Aspen Leaves to Acacia Trees

What Gospel Are We Spreading?

2012-01-31T12:38:00.000-07:00

Driving North from Nairobi, back to the Northern Hemisphere, beyond Mount Kenya is the town of Isiolo. It's basically just like any other largish Kenyan town. A noisy, crowded contradiction of wealth and poverty. But as we drove through it last month, something really caught my eye. On the South side of the town is a fairly sizable mosque. White and green with turrets, it's a good example of your basic Kenyan mosque. On the North side of town, there's a large Catholic church with an enormous mural in garish blues. In the mural's center is a big white Jesus. I guess the traditional representation of Jesus as having a lot of white European features really stood out to me after a year and a half of Kenyan faces. It's an interesting juxtaposition to say the least. I'm not sure what to really take from it but it did make me think about which parts of our worship are cultural and which parts are Biblical. More than that, which parts of our worship are cultural but Biblically acceptable and which parts of our faith are culturally acceptable but Biblically off-base?

Sunday I took a group of RVA students down to the town of Maahi Mahiu for outreach Sunday school. We walk through the streets and eventually gather a crowd of young kids eager to listen to a Bible story and play football (soccer) with the wazungu (white people). Last spring, there were probably three small house-churches along our route. Interestingly, they just keep cropping up along the six or seven 'blocks' we walk to the large empty lot where we hold our Sunday school class. I'd say that there's been a new church started every month. Just last week, a brand-new frame for a new church sprang up virtually overnight. The total now is nearer to ten. On Sunday mornings, we walk to our Sunday school class amid people carrying plastic chairs into several unmarked house churches and the blare of competing loudspeakers. On the one hand, this is exciting. But it worries me a little.

In Kenya, sometimes churches are just business. A con man will set up shop in a make-shift church claiming to have the power of healing, prophesy, etc... Many even sell miracles. They're easy to condemn. In a poor town like Maahi Mahiu, weekly tithes would supply an attractive salary. Maybe it's a cultural relic of the village witch doctor, but these culturally exciting services attract people.*

Churchgoers in America often fall into a similar trap. I've been guilty of going to church because it's what we do on Sunday mornings. Not for fellowship, growth, or obedience but out of routine because it's a part of my living of the American Dream. If this is my motive for attending church, church becomes stale. Church leaders listen to these complaints. They buy better sound equipment, they employ a worship pastor, they make their sermons more interactive.** These are all good things - great, in fact, but when do we cease to worship God and begin to worship a cultural ideal? How do we strike a balance here?

The real problem is, that when unbelievers look at the American church, they don't see people living lives in obedience to Christ. They see nice sound systems, entertaining programs and multimedia presentations. Young believers see churches claiming to be 'authentic' Christians with Saturday night services led by rock bands with a big stage and fancy lights and they want to be 'authentic' Christians too. After attending, they complain that this new church is impersonal and that nobody notices them so they simply leave. It's all a big show, and it's the gospel we're spreading.

I don't really know what to do about it or how to fix it. I guess I've just been realizing lately that the heros of the New Testament - Jesus, Peter, Paul, John, etc... - were probably a whole lot more like hippies living in tents on the fringes of society than the All-American dads we prop up in our minds. And that last part scares me - because I've spent most of my life so far becoming an All-American dad.

The local pastor who sets up our Sunday School in Maahi Mahiu is named Peter. His perspective on the whole thing is a great example for me. Many of the RVA students are frustrated that the number of children attending has been dropping. We had nearly 80 kids every Sunday early on. Now we only see about 20. "Maybe we need to make it more exciting." Yet Peter is undeterred: "Jesus says even if we have only two, that is enough. Even if it is only just you and me, it is enough. We will be faithful."

Instead of spreading a gospel of the American Dream or one that worships a certain cultural ideal, I want spread a gospel of obedience. Instead of worshiping an entertaining god, I want to worship the God who is present in my daily, boring life. I have a hunch that if I'm obedient, my daily life will rarely be boring. It doesn't matter how I look or what words I use. It's not about becoming a part of the 'authentic' church, the emergent church, the reformed church. It's certainly not about being unique. It's about becoming the Body of Christ.

I want to be more obedient.

*An interesting rabbit-trail: are these churches still cause for celebration? At least people are hearing and if they are seeking after God, that's good, right? Philipians 1:15-18

** Sometimes I forget that the technology world is racing along as we sit here in Kenya. I watched an online sermon the other day, and the congregation was texting the pastor questions during the service - crazy!

Great White Savior

2012-01-21T12:04:00.000-07:00

This is the second post in a series of thoughts about evangelical missions from a trip I (Jim) took into the valley to distribute food among the Maasai people. If you haven't done so, you should definitely read the introduction here.

There has been a lot of discussion lately among our missionary friends about the usefulness of short-term missions. I don't know if this is a new topic or whether we've simply fallen into a community for which this is a frequent point of discussion. The discussion usually centers around this question: With all the damage short-term missions do, shouldn't we just stop organizing short-term mission trips?

Now you may be wondering what damage short-term trips cause. There are a ton of examples of this damage. Here are just a couple:

They foster dependency. My first short-term trip was to Tecate, Mexico. We built a house for a poor family. It seemed like almost everybody we met was hoping to be the next family to receive a house. There was almost a culture present which enabled a "wait for the Gringo heros" mentality. They weren't interested in our message. They just wanted another handout.

They steal jobs. When a short-term mission group travels overseas and 'serves', it's often doing menial labor such as painting church walls. This looks bad. Usually, there's almost as much paint on the floors, shirts and faces of the wealthy white kids as there is on the walls. In developing countries, these jobs are at a premium. Why not put a fraction of the cost of these plane tickets toward employing a local person who needs work? They'd appreciate the work, and probably do a better job!

They mock poverty. If you were living in a hut wondering not what to prepare your family for supper but if you'll eat anything for supper and some wealthy American with culturally inappropriate designer jeans, stylish shades, and flashy jewelry bounces up in a fancy new car, drapes their headphones around their neck, hands you a bag with a good day's meal, snaps a couple of pictures and says perkily, "God Bless!" before rushing off again, how would you feel? Just imagine how much it cost that person to get to Africa to hand out that simple meal in the first place!

__________________________________________________________

When we arrived at the project in the valley, it was easy to feel like a rock-star. Everybody was so excited to see us. Faith, the mzungu kidogo (little white person), was a huge hit. Everybody wanted to shake her hand and mine. Each and every person wore a huge smile. It's a thrill, to say the least. The joy in the air was palpable and I think just about anybody would expect to get hooked on that feeling.

When handing out food, people are so grateful. They're thrilled. That gratitude is a subtle trap. It's not long before you start to feel that you're really awesome. That these people really need you. That you're some sort of savior. In fact, there are missionaries and people in charge of NGOs all over Kenya who have this aura about them. It's not the presence of God. It's a huge ego.

Feeding projects in Kenya are big business. Some are done well, but others are just a job. It's easy to raise money to feed starving people. We're even given a Biblical mandate to feed the hungry. But in projects like these, it's easy to see that the wealthy person is in authority. They are not really empowering the poor, not enabling them to become self-sufficient. In this setting, the poor are indebted to the wealthy, dependent upon them for just about everything. These projects foster an endless cycle of inequality. Eventually, the poor begin to view missionaries as some sort of great white savior.

So it seems pretty clear. Short term missions need to stop.

But there are two reasons I believe short-term missions are essential. The first is that most people who go on a short-term trip will leave feeling like anything but a 'great white savior.'

It's basically a given in Kenya that if you're an adult white male at any religious gathering, you'll be asked at some point to speak to or pray for the group. I said some stuff about loving our brothers and that we hoped that our small gift would be a blessing to each of them, and that Christ would somehow multiply that blessing. Then I finished with a loaded statement which I almost swallowed as it came out:

"But we know that Jesus Christ is the greater blessing."

True, no doubt. But what if I were to look at that statement through the lens of poverty? I made that statement out of my wealth. It's an easy statement for me to make - I haven't been hungry in ages. What if simply having food were a big-to-me blessing? Would I still be able to make that same statement?

As we began handing out food I felt chastised by my own words. Here I was giving 6 pounds of flour and 2 pounds of cooking oil to each family knowing that as soon as we were finished, they would be feeding us. And not just cornmeal paste. Rice, chapatis, carrots and peas, and beef. They even gave us some oranges and bananas. We were giving out of our wealth; They gave out of their poverty. Any inkling of being the hero was gone and it was replaced with a healthy sense of humility. If more people in the evangelical church could actually experience that sort of humiliation, a lot of our messed-up attitudes about poverty and wealth, the global church, our own personal needs and even our worship would be corrected.

The second reason I believe short-term missions are essential is this: almost everyone I've met here in Kenya who is currently trying to help the hurting with long-term sustainable projects either grew up here or was drawn to long-term service by first experiencing a short-term mission trip. Short-term missions create life-long servers. I'm convinced. Yes, there are a lot of messed up things about short-term missions. Yes, a bunch of jobless Kenyans would really like to earn a little money by painting that classroom... and they'd do a better job than your youth group too. Maybe if short-term trips were organized specifically to help us as westerners directly confront our material privilege and our spiritual bankruptcy, they'd be more effective.

Anybody going on a short-term trip or leading a short term trip should have to read the chapter on short term missions in the book "When Helping Hurts" which talks about some of these issues. Reading it might make you never want to go on a mission trip to Mexico again, but short-term trips ARE useful. If half the people sitting in the comfortable evangelical churches of the West did attend a good short-term missions outreach, the American church would be fundamentally changed for the better.

Dear Tooth Fairy...

2012-01-20T02:33:00.000-07:00

Dear Tooth Fairy,

I know that we live all the way over here in Kenya, but it would be really great if you could make the trip when Faith loses her teeth. She so carefully and thoughtfully places them under her pillow before she goes to bed. She's lost five teeth now and every morning when she wakes up we hear "MoooOOOM!" In fact, while she's sleeping here, there aren't any kids sleeping over there in North America, so you can't be too busy, right?

She's got a few more teeth to lose, so we'd appreciate an effort on your part to make a more consistent appearance around here. Before you know it, you'll have to be keeping up with Joel and Aaron. You've got some time to improve your record.

Thanks,
Faith's Parents

Ooooohhhh, wait.

Shoot. There are some of these parenting things that are just too much for us to handle. The shillings-under-the-pillow thing is definitely one of them.

Learning

2012-01-18T11:27:00.000-07:00

Saturday was another of RVA's community outreach days. Generally, about three quarters of our 500 students sign up for various opportunities to serve out in the communities surrounding Kijabe. As a science teacher, I(Jim) am normally volunteered to lead the 'environmental option' which so far has involved planting trees somewhere. This time, I was supposed to be building 'rocket stoves' down in the valley truckstop town of Maahi Mahiu. They're fuel efficient cooking stoves that reduce the need for fuel and especially the need for charcoal. I was excited about it and Faith was too, so she asked to come along. As is usually the case in Africa, the plan wasn't actually followed. I was reassigned at the last minute as a driver for a group distributing some food down in the valley. I pictured giving a few small bags of maize to a dozen or so poor families. Then I found out we were supposed to be distributing food to 135 families! Faith still wanted to come along, so we loaded up 1,800 pounds of maize meal (in only 9 bags!) 200 pounds of cooking fat, and 9 students into two cars and headed down the hill.

This was all fine and dandy until we stopped to pick up three crates of sodas here in Kijabe and the locking mechanism on the ignition of our car broke, leaving us stranded just outside RVA's gates. We borrowed a Land Rover and after bouncing down the 4-wheel drive road to Maahi Mahiu, we arrived at our rendezvous point only 20 minutes behind schedule. The man we were supposed to meet (Christopher) wasn't there, so we called on the cell phone: "I'll be there in 20 minutes." This is Africa.

It's amazing to me how different the valley floor is than Kijabe. Kijabe is green. Cedar and olive trees and flowers are everywhere. It's always between 60 and 80 degrees during the day. Eden.

By comparison, the valley floor is all hot dust and thorns.

