were part of the hospital team who went with the Southway team in 2000 to Kiptangwani and Oljorai. John immediately asked how Theola Young was doing.
The congregation of 400 boys from Kijabe Boys School applauded at the end of "We Want To See Jesus Lifted High" which was a new song to them.
I had the opportunity to preach at both the English and the Kikuyu services at AIC (Africa Inland Church) Kijabe Mission. I was a last minute substitute for a fellow faculty member who had to make a quick trip to either Sudan or Uganda (I forget which). When I volunteered to fill the pulpit for him, he reminded me that it was Mother's Day. I usually preach to the men on Mother's Day and to the women on Father's Day, so I prepared a message telling husbands that they ought to praise their wives more.
What no one told me is that it was also Kijabe Boys School Sunday. So I had a message prepared for husbands and wives, but had an audience in the first service of 400 high school and younger boys! The Lord helped me and I adjusted and it worked well for couples and boys alike. They applauded at the end.
The Pastor of the church (who is a very nice guy) interpreted for me in the second Kikuyu service. More couples were present for that service, so I didn't have to adapt so much.
My sermon really put the men on the spot in an area that is very difficult for them in this culture. At the end of the second service, one of the elders said that they would have to invite me back so I could preach at the women, too!
Over all, I guess that I preached to about 600 or 800 people today; all except for a handful were Kenyan. It was good experience. I have found Kenyan audiences to be very attentive to teaching.
May 13, 2007 part 2
Yesterday we had a party inside our new house, with our construction workers.
The party was to celebrate getting the roof on the house. It is a nice custom they have here. I actually had wanted to that anyway as an opportunity for the gospel and to thank them for their hard work. We'll have another party when the contractor is finished with his part of the house. (Don't worry, we're saving plenty of work for our teams that are coming).
The main attraction was a huge pot of stewed mbuzi (goat). I like goat, which is good because it is a large part of the diet here. This was very good. It was cooked by Peter, the man in the blue hat. He is a friend of ours who has done heroic things with the lawn and garden around the house where we are currently living.
It was a bit cloudy that day, but now that a few trees have been cleared, we have a spectacular view of Mt. Longonot. If you look carefully, you will see the volcanic crater. We'll use the wood from the trees for our stairs and stair rails.
They are painting the windows (glass will go in next), plastering the walls, running the electrical (110 volts and 240 volts) and the plumbing. Peter Ruegg, the architect, says that they are working faster than he can watch.
Thanks so much for all your prayers and contributions toward our house. It is close to reality. We hope to move in during September. Please keep praying for safety for the workers, and the Lord's provision for the rest of the money for the house.
May 4, 2007
The day has finally come. The ministry you have prayed and given so sacrificially to bring to pass has begun. Today was my first day of teaching class at Moffat Bible College.
The morning started with me trying to figure out where the class notes and syllabi were that I turned in yesterday. They weren't ready, so I had to give my Life of Christ students a passage to study while I went to talk to the secretary. It turns out that they weren't ready yet (probably because I turned them in late). So, I waited for the secretary to copy the syllabus at least so that the students could get the reading schedule. It was not how I had planned the class to go, but we got over it.
This class deals with the second half of the life of Christ, and begins with a story that has important implications for Kenya: the healing of the Syro-Phoenician woman's daughter. You may remember the story: When she asks the Lord to heal her demonized daughter, "...it is not good to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs" (Mark 7:27). I have struggled for many years to understand why the Lord would treat this woman so badly initially.
What helped me understand this passage was the realization that the Lord turned almost everything that happened into an opportunity to teach His disciples. I believe that the way the Lord was treating this woman reflected the attitude His disciples held toward her. Do you think it's possible that one of the disciples thought "dog" when he looked at this woman?
My second class (where the pics were taken) was Survey of World Church History. It got off to a better start because we had syllabi and notes done by this times. The class went pretty much as planned, though we covered less that I hoped we would. We began with the story of Wu Chao, originally a concubine to the Chinese emperor who welcomed the first missionary to China. She beguiled, murdered, and manipulated her way to becoming empress, even cutting off the hands and feet of her rival the Queen, murdering her own baby, then deposing two of her own sons from the imperial throne. Her ascent to the throne started the decline of the Nestorian church in China.
It's a really good story and served to illustrate the dangers of the church becoming too closely associated with government and too dependent on government favor. When I told the story, I used her less common name, Wu Chao, because I didn't think the students would take her seriously enough if I used her common name:
If you're wondering where the previous postings have gone, they are available by clicking on the "Kevin's Blog Archive" link near the top of the page.
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Africa Inland Mission Int. P.O. Box 178 Pearl River, NY 10965
Home Address: P.O. Box 70, Kijabe, 00220, Kenya
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Even though we don't have the title yet, the present owners were gracious enough to add John and me to their insurance so that John and Sean Nelson could go to the Maasai Mara in the Land Cruiser. Otherwise, it wouldn't have been possible for Sean to get there this trip. They made it safely to the Mara with only slipping into the ditch once. The road to the Mara is awful even when it is dry. When it is wet, it is even more treacherous.