Just outside of Maahi Mahiu, we again leave the main road, first following a natural gas pipeline, here driving up an arroyo, later across a washed-out culvert - the deep wash on each side 'repaired' with two narrow rows of basketball-sized rocks. Eventually, we rejoin the pipeline and drive through open grassland. Dusty flat ground with knee-high grass is punctuated by the occasional thorny acacia. Living in the states, this is what I had pictured Kenya would be like: open flat land with grass waving in the breeze. The stuff you watch lions creep through, almost invisible, as they stalk wary zebras on National Geographic TV shows.

Eventually, we leave the pipeline and travel along a row of barren power poles. Some are already beginning to show age, though the wires haven't ever been placed on them. They stand sentinel, monuments to Kenya's slow development where big projects are started but never finished because the money suddenly disappeared into somebody's pocket.

Leaving barren power poles behind, we turn onto a fading dirt road where only the daily tread of feet beats back the invading grass. Finally, we leave the tired road behind, following a footpath in white land rovers as they bounce incessantly over grassy tussocks to a mud hut and a waiting crowd of people pressed into the shade of a few umbrella thorn trees.

Community Elders sit in the deepest shade in ubiquitous plastic chairs, their distended earlobes flopping against their necks as they chew the ends of kunia branches and passively swat away flies with the fuzzy blue-green leaves. The women fill the rest of the shady space, all of them talking excitedly about who knows what, their earlobes flopping against their necks as they absently wave aside flies with their hands. Covered with bright kangas and buried beneath layers of tinkling beaded necklaces each clutches a bag to be filled with some of the maize meal we've brought.

The whole thing practically screamed, "Missionary in Africa." Everything about the day fit all the stereotypes and it made me think a lot about the way the Evangelical Church does missions. As I tried to distill one big take-away for the blog, it became more and more apparent that this one day was really a great illustration of a whole bunch of points I've been thinking about a lot over the past year. So over the next few days, I've got a collection of reflections on the modern missions movement and some ideas for becoming more effectively involved in fulfilling the great commission.

Comparison, moms, and ministry

2012-01-10T04:50:00.000-07:00

Life for a young mom can be a sometimes arduous exercise in building character. I'm not talking about the kids, I'm talking about the mom. We get the questions about what we do all day, the comments about how 'oh, it must be nice' (it is, but not in the way you are implying), we get asked what else do we do, and on and on. At home, it seems the cooking, cleaning, diapers, nose-wiping, and discipline never ends, as raising a kid can't really be done in a day, week, or even a year. It is a time during which we wrestle with our importance, our purpose, and we are constantly re-evaluating that illusive state of being, called 'balance'. If we let the perceptions of the world lay heavily upon us, the task of remaining focused on our families is daunting, if not impossible, to do peacefully and confidently.

Since we've been here, I'm beginning to wonder if our living situation is an advanced course of the mom-building-character thing. If there's one thing that is so tempting to do in this close community that is focused on one ministry, it is to compare. We compare our daily schedules, we compare who-does-what, we compare what we think is "too much" or "just enough". In this environment, in which something inevitably always needs just one more person to do something, that chameleon of comparison creeps in.

It might be in the form of defending one's self, thus putting our worth in what we do, or it might be in the form of pointing at others, with blame, judgement, or resentment. Anything to make ourselves feel better, or to aim the attention elsewhere, right? Comparison also might create that monster of insecurity, which is a powerful tool of the enemy, especially in us women. Let's face it, there's always something we could do better, something we could do more of, something that maybe five years ago, we should have done totally different that would have been life-changing. Seriously. There's always something.

But when we are looking at others as our measure of success or greatness, we'll always fall short. Yes, we were all created in the image of God, but we were each given unique gifts and personalities. I wasn't created in the image of my neighbor, so I shouldn't strive to be like her. I won't ever gain any ground if that is my goal, and that comparison will most likely lead to jealousy and envy, good poisons for any relationship. Maybe she has some Godly attributes that I recognize aren't so fruitful in my life, but I need to first go to God and ask the Spirit to work in me to be more like Him, not my neighbor.

Christ is my measure, to which I will certainly fall short. But He is also my redeemer, the one who took my sin as his own. The one who loves me so dearly that He longs to share eternity with me. He is my salvation and what I do for Him counts, not what I do for anyone else. If I am serving others to look good in my neighbor's eyes, or to feel like I'm doing my part because of what everyone around me is doing, I'm completely missing the mark.

Last week, I was the Advanced Cooking teacher for a grand total of three days. I've been a mom for seven years but every once in a while, I begin to wonder if I should be doing "more", and in my mind, the importance of mothering seems to fall a few ranks. These thoughts always come when I'm looking around, instead of up. In theory, the idea worked very well for our schedule. We hashed out the idea of me teaching over more than a few days and felt that we made a careful decision. But in reality, it didn't work for our family.

There are no badges for the busiest mom, the stay-at-home mom, the homeschool mom, the mom who only feeds her kids organic food, or the mom who seems to 'do it all'. We've all been given a unique path, life, and personality. God is my guide, my goal, and my judge. No one else. Nor am I anyone else's.

I'm thankful for the crash course in this I received this month,

and I'm sure it will happen again.

(Disclaimer: This perspective of the fallen-ness of missionaries' thoughts about ministry is not criticism of the administration and leadership at RVA. It is more a reflection on the general struggle of women in ministry, young moms in particular. The administration has been beyond helpful, loving, and encouraging to me during this time of "figuring it out", and I am thankful.)

The One Percent and Me

2011-12-28T12:43:00.001-07:00

I (Jim) have been wanting to write something about this for quite some time but I've been busy and I don't really know where to start. I've been reading a lot about the "Occupy" movement - for quite a while. First off, this isn't a political article - just some perspective.

It's been hard for me to get a real clear picture of what exactly the protests are about, but hearing the facts about the 1% making 1/3 of Americans' income made me start thinking.

In the US, I felt poor. I had a masters degree and a steady teaching job and yet our family qualified for WIC (Food aid for low-income moms and children), our heating bill was subsidized through LEAP (again, for low-income families), and our kids qualified for free (but nearly impossible to use) state medical care - all because we were considered a low-income family. From that perspective, it's easy to agree with the occupy movement - income distributions in the US are not fair.

Here, I feel wealthy. We end up giving a lot of money away, lending money to people with hospital bills, buying antibiotics for people... We 'bring home' even less now that we're missionaries but here in Kenya it's a lot easier to see how wealthy we really are. I feel guilty when our house-helper sees avocados growing nasty molds - especially on days she has no lunch. When the crippled guy peddling flowers asks if he can have a ten-dollar loan to buy his weekly batch of flowers to sell because he spent all his capital on medicines for his son who has pneumonia I see how richly we've been blessed.

Because I was curious, I looked up some facts about incomes worldwide - here's one that really hit home for me: over 50% of the world's population lives on under two dollars per day. (Over 80% live on under ten dollars per day.)

My parents visited last month and we celebrated an early Christmas with them - ham, cranberry sauce and all. After eating, I took some of the traditional meal to our yard-worker, Edward. He had a great time trying all the foods. He really liked cranberry sauce, enjoyed the ham. His favorite part was the stuffing; he didn't care for the olives. NONE of it was familiar to him. After he'd eaten it and had seconds of the stuffing and that precious cranberry sauce he asked, "You eat like this every Christmas?"

"Yep." I couldn't admit to him that I would have normally eaten twice the amount he'd just had OR that we'd had a meal like that only a month ago when we celebrated Thanksgiving or that we'd probably do it all over again when Easter came around.

"Wow!" Wonder filled his face. That he couldn't really fathom being wealthy enough to eat one meal like that was obvious - and Edward's a guy living on MORE than two dollars per day - better than over 50% of the world population!

I'm rich. I use the internet, own a car, buy health insurance, have running water (hot water, no less) and listen to an ipod. Maybe I'm not the one percent - but I eat until I'm full.

I'm not sure what to make of all this but reading Luke 16 has a different feel now.

Visiting Edward's House for Christmas.

2011-12-24T14:30:00.000-07:00

We weren't eaten by lions, I promise

2011-12-22T13:18:00.001-07:00

It's been almost a month since the classrooms were emptied... we've been winding down from a whirlwind first term at Rift Valley Academy.

We've been busy learning to eat,

learning to hunt,

and trying to stay dry in the very abnormal, very wet weather of Kijabe these last few months,

which, if you are Joel, has its advantage of a yummy termite crop!

So we took off in search of some warmer adventures... which sometimes were more than we bargained for. Yes, we crossed this in our car. It's not lions that might keep us from blogging, but it's the raging rivers we should be afraid of.

Oh yes, and Grandma and Grandpa came and we were able to show them our home and the beautiful country we live in.

We've prepared our home and our hearts for remembering the birth of our Savior,

and also celebrated with our neighbors around us.

Our hearts and minds are full of so many wonderful things. We've had a lot to think about this term, and frankly, since we've come to Kenya. Where does the Lord want us to be? More importantly, what is he asking us to be doing with our lives? We pray that we can grow to honor him in what we do, more and more each day and in the coming year.

Apology

2011-10-30T13:48:00.000-06:00

We've now been here at RVA for 15 months. It's given us time to grieve our loss of 'home' in the states, get adjusted to a different lifestyle here in Kijabe (read: fight the differences with plenty of frustration), get to know students and let them get to know us, and settle in general as a family.

Learning to understand and incorporate the Kijabe station lifestyle was one of the challenges we didn't really anticipate when arriving at RVA. We were thrilled that we could live within walking distance from school, friends, grocery, library, church, doctors, and pretty much everything else that we would need on a day-to-day basis. But we didn't really think beyond that. Pretty soon, we realized that whether we liked it (or them!) or not, we worked, played, worshiped, vacationed, shopped, and lived with everyone here. The same people. Everywhere. ALL THE TIME. We hadn't spent much time recognizing the fact that that in the states, we had church friends, work friends, ministry friends, mommy friends, camping friends, old friends and new friends, who were often in their own separate categories. There was some overlap, but certainly not total overlap.

This difference in lifestyle is more of a subtle one. Term starts off great, but by the end of the 12 or 13 weeks that we've all spent mostly here on our fenced-in little piece of land, you can tell we're all ready for some space, or peace and quiet, or a vacation on which we don't see anyone we know. (Although that too, rarely happens.)

Obviously, for the school to function well for its students, and since this element of close community living is a given part of life here, it seems there are some important aspects of healthy relationships that are less-easily ignored here than in the more separated communities that we came from.

The one that stands out to me as I look back on our time here is the importance of an apology. I can count three very specific, clear times that another staff member has come to the door of our house or called on the phone, asked for me (Heather) and proceeded to apologize for an event that happened that very day, or just the day before. They admitted wrong, and asked for forgiveness. It wasn't a big deal, it was just honest, humble, and open.

It has been an incredible lesson to me to see this aspect of our community live out Christ's calling to admit to wrongdoings and ask for forgiveness in a very consistent manner. Instead of being ashamed or trying to forget or push aside wrongdoings, the vulnerability of a sincere apology has given many relationships a depth of trust, love, and forgiveness.

These events have made me think of my own actions. I think in the past, when I have done wrong, I am easily shamed by my sin, and my energies and thoughts are directed towards not making mistakes in the same way again. But the fact is, no matter how hard I try, I'm going to mess up again. More than once. Wouldn't it be better if I put my energies towards saying sorry, letting someone trust me, and I them, and accepting my ultimate freedom in Christ?

I'm thankful for this [sometimes messy] body of Christ here in Kijabe that strives to love one another, just as He has loved us.

Under the (Broom)Tree

2011-10-23T12:35:00.000-06:00

Almost exactly one year ago I (Jim) wrote some thoughts I had while lying under the Jacaranda tree in our yard playing hooky from one of the sessions during RVA's Spiritual Emphasis Week. Most of my thoughts were reflections on God's grace and provision and my struggle to accept His gift and actually trust that God has my best interests in mind. You might want to read it here.

This year at Spiritual Emphasis Week I did not skip a single lesson. I went to every session. At one of the last, the speaker was talking about Elijah. In 1 Kings 18, we hear the story of how Elijah, in great faith, prayed to God in front of the prophets of Baal and how God sent down fire on Elijah's offering, then Elijah killed all 450 prophets of Baal and finally God has Elijah end years of drought. As if that weren't enough, Elijah is then overcome by the spirit and outruns the chariot of king Ahab to queen Jezebel. I'm not sure what Elijah was expecting to happen next but apparently hearing Jezebel say that she'd have Elijah killed wasn't it. Jezebel's threat freaks Elijah out and he begins running for his life - scared - like he's totally forgotten everything that happened that day. The following day, he's sitting under a broom tree begging God to take his life.

It's laughable, really. Elijah has one unbelievably productive day spiritually and then he's caught totally off-guard by one unexpected hurdle and he runs off into the desert and gives up in despair.

I'm pretty sure this wasn't the speaker's point, but as I walked back home in a gentle rain remembering my time under the Jacaranda tree almost exactly one year earlier, I could see myself sitting under that broom tree. It seems like the last year has been an incredible one - probably the richest of my life - with many lessons and examples of God's provision but spiritually, I feel like I'm in the same place! I'm sitting there under my broom tree needing some special encouragement after having just witnessed God's provision for our family. I guess it was just the sort of encouragement I needed at the time - I'm feeling better about things now. Isn't it great how God provides for us?

Outreach.

2011-09-24T13:12:00.000-06:00

Last Saturday was one of RVA’s once-a-term outreachactivities. During the day, about75% of our approximately five hundred students participate in various outreachprojects surrounding Kijabe ranging from playing soccer at a maximum securityprison, to building fuel-efficient rocket stoves for widows or, like Faith did,making a lunch for the campus security guards.

Seedlings waiting to be planted.

I always end up on the same sort of project. It’s like being a preacher visitingsomeone’s house – somehow you’re always the one praying for the meal. I’m a biology teacher, so Ialways end up on the ‘environmental option.’ This time was probably one of my favorites. About one year ago, we helped build afence for Care of Creation – a Christian organization trying to help educatepeople throughout Africa about environmental concerns and what it means to begood stewards of natural resources and how to get good crop yieldswithout destroying the environment.

This time I joined Care of Creation with close to twenty RVA highschoolers. We drove down to OldKijabe Primary School, about 20 minutes down a four-wheel drive road underdeforested hills and across dried-up streams. This was probably my favorite trip so far. We met up with around twenty students fromKijabe Primary and planted around 200 trees. The kids were excited about what they were doing and had agreat attitude about working to restore the forest.

The best part? Watching Kenyan primary students teach RVA kids about stewardship.

Hauling water to give each seedling a good start was the hardest part.

The Monkey In The Classroom

2011-09-22T08:21:00.000-06:00

Today was one of my most difficult days in the classroom ever. Shaken by the news of the passing of an RVA staff member on furlough this term, classes were awkward, painful and full of tears. By fourth period, my students and I were emotionally spent. Nobody wanted to talk anymore, but our minds were consumed. We decided to proceed with the lesson as planned. This decision was followed by a totally unexpected, and much needed, distraction:

Today we were learningabout cells. About 15 minutes intoclass, I was demonstrating to students the preparation of a good slide with a leaf in order to observesome cell structures under the microscope. Just your average, everyday, biology stuff. A student raised his hand with aquizzical look on his face, and I waited until I’d finished explaining theparticular sequence I was demonstrating to call on him. Before I was able to finish, I wasinterrupted by a second student asking a question about a specific step I wasexplaining. All the while, thefirst student was engaged in all kinds of facial gymnastics.

Finally, his body language becoming more and more animated and his face cycling from curiosity to repulsion to panic in comical fashion, hepointed to the place I had been standing only seconds before and blurted out, “Mr. Frazier,what is THAT!?”

There, next to the class set of Biology books, laid afull-grown Syke’s Monkey – dead.

Turns out, there was a monkey that somehow got hung on a power-line last night. The electrician who took it down brought it by to see if we could use it. I wasn’t in the room, so they just left it on the counter. Only in Africa…

What's a kid to think?

2011-09-17T10:43:00.000-06:00

Today we took an impromptu trip into Nairobi as a family after the morning's Titchie field day games, and a lunch of Senior Store (a class fundraiser). Jim and the kids sat at Java House, drinking milkshakes, while I made my way around Nakumatt (our supermarket) stocking up for the month.

On our way home this busy Saturday afternoon, Jim got to practice his best Kenyan driving skills. We were making our way through a few busy intersections back to the main thoroughfare that takes us up to Kijabe. We came upon one that happened to have one of the five stop signs in Kenya.

Joel, who has now witnessed Kenyan driving and traffic rules (or lack thereof) for over a year, exclaimed: "When you see that kind of a stop sign, it means you can keep going!" And sure enough, the cars in front of us drove ahead as if it weren't there, and then so did we.

Every once in a while, amidst daily life that has become normal, and in a place that has become home, Faith and Joel make comments like this that remind us that we have been raising them in a different culture than we came from. I'm just glad that he'll maybe have a few years to forget what he learned here before he's sitting behind the wheel!

No deep thoughts; just cuteness.

2011-09-08T10:20:00.000-06:00

We're almost two weeks into our new school year here at RVA, and the kids are back into their routine...

Faith is now a big first grader, with morning AND afternoon class! Her quote after the first day: "It was too short!"

With sister off at school, Joel is back to his sandbox. Here he is in his "big hole". He loves spending time digging around with his trucks, as evidenced by the dirt that finds its way into his pockets and onto our couch!

And Aaron is busy growing! After having one completely-under-the-curve child, and one 15th percentile child, we're not sure where this 95th percentile child came from. But I suppose we'll keep him!

On Being a Boring Missionary

2011-09-06T03:04:00.000-06:00

It's amazing the pressure missionaries feel (whether it comes from our own expectations or through the expectations of supporters) to have exciting news and big thoughts. As a church, we are in the habit of viewing spiritual experiences as intense and exciting and missionaries as super-spiritual people. Spiritual experiences should be more exciting, shouldn't they? David Platt in his book Radical speaks of how the Christian mega-church has become just another mass-marketed interpretation of the American Dream with entertaining speakers, an emotional concert-quality worship set, engaging programs... exciting entertainment. Is it any wonder that we then expect that same level of entertainment from even our own spiritual lives?

It's totally natural, then, that when our lives feel boring or mundane we begin to feel like we need to 'be more spiritual.' This pressure is even greater when you're in 'ministry.' A few weeks ago, there was an article flying around Facebook called We Need Boring Christians. You should read it; It ties in perfectly with the other day's 'focused on me' Rugby post. Basically, this guy writes about feeling like God was calling him to the mission field and winding up stranded and out-of-touch with God. This paragraph pretty much nails the missionary dilemma:

"Following Jesus is not to be romanticized through impressive Facebook status updates or photos of exotic places on our blog. Discipleship is often ugly, messy and painful. Faithful service will regularly lead us into dull labors and bewildering struggles that would make unexciting press. To romanticize social justice or cross-cultural evangelism is to promote an idealism that will be inevitably vaporized on the field, inadvertently leading to burnout and cynicism."

A lot of our life here as missionaries is boring. Most of it, really. To be completely honest, my greatest spiritual triumph right now would be finding the time and self discipline to get assignments back to students a little faster with some really meaningful feedback - feedback about biology. Often stories from the mission field include intense spiritual warfare, but so far the most intense spiritual warfare I've experienced here has been the 'boring' fight against a stubborn self-righteous flesh that works to do good while pushing the real issue, that of total obedience to Christ, comfortably out of mind. Instead, it's easy to sit and think of how I am spiritually above grading papers and how much greater my impact could be - to think how awesome I could be for Christ, not how HE is doing amazing things. I begin thinking of how my spiritual life can entertain me - not in those words, of course, but eventually, being 'more spiritual' begins to replace being obedient.

Rugby

2011-09-04T05:54:00.000-06:00

RVA is not like many other schools in a lot of ways. Here's a good example: At the end of last term I was asked if I'd like to play in the faculty vs JV rugby game. I said sure. I figured it would probably be just a bunch of hopelessly slow and awkward American staff running around desperately grasping at flags.

The day before the game we had a faculty practice. It was there I found out that this was a full-contact tackles-and-all game. Some of the guys knew a lot about rugby. I hadn't even heard of a 'ruck'. One of the experts spent about 15 minutes showing us how to tackle properly - with your head behind the runner's legs "so you don't get knocked out." The whole thing seemed like a good way to get hurt.

At the end of the practice I was asked if I could play wing. I had no idea what a 'wing' was. I googled it. After spending about an hour on wikipedia reading about the role of a wing and working through a who's who of outstanding wings from past international leagues and how each had "redefined the position" I felt much better; The wing plays on the edge of the field and while the goal is always to get the ball to the wing so he can advance it, I felt confident we'd be so overmatched the ball would rarely be coming all the way to me.

Game day it poured rain. I offered extra credit to any varsity player willing to loan me a pair of size ten and a half cleats. Warming up on the field I was told I'd no longer be playing 'wing' but 'fullback'.

"What's THAT?" I asked.

"It's kind of like a punt returner, but you always have to be ready because they can kick the ball whenever they want. Just make sure you catch the ball and it'll be fine."

I listened as they continued to describe how I was supposed to tackle anybody that got past the defense "kind of like a free safety," to join the 'line' on offense and several other things that I can no longer remember. It sounded impossible!

The game started with the faculty receiving the kick, me waiting back deep, by myself, hoping just to avoid embarrassment. Nobody's ever accused me of having good hands, and I guessed (rightly) that the JV team would be extra willing to kick the ball at me just to see if I could catch. Sure enough, the ball came right at me. Surprisingly, I caught it. Even more so, I ran past the first two or three defenders untouched. I made it across midfield. The crowd was getting pretty loud.

"This is really fun!" I thought. I actually broke two or three tackles before being taken down quite a ways across midfield. 'Fullback' was going much better than I had anticipated.

Almost immediately, they got the ball. I didn't know where I was supposed to be. Thankfully, some of the students in the audience started yelling, "Mr. Frazier! Scoot back!" I did and then a student broke free around the end of our line. He was really fast! I was the only one left between him and the try zone. I hadn't tackled anybody since my eighth grade lightweight football days. I got in front of him and made the tackle! The only problem was, I forgot to put my head behind the runner and I took a hard blow to the chin. Somehow my lip got pulled downward by something and that little flap of tissue in the middle of the bottom lip that keeps it from getting pulled down too far tore free. My whole chin was totally numb. I felt like I had lost the lower half of my face and had a huge rubber prosthetic chin put there to replace it. I couldn't tell if I was bleeding, so I stayed in the game.

The J.V. team thought I was pretty good. I didn't have many more kicks come my way. I only badly missed one tackle the rest of the half. By that time, I knew I was bleeding... a lot. I'd spit out a bunch and now my mouth was dry with it. I decided to rinse it out and get a drink. I filled my mouth with water and swished it around. That was a terrible idea. NOW I could feel. It stung - badly. But the admiring groan from those who saw me spit a bright red stream of water soothed pain.

The rest of the game is just a blur of bodies and tackles. The staff began to pull away, scoring several tries. A large portion of the student audience coached me through the game, telling me to run back, to join the line, to watch for the kick...

Toward the end of the game, I was trying to tackle a guy. I was very careful to put my head behind the runner, but as I did, something out of nowhere collided with my face. It ended up being a team-mate's knee. (a picture of the instant after the collision at right)

I could feel my lip getting pulled even farther out of place, and my nose started pouring blood. I wobbled off the field. On the sidelines I gave a pained grin to my teammates.

"Was your nose crooked before?"
"Not really."
"That nose is broken!"

I went home to check out the damage and to put ice on my nose. I walked in the house and avoided seeing Heather who was sick in bed, snuck into the bathroom and began to wash up.

"Are you ok?" she asked.
"Just a bloody nose."

And I thought it was just a bloody nose. My lip hurt a lot more. Now both have healed just fine, but the nose is just a little different.

The next day in class, I had a lot of comments about how great I'd played, how fast I was, how tough I must be for staying in the game... I think what they meant was that I was faster and better than they'd expected from an uber-ackward science nerd. It still felt really good - to be praised by men, and have my ego fed. I think the experience helped me see how much I crave that external validation.

So I've been thinking about it a lot the last few months. I think a lot of the time when we do bigger and better things as Christians our motivation is often that others will notice us and praise us more. Even when my initial motives are pure, the siren song of recognition can easily pull me under. "Great job in chapel today, Jim!" or "I can tell students really like you" are a couple of comments that make me feel great, and more often than not, I just soak it all in.

God calls us to something much different. Deitrich Bonhoeffer in his book "The Cost of Discipleship" wrote, "When Christ calls a man, He bids him, 'Come and die.'" I've begun to realize that all my thoughts about the rugby game were about how awesome I was. In fact, my whole method of appraising my success (even my spiritual life) concerns what I am doing. What if my reflections on the tasks I've undertaken all made me think about how awesome HE is and about what HE is doing?

And We're Off!

2011-09-01T03:15:00.001-06:00

It's been a while since we posted (again). We just started a new school year, which means we just finished the shortest summer vacation of my life. I (Jim) thought the last month was going to be a good time to catch up on the blog (and life in general). Turns out, it was a good time for disrupting routine and causing family chaos and getting further behind on the blog (and life in general). It's an interesting example, I guess, of how total freedom brings total Chaos. So now we're hoping for a return to normalcy and a schedule. Maybe we'll catch up on the last three months of thoughts and events too.

A long time now...

2011-08-12T12:04:00.000-06:00

It's been quite a while now since we posted! I (Jim) think we ended the school-year (July 17th) out of gas. Physically and mentally exhausted. I'm sure having a newborn and the accompanying short nights has contributed, but still. I had great plans for posts at the beginning of he break. It's been a busy break. We've gone on a couple of great family trips and taken care of lots of loose ends... we may even have a birth certificate and passport for Aaron soon! At any rate, time has gotten away from us. We still have dozens of things to share, but we just haven't found the time or energy to actually DO it! Hopefully that will come eventually, but here is what I've really been thinking about lately:

Being as worn-out as we were at the end of this past term, I've done a lot of thinking about why. I can't remember which term it was but Tim Cook (our now-retired superintendent) shared what he'd been reading about the Cycle of Grace - an idea written about by Dr. Frank Lake and explained well on this guy's blog. (I don't know what else is on the site, so if it's weird, sorry!) The natural cycle is something like this: I work to achieve goals that give me a sense of personal significance and feel success when the world notices. Successful work (properly recognized by others) stokes my ego and gives a sense of acceptance; all is right with the world - and me. But it doesn't stop there. Unless I continue to work, significance fades and with it, success and that sense of acceptance. I am no longer right with the world. I fall into this cycle naturally: in my work, in my relationships with colleagues, my marriage, my relationship with God...

The 'Cycle of Grace' has all the same components, but starts with our acceptance by God and proceeds backward from that. The realization that we are accepted through Christ as adopted children (Romans 8:15) gives the perspective that success is then through Christ alone... who has already accepted me. This gives every action significance and drives my work: now an act of obedience to God... who has already accepted me! Really it's just a simple change in attitude but what if I approached my work (in whatever context) this way?

Believe it or not, there are a LOT of Christians (especially missionaries) who have this cycle backwards. And I think this is dangerous for Christians... Working to achieve significance will lead to burn-out and I think that's where I was heading at the end of our 1st year here (as you can see from the previous post). So... my new goal is to begin working from that position of acceptance. We'll see. It's interesting how the gospel Christ preached takes just about every natural tendency and commands the exact opposite.

Coming soon to a mailbox near you...

2011-07-19T03:36:00.002-06:00

Just a quick note to say that we are putting together a mailing to send out summarizing our first year in Kenya. There will be a new prayer card enclosed, and of course, a photo of our newest family member. If you'd like to receive this, and you know you are not on our list, please click on "Join Our Mailing List", found on the right side of your screen.

Also, AIM has updated their online giving link, so in case you found that ours has been faulty as of late, I have fixed that too.

Asante sana! (Thank you very much!)

The Fraziers

The End of the Year Trainwreck

2011-07-15T22:25:00.001-06:00

So Thursday was the end of the school-year. Maybe you weren't expecting that. We didn't really communicate that here on the blog - maybe because it kind of snuck up on us. I think there's also the truth that we've been a little overwhelmed. A little more than a month ago, we welcomed Baby Frazier #3 into the world which brought nights of sleeping like a baby (not good) and loads of laundry and visitors and... Heather recovered slowly due to some sort of infection, then Faith got sick. Joel and I were plugging along just fine - but busy.

A few days ago, it looked like Joel had a bug-bite on his chin, but a couple of days later it exploded into this huge raw blistering sore - it looked a little like pictures of the early stages of a brown recluse bite that I've seen. We asked around and, surprisingly, there are no spiders or insects in Kenya with a bite like that.

Monday was my Birthday and we didn't have class. I was very grateful because I didn't feel very good. I had this intermittent fever and a really sore throat. I felt a little better and kept teaching Tuesday and Wednesday, but Wednesday night I felt really bad. Dr. Entwistle who lives next door and works at Kijabe Hospital came over just then to take a look at Joel's chin: Impetigo. He heard I hadn't been feeling well either and took a look down my throat with our little wind-up flashlight. After some uuughs, wows and grimaces he said it looked like I had strep. He said he'd leave a prescription at the hospital chemist in the morning. That night I couldn't sleep. My fever was really high, I was having weird thoughts, and sweating buckets and in the morning I knew there was no way I was going to school.

Faith had a wonderful year at Titchie!

Heather walked Faith up to her last day of Kindergarten and then went down to the hospital to wait for my prescription... sometimes a morning-long process and never fun but Heather went cheerfully. It seemed like she suddenly had a lot of energy.

I dragged myself out of bed and hobbled to the bathroom. I glanced in the mirror and saw my right lymph node bulging out the side of my neck like a second trachea. I was miserable. I climbed back in bed and stayed there until evening. The most frustrating part was, I didn't feel good enough to read or write and I couldn't fall asleep, so I had a lot of time to sit and think and pray. It ended up being a great time of reflection on the year. The one which I didn't quite finish.

My reflections had a recurring theme: God has really provided for us. We've had some rough stretches and some trials, certainly, but we've grown a lot and seen the faithfulness of God through them. The last few weeks have been a good example. I was sick for the last week of school and I don't think I had the physical energy to fight off sickness or to finish well. There was no way I was finishing the tasks of the year without everything somehow falling in my favor and time after time, things did.

Aaron's been hard to put to sleep and I somehow have the knack. Heather fed him and tried putting him down for quite a while, but he just fussed. "I can't do this," she said. I dragged myself out of bed and tried putting him to sleep. It took a while and he was practically gone so I crawled back into bed, freezing. He was quiet for a minute, maybe.

Then, he started screaming. I thought, "I can't do this," and, "Jesus, help him fall asleep." Heather (who had no idea how badly I felt at that point) asked me if I was going to help him. I mumbled something to the effect of, "I think he'll fall back asleep." I was just stalling; his crying sounded nothing like a baby about to fall asleep and I didn't think he would. I felt like I was just about to pass out. Then he just stopped crying and fell asleep.

I think sometimes we say prayers like that and God says, "No." Maybe most of the time, actually. But I think we can usually look back later and see exactly why he said it: a lesson learned, a truth reinforced, humility gained... but it is comforting to know that those other times when we actually are spent he really is in control of our circumstances and blesses us with little things. 1 Peter 5:6-10

The whole week was full of those small, convenient blessings! Now another conveniently-timed blessing: Break! Over the next few weeks, we'll be able to recover. And the reason there's been very little on the blog in the last month is not for lack of news! We'll try to catch up on that too.

Out of Kijabe hospital

2011-07-03T09:32:00.000-06:00

Here's a video Jim took as we walked with newborn Aaron from the hospital room to the car on Monday morning. It's a good glimpse of a small part of the hospital and what it looks like on a daily basis.

The story of Aaron Hudson

2011-06-30T06:29:00.004-06:00

Phew, it's been a quiet almost-three-weeks on the blog, we know. It hasn't exactly been a quiet almost-three-weeks at home, though I think we are getting a handle on being parents of three. I (Heather) lost quite a bit of blood after the delivery of Aaron, so it's taken a bit to get my strength back, and we've all been battling our share of illnesses, but now we are starting to come out of the fog, and we're feeling pretty good.

I've been wanting to share a little about Aaron's birth and our experience of having a baby in Kenya, so we'll see if I can put my thoughts together.

The weekend Aaron was born was the long-awaited Sophomore Restaurant. On Saturday night, the staff of RVA, lower station families (those who work at the hospital or other surrounding ministries... RVA is "upper station"), and junior and senior students, all got dressed up to be served by the sophomore class. The sophomores plan and prepare all year to put on "dinner and a show" as a fundraiser for the banquet their junior year. So here we are, ready for our big date on Saturday night. As it was three days prior to my due date, we had reserved a table for two not knowing if we'd have a newborn or not. Lo and behold, here we are, still waiting.

The funny thing about living in this community, is you do everything together. Both my doctor and the nurse who would attend to my birth were both there, with their spouses, enjoying the night out. Dr. Myrick finds us and jokingly tells me to please wait until after dinner to have a baby. I did have a few contractions throughout dinner, but went home to a quiet night, thankful for some rest.

I woke up at 4 am, rather uncomfortable and unable to sleep, but kept resting until about 10. Jim got the kids off to sunday school, and I got up for church. Church starts at 11, so we went down to the chapel to worship with the rest of the community. I was starting to notice contractions, but nothing very regular, and it felt much different than my other two labors, so I wasn't very convinced anything was happening. After church, our Sunday tradition is to eat in the cafeteria, and Jim asked if I was up for that. I told him only if there were mashed potatoes. Well, there were mashed potatoes, so we had a nice lunch together. However, the contractions were feeling a bit stronger, so we hurried home and I laid down while Jim put the kids down for a nap. That's when everything picked up. Instead of ten minutes apart like they had been all morning, labor seemed to be speeding up... 8 minutes... 7 minutes...

After resting and walking for an hour, we called Jacqui, the nurse, at 3:00. She came to the house, we visited between contractions, and she was timing them, something I had lost concentration to be able to do. Labor seemed a bit erratic still, but we decided the baby was probably coming, sooner or later. Jacqui called Dr. Myrick, who was playing Sunday-afternoon ultimate frisbee on campus. She told him he could probably finish his game, but would he please come by afterward. He came to the house around 4:00 (also the time my baby shower started... needless to say I missed my own party!) and decided we'd better head down to the hospital. On the way, Jacqui ran into our neighbor's house, who happened to be the pediatrician on call for the day, and told him there'd be a baby to check out in a little bit. There really are some nice things about having a baby here...

Here I am at the hospital, in the hall, waiting for the private room to be set up. Dr. Myrick decided that if the baby and I continued to look okay, he'd be fine delivering in the private room. This was a very nice accommodation that we did not expect. It is much more private than the conventional experience at Kijabe hospital. After 15 minutes in the hallway or so, we made our way to the room. Jim took some quick pictures before things got very serious.

The call button.

The sterile delivery sheets and gowns. Yes, really sterile. The hospital found that this system would save quite a bit of money, and help to employ more people.

Myself, Jacqui, and Faith, a good friend who I asked to attend the birth. She knows the Kijabe hospital ropes quite well. Two of her four children were born here. Oh-- and note the dress. It was what I wore to restaurant, church, and to have my baby. Seriously multi-purpose.

And then things got going. Right outside that window is a big sidewalk where a lot of people and visitors wait, as well as the cafeteria.

From 5:30 until Aaron was born (6:27pm) I worked pretty hard. I remember looking at Jim's watch at 6:00 and thinking that I wasn't going to ever see my baby! I was thrilled that he came quite soon after that. I was so thankful for the support of everyone that was with me. It was nice to have the gentle encouragement of Jacqui and Faith, and Jim's hand on my back. The most important thing for me was to not feel alone. Dr. Myrick is a family practice doctor here at Kijabe. I'm not sure how many years he has worked here, but before Kenya, he and his wife served in Jordan, so he's got years and years of experience in overseas medicine. While I was hoping and praying throughout my whole pregnancy that an OB would show up in time to deliver my baby, I really forgot about that in the end, and we were very thankful to have his skill and expertise when the time came.

Being new here, I'm not sure I can accurately put my finger on what makes missionary doctors different. You can have a specialty or a focus as a doctor, but here, or elsewhere on the field, you've probably done way more than that. For Dr. Myrick, being a family practice doctor, and having years of experience in overseas medicine, and due to his experience, means he's a regular on the OB rotation, and delivers babies all the time. I also think being a medical missionary means that you see extreme cases day in and day out, and so when the routine comes along, there's thankfulness, and no need to make something more than it is. As one of the pediatricians told me last week "why go looking for trouble?" And of course, there's not the liability or the worry of malpractice here like in the states. Medical care is a luxury and a privilege, and thankfulness is often the perspective of the patient here, no matter the outcome. All of this makes Kijabe a wonderful place to have a baby as well...

Aaron arrived safely at 6:27 pm. Thinking all along in this pregnancy that I must be having a girl (we really didn't know, however), it was a fun surprise to welcome a little boy, which was cause for lots of giggles and laughter all around. He was wiped off a little bit, bundled up in a surgical gown, and put into my arms. Of course, we didn't know he was Aaron (we named him the following morning) so we had to keep from calling him Joel, he looked so much like his older brother.

After a few hours, a Kenyan nurse checked him out before we went to bed. (He was also examined by one of the missionary pediatricians right after her was born.) No one bothered us again until the next morning, and being our third child, there was no way we were going to wake Aaron up to eat. We enjoyed the hands-off approach very much!

The next morning, Jim ran around the hospital, getting discharge papers, medicines, paid our bill ($130) and got Aaron's record of birth, which is needed to obtain his Kenyan birth certificate. By 11:30 we were on our way home!

Needless to say, there are no car seat checks here... (He will ride in one, I promise, just not the half of a kilometer it took to get back home.)

The best part of the day: meeting the new sibling!

First family story time with three kids... we'd been waiting nine months for this!

We are so thankful for our experience here, and although things looked a lot different on the outside, it's really not that different. We had excellent care, and as in most cases, the labor and delivery went smoothly, and when there was a little bit of trouble, there were resources to help. It sounds a little cliche, but it really is true... women do have babies everywhere. For me, the lesson was putting my trust in the Lord and his creation (Aaron and myself) and not into medical practice, buildings, or culture.

It's a BOY!

2011-06-15T05:30:00.003-06:00

Heather had the baby on Sunday evening, 6:27 Kijabe time. Much to her (ok... our) surprise, it's a boy! After several hours, we chose the name Aaron Hudson for our little boy. He weighed 7 pounds and was 19.5 inches long. There is a lot to tell about the birth and related events. At some point Heather will probably have the time and energy to write about her thoughts and experience. I'll try to put mine down too, but for now, here are a few pictures!

Leaving Kijabe Hospital.

The very Happy BIG brother!

And big sister.

Showing the baby to the grandparents.

And about the name of the blog...

This is Africa

2011-06-07T22:08:00.003-06:00

Every so often we're reminded that we're in Africa. For example... last night I was sitting at the kitchen table and the lights started doing this every 10 seconds... for about 30 minutes!

When I got home from school this afternoon, Heather asked me to take care of a skink that was under a basket in the living room. I couldn't find it. Tonight I went for a run and when I came back in and closed the curtains, I found this guy.

I tried catching him, which would have made a really great youtube video - especially the part where I was standing on the couch tentatively reaching up to grab him and he leaped from the curtain onto me - but we'll just have to settle for this. It's still pretty hilarious... as close to a viral hit as I'm ever bound to come. He's outside now.

Clinging to... What?

2011-05-31T08:04:00.001-06:00

We're entering an interesting time here at RVA. I guess it's a yearly ritual - one of the quirks of living on a mission compound with a bunch of other people all in houses which aren't really their own. The last few weeks, the housing committee has been meeting to discuss who will live where next school-year. I (Jim) don't envy them. They try to be objective - to look at family size and need. They try to find the best fit for everybody. It's interesting - do you make a family move who's lived in the same house for several years but no longer needs all the space because some of their kids have graduated? Veterans of RVA have come to accept this: you can't expect to be in the same house for long.

Some people think that missionaries are 'good' Christians - I think this time of year is proof of our fallen nature. There is sometimes-intense speculation on who will get the new house that's being built on campus... probably even some with (gasp!) jealous hopes. People get possessive. I get possessive.

I think as far as having to move is concerned, we're pretty 'safe.' But still, I don't want to leave the house we've been in for the past 10 months. I don't want to leave behind our big yard, the upstairs playroom or the freshly painted walls. It's just now starting to feel like our home. (The panicky feeling I get when thinking about these things demonstrates just how attached to them I am.)

The other day I was feeling a little anxious about all this after hearing somebody on the committee talk about how tight next year looks for available housing. What if they ask us to move?

And then I felt strongly convicted about the whole thing. Why am I so attached to this stuff? What if I were that attached to the things that really matter?

My internal committee makes decisions about these things all the time: Morning quiet time gets eliminated so that I can sleep. Sleep gets pushed back to grade papers. Papers get shoved back by homesick wanderings through my 'social network'. Suddenly, I find time with God has been replaced by... Facebook?

What if I got that same panicky feeling when time with God was pushed out of my morning routine? What if I was as attached to thinking about the world like Christ as I am attached to this old house that's not even ours? What if my desire to know Him was as strong as my desire to know what's going on in the lives of people at home?

It's not as if I always make the wrong choice. Sometimes my actions really do fit with those of the authentic Christian I want to become. But not all the time - usually when it's comfortable. Wouldn't it be awesome to be emptied of our attachment to stuff and filled with full dependence on Him? I want to be that sort of Christian - clinging to Him.

Names (A Chapel Address)

2011-05-30T01:12:00.003-06:00

It's fun to be able to encourage and exhort students here at RVA. There are opportunities for it everywhere. Here's the script from a chapel service I spoke for last week. If any of you whose names I made fun of happen to read this... thanks for brightening our day, and sorry!
___________________________________________________________

We’ve been thinking about baby names a lot lately.

Heather’s getting anxious about choosing a name, but I can’t think of anything. It seems like a big deal. You can’t just rush into this kind of thing - You don’t want to mess it up!

Heather has a name she likes, but I don’t like the spelling.

You want to spell it so people say it right… you don’t want people to mess it up… you know the kind of name: Kyalo

But you don’t want to spell it stupidly either. I once had a student named Nathunn

What were those parents thinking?

'I don’t know, honey… don’t you think people will say Nay Than? I like more of an Uh sound… lets use a U… and what about an extra N… that’d be awesome. It really makes that unnnn stick. Nay thunnn.'

Maybe we should pick a name that really means something: I looked up some Biblical names and their meanings:

Hephzibah – My delight is in her. Kind of a nice girl name, right?

Or maybe you choose a name you really like and THEY don’t. I know a guy who changed his name to Purple Frog Rainbowstar. What if my child does that!?!

It’s really intimidating!

Sometimes names really DO mean something, but really, more often, the name means something because of what we DO. As a teacher, there’s a whole list of names that have been contaminated by some punk kid:

'Honey, How do you like the name Jacob?'

'Jake… uh Jacob… uh… ' And there’s this image of somebody DOING something or BEING someone. And I don’t like it!

There is one name most of us share: Christian.

Does that name have meaning? Look it up and you find: follower of Christ.

But I think like Hephzibah the real meaning comes by observing ‘Christian’ in action. I think a large part of the world hears the name ‘Christian’ and the meaning that comes to mind is nothing like ‘follower of Christ.’ I think it might be a whole lot more like our understanding of the word Pharisee.

One thing I really like about teaching at RVA is the conversations I don’t hear. I haven’t sent anybody to Mr. Reber (the principle) for calling me a ____. I haven’t had to stop any conversations about any activities from this past weekend that were illegal. But there’s a problem:

It seems to me like most of our ‘Christian’ life is a little bit like Clearplay. [A movie-editing program used here at RVA.] We take this movie and cut out all the junk… the foul language, the dirty pictures, the crude jokes… but the THEME is still the same!

To ‘be more Christian’ we stop using certain words, we dress a certain way. We stop telling dirty jokes… but the THEME is still the same!! We’re just clearplaying our pre-Christian life. We end up being a lot like those Pharisees that Mr. Hildebrand [our student pastor] talked about yesterday… with our 600 laws, our ‘cleansing’ rituals - all careful self-righteousness. In an effort to tone down our unsaved life we adhere to strict rules and end up with something that LOOKS and SOUNDS a lot different on the outside but at the core, we’re still the same old sinners.

Sure, becoming a Christian is so easy a caveman could do it! [Referencing Sunday's message.] But what about living the Christian… the Christ-following life?

"I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace." Ephesians 4:1-3

Completely humble? Every effort? That’s impossible! So how do we LIVE as CHRISTIANS?

You cannot live as a Christian!

"To this end I labor, struggling with all His energy, which so powerfully works in me." Colossians 1:29

"I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me." Galatians 2:20

We’ve got to drop the self-righteous façade… Clearplay doesn’t work! Cleaning up the rough edges still leaves us with the same sinful life, the same theme on the inside. Does my life look like CHRIST is living it? Christ who is within me? I’m afraid not. I think most of the time I’m just another Clear-played Christian – a ‘clean’ movie with a worldly theme. I’m praying that God will work within me to help me to live the life that looks RADICALLY different to the world. The Christ-like, Christ-following life.

Wow.

2011-05-25T13:16:00.004-06:00

In my post yesterday I referenced a specific type of sleeper that the Gerber brand makes that zips up instead of snaps. And how I REALLY wanted to get some, but it really DIDN'T matter. Well, after library duty tonight, Jim came in looking like Santa, laden down with three packages. There was a nice big one from my good friend, Nicole, who I left behind in Colorado. She and her husband, Chad, were a large part of our preparation before we came here to RVA. They were missionaries in Asia, and hope to head back one day. Nicole and Chad proved to be very wise, insightful, encouraging, and challenging as we navigated all the preparations required to bring us here to RVA. What a divine appointment the Lord gave to Nicole when they moved in just around the corner from us... I treasure the memories of the cold winter days that we spent curled up on each other's couches with our four children, talking about missions, motherhood, big changes, and our human inability to handle it all.

She mailed a package last month that was a long time coming. The treasures absolutely warmed my heart, as she had creatively thought of each and every one of us. But I have to tell you what I pulled out first. I ripped the tape from the customs inspection off the open end. I immediately saw the patterned print that I recognized from the Gerber brand. A colorful print of African animals. Joel had a few things with the same print. I thought "No way, that would be too good to be true." But the first thing I pulled out of that package was a newborn, Gerber, zip-up sleeper, just like I was longing for. It absolutely made my night!

The thing that is even more dear to me about this is that I remember so many conversations with Nicole about the Lord's provision for not only our needs, but for the desires of our hearts as well. I wrote this post after telling her about what He had done for our family over the course of October 2009. And she spoke of the Lord building up our faith in His provision so we would have that foundation when we came to Kenya. And honestly, I think of that important lesson she pointed out to me almost every week since we've been in Kenya. A few months later, I remembered telling her how it seemed too silly and materialistic, but I was thrilled that the Lord was providing a [free] white fridge to replace our old almond-colored one. Then all of my kitchen appliances would finally match. But she said "No-- God's created us to appreciate beauty, and He loves you and wants you to have that!"

And so it was just like having her here next to me, sitting across the bed from me, and I could hear her saying "Wanting something exactly right for your baby is okay... and God delights in providing not only for our needs, but for something we might long for. And look! He did it!" And that was the biggest gift for me tonight. A reminder of God's abundant, limitless love, that came through a dear friend who loves me so well.

Getting ready for baby

2011-05-24T14:57:00.002-06:00

Mother's Day, 2011

We made it! I am officially 37 weeks pregnant today, a milestone that always feels good when we arrive, because of the time that we didn't. We will get to meet this little one within the month! I've been busy getting things ready on the home front, trying to make the arrival of the baby as easy as possible, since we will still be in the middle of our third and final school term of the year. If we were back in Woodland Park, this would probably mean clipping coupons for newborn diapers and Papa Murphy's pizza, going to Munchkin Market to get some great deals on secondhand baby things that we might need, long weekly doctor appointments and getting ready for a short hospital stay away from Faith and Joel.

Things are a little bit different in Kenya. I've said many times lately that I've made up for the lack of "nesting" instinct during my first two pregnancies with this one. I think at least 75% of that has to do with necessity of preparation for the baby here!

One of the items that has proven most helpful for our family this year has been my sewing machine, that was at least 50% of one of our precious thirteen suitcases. I've been busy making simple things like swaddling blankets and burp cloths, that are easy enough to make here, and don't really justify the effort or cost of receiving from the states. I even made a 'Boppy' nursing pillow, which I'm really excited about having. I had to make some custom-sized sheets for our custom-sized Kenyan mini-crib that the baby will sleep in for the first couple months or so. I've also enjoyed making a few small quilts and other less-practical, more-crafty things, which keeps me busy when I'm feeling like I'm just sitting and waiting on the baby to come.

I've been stockpiling diapers and wipes on my trips into Nairobi for shopping. Newborn diapers are very difficult to find here, so we'll just start out with size one. Faith was in preemie diapers for a few months, and even Joel was for a few weeks, so I'm hoping this one can fill 'em up a little better, to cut down on laundry! We will primarily use cloth diapers, once we feel up to getting back into the swing of things with those. We've had a break for over a year from diapers! I imagine we are in for a bit of a shock again. Disposable wipes are also very expensive here, so I'm working on a few options for using cloth wipes. We brought along most of our cloth diapers, so we have what we need, but there is an awesome diaper grant program for missionaries here that provides for many missionary families throughout the world.

One of the more challenging differences that I am anticipating is the lack of "fast" food here. I don't really mean McDonald's, but just the lack of convenience foods/locations/hours here. We can't run to the store after supper to get some more lunchmeat for quick sandwiches, or grab some soup from Safeway or a frozen pizza from Walmart. Yes, we will have wonderful help in the form of meals from others on campus, but once we are on our own again, we're back to cooking from scratch day in and day out, and planning ahead for the day-long stock-up trips into Nairobi. I've been trying to freeze some meals and have easier things on hand (we can find a selection of more convenient things to eat in Nairobi, thankfully) but really, convenience food after this baby is born is going to mean my stockpile of $6 boxes of granola cereal! Pictured is my first attempt at making a (giant) batch of granola bars, which are sitting in the freezer, waiting for me to go into labor.

photo credit

I was telling Jim the other day how all I wanted was to go to Walmart or Target and get this certain kind of Gerber sleeper that we had with Joel that I just loved (they had zippers... so much easier than snaps!) and then I could come back here, and I'd be happy. Once I snapped out of my daydream, I realized that if we were in the states, I really wouldn't care about that at all, and I wouldn't do it. What's the next best thing in Kenya? Or maybe the tenth best thing... Toi Market. 'Toi' is a large outdoor clothing market in Nairobi, with stall after stall of used clothes and shoes. This first picture is just the outskirts of it. It's really one big crowded maze that makes you think you should be in the Amazing Race. The roofs are just tarps, the stalls made from lumber, and you are constantly trying to watch where you step (it's just muddy ground below), look for what you need, hold on to your money tightly, and tell the vendors hounding you that 'no thanks, I really don't need any more maternity clothes'. If we were to need anything for our family to wear, we would certainly be able to find it here. Maybe not in the right brand or color, but we could keep ourselves clothed quite nicely. I purchased four more baby sleepers for about $6 total. It can be rather warm inside, and it's certainly more tiring and more of an ordeal than shopping online or waltzing in and out of Walmart, but for what is available, it's more than sufficient.

photo credit

We plan on welcoming our newest creation just down the hill at Kijabe Hospital. This will allow me to labor at home as long as possible, take a last-minute ride down the bumpy road to the hospital, welcome our baby, and as long as everyone seems healthy, return home a few hours later. There will be no routine IV's, no poking or prodding of the baby, no extensive monitoring, no waking the baby every so often, and nothing that the natural process doesn't really warrant. Maybe I sound a little like the natural birth movement that is hitting pockets of young moms in America and has been for a while...

There will also be bugs on the ceiling and spiders in the corners, I may end up laboring in the ward with eight of my closest Kenyan friends, or maybe I'll be pushing out the baby alongside another in the delivery room without a door, on the narrow flat bed that doesn't do anything fancy. There are no epidurals to choose to have or not to have, and there is no heat or air conditioning. Most likely there will be power, but last Tuesday it was out all afternoon. There's one bathroom down the hall for everyone, and I've gotten the impression that I'll probably rather just wait to shower until I get back home. Our hospital bag isn't just filled with things for 'mother's comfort', it's filled with towels and blankets, and diapers, and anything and everything we'll need for that day or night that the baby arrives.

That being said, we are excited for this delivery, and the part that makes the above paragraph bearable, and maybe almost not noticeable, is the care that we will receive. I will be attended by a good friend and a talented nurse, along with the skilled doctor or midwife that greets us in the delivery room (that part is unable to be planned, but whoever it will be is very skilled and able), and there are a handful of missionary pediatricians around that will be on call, day or night, to care for the baby that has been wonderfully knit together in my body over the last eight months.

Above all, we trust in the God who led us here to Kenya, allowed us to create this life, and designed the amazing feat of childbirth, and we eagerly anticipate the unveiling of his awesome plan and faithfulness in the arrival of our third child, just as He did with the arrivals of Faith and Joel.

The Coconuts

2011-05-23T11:28:00.001-06:00

(Quite) A while back, we celebrated Faith's birthday. She turned 6. I can't believe how fast the past 6 years have flown by! On the day of her birthday, we were at the coast near Mombasa. A few months ago, Faith saw people drinking from 'young' coconuts through a straw at a travel fair in Nairobi. She really wanted to try it when we got to the coast and on her birthday, we agreed to let her.

Mombasa was hot and REALLY humid. This picture is of a guy climbing the palm tree to cut down some coconuts for us. It also shows what happens when a camera lens goes from an air-conditioned room to the hot, sticky air outside. (This picture was taken early on a bright, sunny morning!) The coconuts were put in the refrigerator to chill until afternoon Chai.

Joel Was the first to try it.

It didn't really live up to Faith's expectations either!

The 'meat' inside was much better!

We stayed in a house about 15 minutes' walk from the beach, and when the house-help found out that it was Faith's birthday, they decorated for her. Faith was pretty excited when we got back from the beach and everything was ready for her party!

She asked for shrimp for her birthday. I'm not sure this is what she had in mind... but it was pretty good!

We topped it all off with a coconut cake that Heather made from scratch... in a toaster oven and iced in the air-conditioned bedroom where it stayed until its big moment. Have I ever mentioned that my wife is awesome?

Through A Child's Eyes

2011-05-10T12:50:00.000-06:00

If you ever want a really interesting take on life, hand your younger kids a camera and then see what they find beautiful. Several weeks ago, ours (age 4 and 6) ran around with a camera one afternoon. The pictures struck me at the time as beautiful and different. I ran across them again, so here they are in photo-essay form. These are some of the ones that were in focus. Enjoy!

Even trash can be beautiful!

A Joel-high perspective of our home.

Joel's Foot and a Daisy.

Our watering can.

Self-portrait by Faith.

Helping People

2011-05-06T01:03:00.000-06:00

During the term break, I wrote a couple of posts about wrestling with poverty, the desire to help, and the plight of the poor. So many destitute people here have, as they see it, no way out. And much of the time, they're right. Unless somebody helps them somehow or takes compassion on them, they are powerless to change their situation.

Most Americans are incredibly wealthy. We, on a missionary salary, are incredibly wealthy. We have the potential to do great good - but the problem is overwhelmingly huge! So, as I've processed the last couple of weeks, trying to distill the actionable points from a complex set of experiences, I've got a couple:

The Power of Hope. In our relationship with Zack, it's been incredible to see the role hope plays in breaking the cycle of poverty - I think. While the jury is still out on whether Zack has been able to develop a long-term, sustainable means of supporting himself, a person's future is often written in their face. Zach's desperate, hopeless, tension was clear - even in this culture that discourages negative emotional displays of any kind. The relief of a way out was equally palpable.

I'm still unsure whether we did just the right thing to help Zack, but I think we did help - hopefully without developing an unhealthy dependence on 'wealthy' white missionaries.* Yesterday, Zack stopped by to chat. He's a new man. "I think it will work out, We will be ok," he says. The poor don't need a handout, they need a way out.

Our Need for Humility. Zack was making less than 100 dollars per month in a place we spend at least as much to eat as we did in the states. And yet he is able to raise over 60 dollars a month to feed twenty HIV families once a month. When feeding those HIV families, I saw families much poorer than Zach living in huts facing an incurable disease with JOY on their faces. Me? I get stuck thinking I'm over-worked, underpaid, under-recognized... I am blessed! I need to recognize my complaints for what they are: prideful self-entitlement. I need to respond to trials and disappointments in humility. But not only those! My successes and my blessings are not deserved - they require humility as well.

Our Burden. I am rich. Money and possessions - these are obvious, but we (the western church) are rich in other areas. Time, experiences, opportunities, knowledge; we have the best. Will I part with the wealth I have to serve the less-fortunate? To give all? Christ demands it, will I surrender it?

* I recently read the book "When Helping Hurts." The first few chapters are a very good and thought-provoking demonstration of the need for real help - not just handouts - and should be required reading for those thinking about helping the needy. A later chapter on short-term missions is also very good and thought provoking. If you're going on, or especially if you're organizing, a short-term missions trip, you need to read this chapter!

Spiritual Obscurity

2011-05-04T12:52:00.002-06:00

Lately I've felt like God wasn't speaking. Getting to Kenya brought with it huge changes in the way I pictured and thought about the world. It seemed just about every day, I (Jim) was growing in my relationship with Christ, being stretched by the things around me and a necessary dependence upon Him. Not that our dependence isn't necessary, it's just so often forgotten when we feel adequate.

I really felt that God was convicting me of one thing: When we came to Kenya, it took considerable surrender on my part. I knew I'd miss my family deeply. Woodland Park was comfortable. I liked my colleagues, my job, our home... Colorado was home. We were surrendering a lot. But in the back of my mind was a little number: Two years.

"This is for two years, then we'll see what God has for us." It was our default response to how long we'd be in Kenya. But was it true? I needed to let go of everything... not just for two years, but for life. I wrestled with myself, prayed, agonized and finally felt that I could honestly say, "I surrender!" I expected things to really start moving then. I knew I was on the edge of some breakthrough spiritually - I could feel it; I expected it.

Silence. I never before felt quite that isolated despite efforts to keep growing in my faith. For months. God should have been speaking to me. I was trying my best to be faithful. What about His end of the bargain?

On Sunday afternoon, I had a few moments of down time, so I grabbed my Bible and went outside for some peace and quite. As I was taking my Bible off the bookshelf, I noticed 'My Utmost for His Highest.' I read through it some time ago as a devotional, and I brought it to Kenya. I haven't been using it, but something made me pick it up.

I turned to the entry for May 1st and read.

"For a time we are conscious of God's attentions, then, when God begins to use us in His enterprises, we take on a pathetic look and talk of the trials and difficulties, and all the time God is trying to make us do our duty as obscure people. None of us would be obscure spiritually if we could help it."

I was craving attention. I wanted to be recognized. I wanted to do something big to serve God, yes, but also to feel that I was important, somebody.

I thought for a little bit. "None of use would be obscure spiritually if we could help it." I put the iPod on. I'd put the entire music library - new songs, songs from before college, kids songs, audiobooks - on random shuffle the day before. The first song was an old hymn sung by Caedmon's Call "I Boast No More." You can try listening here.

No more, my God, I boast no more
Of all the duties I have done;

I quit the hopes I held before,

To trust the merits of thy Son.

Now, for the love I bear his name,

What was my gain I count my loss;

My former pride I call my shame,

And nail my glory to his cross.

Yes, and I must and will esteem

All things but loss for Jesus' sake:

O may my soul be found in him,

And of his righteousness partake!

The best obedience of my hands

Dares not appear before thy throne;

But faith can answer thy demands

By pleading what my Lord has done.

Suddenly, after exasperating silence, it seemed as if God was getting out a big stick and beating truth into my head. I need humility.

I wonder if God is celebrating the death of Bin Laden.

2011-05-02T07:57:00.001-06:00

When I got up this morning, I saw the news that Obama was going to hold an evening press conference. As details began to emerge, it was interesting to watch the initial euphoria grow. This was a big deal! But then it all began to leave a bitter taste in my mouth.

At the risk of sounding like a flaming liberal and making people mad, I don't think we should be glad that Bin Laden was killed. Obviously, he was a bad man. Clearly he got what he deserved. But as a Christian, it stung to hear many friends cheer his death and read facebook status updates celebrating the fact that somebody had died and was going to hell.

I don't think God's celebrating. I think he's deeply saddened. And I think we should be too. Saddened that Bin Laden burned with hate for God's people. Saddened that the decadence of the west fuels the thirst for radical jihad. Saddened that Christians are celebrating the death of an enemy, when death is exactly what WE deserve for our sin. Saddened that we've forgotten what Christ died for and what we celebrated just last week!

Yes, wars happen. Yes, I'm grateful for the men and women who sacrifice to protect our freedom - really - THANK YOU! I don't think pursuing bin Laden was wrong. The world might be a safer place without him. But let's not celebrate the ending of a life! Instead, let us recognize the depth of our fall and the penalty we deserve. Let's grieve with our Father for the lost. Let's rejoice in Him for the hope we have. Let's tell somebody about Our Hope!

I pray the church will rise up as a church of forgiveness. That we will indeed love those who persecute us and pray for our enemies. (Matt. 5:44) If we cheer the death of our enemies, our faith is without love; Without love, our Christianity is just another empty religion.

"For I take no pleasure in the death of anyone, declares the Sovereign Lord. Repent and live!" Ezekiel 18:32; also see 1 Timothy 2:4; 2 Peter 3:9

The Starving Situation

2011-04-27T12:35:00.000-06:00

Anybody who's read the blog lately probably senses a recent theme: my (Jim's) struggle to wrap my mind around poverty. One comment on the last blog post said something about me (Jim) really 'getting it.' It's not really like that. God has to beat things into my brain in order to get me to actually think about them quasi-spiritually. It's not as if I visit the vegetable market and suddenly feel convicted about poverty and privilege. Actually, most of the stories are much more shocking and they've taken nine months to sink in.

Zack Distributing Maize

Several months ago, we began partnering with a Kenyan national on an HIV project feeding women and families who are HIV positive once per month. You may recognize hearing about him in this earlier post. A couple of months ago, Zack showed up at our door and said, "I have a domestic problem." The way he said it almost made me laugh. Then he explained that his wife was down at the hospital. They had been expecting a baby, but began to fear something was wrong. The hospital ultrasound revealed no heartbeat. They'd lost the baby. I was embarrassed at my initial flippant attitude.

He quickly explained that surgery was necessary but they could not afford it. The bill was to be nearly 400 dollars. He asked us for a loan of the money. He was frantic.

I was concerned; Four hundred dollars is over half the average annual income of 730 US dollars... an income most probably inflated by a few incredibly wealthy individuals - the ones driving brand new Mercedes, Lexus, and Hummers through dirt streets. We paid about half the bill as a gift and the other half as a loan.

I felt totally conflicted. Were we helping? Was a loan fair?

I felt like an idiot. How much could Zack earn as a piki (motorcycle) driver? It wasn't even his piki. I couldn't imagine his profit was very much.

Things were fine until a few weeks later - only two days after our ride to the HIV project, actually. Zack dropped by to tell me more news. The owner of the piki had sold it and was starting a new business. Zack was unemployed. Shame and fear were written all over his face.

We left the next day for a trip to Mombasa. When we returned a week later, I received a text message from Zack, "Is there any way you can help. I want to avoid the starving situation."

A few days ago, Zack and I sat down to work out a loan to get him back in business. As we talked numbers and terms it became clear what his financial situation was. He had been making around $3.75 a day six days per week to feed, clothe and house himself and his wife. How long would it take to repay that $200 medical loan?

$3.75 Shocking.

Then I calculated his annual income: 1,211 dollars. Much BETTER than average. An income that had been 166 percent of average was now zero.

The food I eat for a SINGLE meal here in Kenya probably costs about $3.75, to say nothing of food, housing, clothing, etc...

I asked Zack how he'd cope with such a debt. "Maybe eat less. Maybe if you are taking meat with some meals, instead you take maize. If you are taking milk in your chai, you take the chai black. If it is only for a time, it is ok."

One unplanned emergency and he was stuck under a mountain of debt. Two and his situation was hopeless. This, a man with a better-than-average income. It's then I really began to grasp the true nature of poverty - it's a trap.

I still feel incredibly convicted on this subject and I STILL have no idea what to do. The sheer scale of my wealth is humbling. The much larger problem of poverty paralyzes my thoughts. How do we help?

"Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer; you shall cry, and he will say, ‘Here I am.’ If you take away the yoke from your midst, the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness, if you pour yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in the darkness and your gloom be as the noonday." Isaiah 58:9-10 ESV

Because We Are Very Poor

2011-04-22T23:17:00.002-06:00

Photo Credit: Hannah Sterling

I (Jim) just got back from a trip to the vegetable market where about eight women sit waiting for people to come buy vegetables. I'm told that you used to have to haggle over prices but now prices are all fixed - a very good thing for this mzungu who provides plenty of entertainment without clumsy bargaining. I don't do well when I visit the veggie market.

Apparently, and I found this out after the fact, the normal routine goes something like this: Each time you enter the building, you move in a counter-clockwise rotation, buying a small amount from each of the ladies until you've gotten everything you need. At that point, you are supposed to remember where you left off and begin at that point the next visit.

The first time I went to the veggie market, I traveled CLOCKWISE around the circle and, in typical Kenyan style, nobody wanted to tell me I'd messed up! In fact, it wasn't until the next visit, when I walked to my beginning point, that I even knew I'd ever messed up in the first place. There was some disagreement among the women about where I should begin and who I should be buying my vegetables from - finally, I was told, "You just go backwards again from this spot."

Backwards? I had no idea. From that point on, I have been the mzungu who does his shopping backwards and each time I enter the room, snickers and smirking smiles greet me. For months, I tried to scheme a way to switch directions while saving face, but it never worked.

Today, I'd forgotten where I last finished buying so, I told the veggie ladies, thinking they'd remember. Remarkably, they didn't. One of the ladies said, "You just buy something from each of us, because we are very poor." This was IT!! The golden opportunity - the chance to travel counterclockwise. I totally missed it. I'm STILL the one that does his shopping backwards. So, I bought something from each of them; I spent 30-50 shillings at each spot (40-60 cents) and went on my way.

The whole walk home, I thought about that woman's statement: "Because we are very poor." She wasn't kidding. After paying their suppliers, they probably each earned 10-12 cents doing business with me.

Photo Credit: Hannah Sterling

I (Jim) think most of us have heard the parable of the rich young ruler at some point in our lives - and I think most of us understand the basic lesson. Yes, it's difficult for the rich to put their trust in something other than material provisions - obviously. Now this may sound strange, but I don't think we (the church) understand this parable very well. I don't think most of us really understand what it means to give up everything. Somehow, Jesus' command to sell everything and give the money to the poor fails to register fully in our Western minds. If we sell everything and give the money to the poor, then WE will be POORER than them. Could I give away everything and become destitute save for my knowledge of Him? I can't even imagine living on less than $1.25 a day as approximately 50% of Sub-Saharan Africa does.

I am the rich young ruler.

In the states it was easy to deny - as a teacher with a family of four, we lived just above the "poverty line." Here, on a missionary salary, we are wealthy: Wealthy enough to have a change of clothes every day. Wealthy enough to buy more than maize.

Some say salvation is free - and theologically, they're absolutely right. But the truth is, following Christ costs us everything. We're still called (every one of us) to give up everything and follow Him. Matthew 13:44 "The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field." Can I really surrender everything?

When outsiders look at the church in America, many see hypocrites hiding a multitude of sins behind opulent church facades while much of the world suffers. And in some sense, they are right - we are wealthy. Like the rich young ruler, much of our trust and comfort is in our wealth. If God told me to give all my possessions to the poor, could I? The totally honest answer is, "I don't know." I'd like to, but really, could I? So then the assay: if I am unsure that I can abandon everything to trust and follow Christ, then am I trusting and following Christ? I think I'm typical of Western Christians and I'm afraid we may be spiritually bankrupt. Can we surrender everything? We need to.

Because we are very poor.

Sunrise

2011-04-22T03:00:00.000-06:00

Life at RVA is non-stop crazy. During the course of the term we don't really have much time to think so our second-term break was much-needed. We left RVA and all our cares behind and took a trip to the coast. It was hot, but a great time to be a family and to relax and think. On the way, we stopped for two nights in Tsavo West National Park and stayed at an older safari lodge with million dollar views, as many bugs and lizards and a whole lot of character. I (Jim) woke up to watch the sunrise the first morning and it was stunning. The bird songs were amazing, the view looked like something out of a magazine - fake almost - and I sat there thinking about how awesome our God is and snapping pictures. Then I realized that pictures alone did not come close to capturing the moment, so here's a video - turn up the volume and watch the sunrise

The video's short for a reason and it's not the ridiculously slow upload speed of an internet connection in the developing world. If the audio is turned up loud, at the end there's a little 'thump.' That was the sound of Joel falling out of his bed, knocking a glass off the bedside table to its glittery end. Needless to say, my morning reflection was over. I was left thinking it would be really nice to ACTUALLY leave everything behind. I've said it before: I'd really like to become a hermit, live in a cave, watch sunrises and think - nothing else. It's hard to balance all of it: Am I so busy working to 'fulfill my calling' that I neglect to listen to the one who called me to that work? Or am I so busy trying to listen to God and discern my calling that I fail to actually DO any work? Too often I think I'm stuck at one extreme or the other, absorbed by doing or paralyzed by lack of direction.

HIV 2

2011-04-07T08:12:00.005-06:00

Our last visit was to a woman Zack calls Grandma Ann. Grandma Ann has a very different experience with HIV. She is very old - I'm not sure how old - and is taking care of her five grandchildren. In Kenyan culture, kids provide for their parents financially after they've grown old. There is nothing like saving for retirement. Grandma Ann's son and wife died of AIDS leaving behind 5 orphan children. Now Grandma Ann is trying to provide for them.

As we ride down dusty trails we finally reach Grandma Ann's house. I'm shocked - even by Kenyan standards, this place is run-down. Zack tells me, "When I first met her, I was scared - 5 kids and a woman in that house!" The pit toilet has sheets for walls, the house is cobbled together with old pieces of tin and other scraps of sheet metal gleaned from who-knows-where. Five kids and an elderly woman living in a house measuring maybe 10 feet by twelve feet. Poverty. This wasn't the way it was supposed to be; it's certainly not what Grandma Ann had planned: alone, nobody to support her, five extra mouths to feed...

Grandma Ann isn't home, but looking at her house, I'm reminded of my own wealth. In the states we were 'poor.' We received government aid: help with food, heating... It was easy for us to say how shameful it was that teachers were paid so poorly. Really, we're wealthy. We own a house house, we have health care, our kids have the opportunity for a complete education. Our house has windows, a roof that doesn't leak, more rooms than people, a floor. Our kids have never known hunger. In one morning driving through desperate poverty, hunger, and squalor it's easy to see that we're filthy rich.

I'm reminded of Luke 12:48... Most of us know the watered-down, "From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be required." But taken in context, it's a scary parable. Really! Our Western world has exceedingly great wealth; we have more than plenty. Am I using it faithfully?

When I look at Grandma Ann's house, I am scared - 5 kids and a woman in that house! I want to help, but I'm paralyzed. How? The problem is huge; houses like this litter Kenya - a stable African country. What can we do? Pray that we can be faithfully serving him with our lives and resources.

HIV 1

2011-04-06T10:55:00.002-06:00

Today I (Jim) made a trip down to the valley floor to a town called Maai Mahiu. It's located just below Kijabe and serves as a truck stop on the highway to Nakuru and to Uganda beyond. For a while, we have been working with a Kenyan named Zack who is trying to find creative ways to help families struggling with HIV. Once a month, Zack collects funds to buy maize and beans to serve a meal for around 20 families struggling with HIV. On our trip today, I was finally going to meet a handful of them. Today and tomorrow I will attempt to share some of my reflections on the experience.

The day began with a ride by piki (motorcycle) to the valley floor.. Most rides in Kenya are white-knuckle affairs as drivers negotiate crowds of people, sheep, goats, bicycles, cows, donkey carts and other diesel-belching vehicles. This ride had none of that - the road is far too rough for crowds in transit - but was still a white-knuckle affair as we raced down a pretty gnarly 4WD road to the valley floor, on a cheap Chinese road bike, me trying desperately to land on the seat instead of the metal luggage rack but still glad enough of sticking a landing on the metal rack after the largest bumps. The ride took 15 minutes which, in hindsight, is scary.

Once in Maai Mahiu (which has all the charm of a truck-stop - Kenyan style) we bought 45 kilograms of maize and hired another piki to deliver it about a mile out of town where Zack had arranged to meet 5 of the twenty HIV positive women he helps on a regular basis.

We are enthusiastically greeted by a woman named Nelly who invites us into her home. We sit in the wooden shack on wrought-iron 'couches' waiting for the others to arrive - me puzzling over the antique hutch sitting against one wall obviously imported from Europe during the days of British Colonialization, them speaking in Swahili and Kikuyu. I'm wondering what it will be like to meet these women; then wondering what it would be like to be diagnosed HIV positive and wonder how long you'll be able to hang on.

My thoughts turn to a more personal vein: Will they serve me chai? Will it be boiled? Should I drink it? I don't want another stomach bug. These 'couches' are really painful. I'm not sure which is better: the piki rack or the couch? How in the world did that hutch find its way HERE?

There was no chai. All five women (Nelly, Leah, Mary, Jane, and Shiroh) were very grateful for the maize - a few days worth. I was surprised by something:

I expected to see women who were the victims of poor choices, but I think the notion that it was going to be THEIR poor choice tainted my expectations. I expected younger women who were never able to establish themselves before their lives were altered drastically by the consequences of a single bad decision. Perhaps one of them fit that mold, maybe two. But the thing that surprised me most was that three were older women; wrinkled skin, stooped shoulders, toes splayed, even signs of grey hair which, for Kenyans, indicates someone much older than me. These women already had families, probably several kids and most likely, they are suffering from a husband's poor choice. It's probably not their fault.

The visit ends on a tense note. These women visit the hospital every Friday for Anti-Retro-Virals (ARVs). These medications can temporarily slow or prevent the progression of HIV to AIDS. Rumor has it, the hospital has had problems obtaining the weekly ration of ARVs. Questions show plainly on their faces. The fear is palpable. When life is such a tenuous thread...

My mind is full of questions: How do we bring these women hope? What about the kids? Their future? How do you help them? What if it were me? Would I be so joyful? What kind of a god allows these things to happen? If that were me, would I have faith?

Flexibility

2011-04-03T02:26:00.000-06:00

A month ago, we celebrated Joel's fourth birthday. The birthdays seem to come faster and faster each year. Although somehow, knowing that we are on the brink of doing this all over again makes the birthday season (Faith's is coming up in about a week) seem a little less bittersweet this time around. Most of the time I am thankful that Faith and Joel are learning more and becoming more independent every day. It will certainly make caring for a newborn at the same time a little easier!

This year, Joel's birthday reminded me of more than just how blessed I am to be his mom, and how thankful I am for a happy, healthy little boy to love. It reminded me of some important lessons I've learned along the way, both in mothering, and in missions.

One of the phrases that we heard quite often during our season of preparing to move to Kenya was "be flexible". And I would agree, it is quite an asset to being a missionary if you can 'go with the flow' and 'roll with the punches'. Between daily life with a whole different set of amenities than our home country, and the complexities of cross-cultural communication, life sure can be interesting here. However, I believe my flexibility training began when I became a mom. And some days here, there's a blur between the mothering hiccups and the cultural ones. Joel's birthday was a good example of that.

Joel and Faith both woke up excited for the day, ate some breakfast, and Joel got to open a few presents while Skyping with some family, since the time zones aligned well. Only in Kenya will they be spoiled with such instant gratification! Jim went off to school at 7:30, and we sent Faith off to start her school day at 8. Joel and I proceeded to enjoy our morning together. We read some books, looked at a few of his new treasures, talked, and laughed. Around 9, we ventured into the kitchen to start his birthday cake. I borrowed a new recipe from a friend for a milk-less, egg-less cake, because her family was joining us for the birthday dinner, and their son is severely allergic to both of those ingredients. So with a little prayer that it would turn out well, we popped the cake into the oven, timing it so it would be done a few minutes before we would head up to Tuesday morning playgroup. Joel was pretty excited to get to see so many friends on his birthday.

At 9:50, I opened the oven to pulled out what I hoped would be a perfect cake, to find the oven mildy warm, and the cake rather unbaked. Sigh. Our gas bomb had run out. To use our stove, we have a 13 kg tank that hooks up to the oven. There aren't any gas lines here with a seemingly unlimited supply of fuel, like the states. And the gas always runs out when it's least convenient. Most of the time it is a Sunday, when you don't have a spare tank, and everything is closed. So then you run over to the neighbor's with half-cooked whatever, hoping they aren't in the same predicament. Well, this wasn't too bad, I had an extra bomb in our laundry room. So I laughed, looked at Hannah, our inside helper, and asked her if she knew how to change it. She looked at me with wide eyes and shook her head. School being in session, I wasn't sure right away who to call. Jim was in class, as were all our neighbors. It was just a few minutes before staff chai time (a daily meeting) so I quickly called the husband of the family joining us for supper, as he teaches later on in the morning. His wife and kids already on their way up to playgroup. So he ran over, saved the day, and I left instructions with Hannah for taking the hopefully decent cake out of the oven, in the form of "I have no idea when it will be done..."

So Joel and I headed out the door, I, wondering if I would be making a replacement cake when I got home. Just behind our house is the elementary school, and we were headed to a home on the other side. It was just recess time for the Titchie students, so I expected to catch a glimpse of Faith playing with her friends, which is always fun. Instead, I immediately saw her coming right towards us, headed home. She was hanging her head, she was nearly doubled over, and as soon as she was within earshot, she started bawling. Tummy ache.

Turn around. Go home. Give her a banana, half a tums, and some water. Go back to the school. Talk with the teacher. Decide to keep her with me to see if the food helps, or if it's something worse. Get to playgroup 30 minutes late, after carrying sick daughter up the hill and dragging Joel along behind.

Phew. Joel is happily oblivious, tells everyone that he is four, and runs right over to the sand box. Faith doesn't seem to improve, so I take her home, leaving Joel to play. I carried her back down to our house, put her in bed, got her some sprite and a puke bucket, tell Hannah I have to run back to get Joel, hoping for the best while I am gone.

I am completely exhausted after climbing the hill (yet again) to get Joel. Two hours earlier, I was thinking it was going to be such a relaxed, blissful day with my sweet four-year-old! We get home, to find Faith had been sick, and Hannah sitting with her, rubbing her back.

Sometime, during all of this, Hannah had babysat the baking cake, removing it from the oven at the perfect time. And browned all my meat and onions for the sloppy joe birthday dinner. Have I told you how thankful we are for her? She is a wonderful second set of hands, she loves Faith and Joel, and she makes living in Kenya just a little easier on us.

I get Faith settled again, Joel's off playing, and now it's time to start thinking about lunch. And birthday dinner for that matter.

Amazingly, by the time Jim got home for lunch, Faith had perked up some and joined us.

I started to put together the sloppy joes, but realized I needed tomato sauce. I called a friend, asking if she had some in the pantry, and she said no, but her worker was going to the dukas (local shops) and she'd add it to her list. Well, funny thing. Kenya has their version of ketchup, and it's called Peptang. We know of one American who likes the stuff. (Autumn, that's you.) Well, turns out, it says "tomato sauce" on the bottle. So that's what showed up on my counter that afternoon. Obviously, that's exactly what was on the grocery list, it just wasn't in my still-longing-for-Safeway mind. It is neither tomato sauce like the nice little 8 oz cans of Hunts, nor is it ketchup. It will probably sit in the cupboard for the next 18 months, until we bring it back for you, Autumn.

So, I put in a few cups of diced tomatoes. Close enough.

On goes the day. I'm a little more tired than I bargained for, but Faith doesn't seem to need a trip to the hospital, so things are looking up. Turns out Joel was a little more tired than I bargained for as well. Right before supper, he gave his sister a good swat, which, even if it's your birthday, gets returned with some discipline around here. Then there was a repeat performance when his friend succeeded in blowing out the birthday candles before Joel did. That made for a memorable birthday video!

Finally the kids are in bed, the wrapping paper cleaned up, presents put away to be enjoyed in the morning, company gone, and the house is quiet. Jim decides to tackle a few dishes before we crash into bed for the night. He walks into the kitchen and... the power goes out. We laugh. And go to bed.

A long time

2011-04-01T23:12:00.001-06:00

It's been a long time since anything was posted here... over a month, in fact. I (Jim) guess it's fitting that the last two posts were about being incredibly busy and the struggle to find time for things that should be priorities. We're a week into our break now and we've had some time to breathe, refresh and get caught up on sleep. Heather's still busy growing a baby, but all I have to do right now is think - a luxury that will probably get me in trouble at some point during the break.

Here at RVA it's feast or famine as far as quiet, unscheduled time is concerned. The last three months were one contiguous struggle not to 'drop the ball' or a ball or... suffice it to say that there were enough balls in the air at one time that no amount of juggling could have prevented at least a couple of drops. Now the calendar is virtually empty for the next three weeks. To add to that, we've had some rain lately. It's provided a very tangible relief from the dusty, brown, drab monotony that the last couple of months had become and everything feels like spring which, for the first time, matches the feelings of everybody at home. Hopefully in the next few weeks we'll be able to share some news; from reflections on the past term to our current thoughts and a looking forward to our immediate future.

Here's a picture from a walk on Thursday that basically captures my mood this 'season.'

Priorities

2011-02-28T12:03:00.000-07:00

So the last blog post talked about margins and trying to maintain a healthy balance in life here at RVA. I (Jim) was already feeling a little bit convicted about my time management or, more accurately, convicted about my priorities. Really, the things which consume my spare moments begin to consume the hours which consume my days, my weeks... my life. Safe to say, the things which consume my life at the moment are probably the things that an honest appraisal of my thoughts would reveal as my priorities. Not that this is a new lesson by any means but one I'm re-learning. It was this lesson my thoughts were focused on at the beginning of the week.

The other thing I never seem to learn is that when God is speaking, I should listen - because when I don't listen, He speaks the same thing over and over and over again until I begin to catch on. On Thursday, we had a chapel speaker who shared reflections on the political and spiritual situation in the Northern part of the continent. The content was fascinating, but the lesson which grabbed my full attention? I get one life.

Then, on Sunday, Brock Mathison shared with us the story of William Borden, which you should watch on youtube. He then spoke on Philippians 3:7-11

"But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead."

Whatever things were gain to me, I count as rubbish? So that I may gain Christ? Last week, it began with stress, feeling overwhelmed, having too much on our plates and ended with time to re-center, re-focus on priorities that really matter: Serving kids at RVA? Certainly. My family? Absolutely.

'I count ALL things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.'

Serving kids at RVA a loss? Apparently. My family? I guess so; compared to Christ. It's easy to say, but the real priorities, those that consume my days, my weeks, my life? They speak otherwise! I can not Gain Christ so He can be found on the margins of MY page, my ministry or my family. My priority must be: Gain Christ, and be found in Him.

I get ONE life.

Margins

2011-02-21T11:47:00.000-07:00

So... you may or may not have noticed that it's been nearly a month since anything new showed up on the blog. It's been a bit of a busy term so far. In addition to our commitments last term, I (Jim) signed up to coach Junior High Basketball, Heather's been covering a dorm one night a week, and feeling sick with pregnancy blehs, and... To make a long story short, we've been busy, I'm stressed, and it feels at times like we're just making it through each day, or (worse yet) not quite making it through each day - I ended up skipping almost two weeks of basketball, just trying to catch up - crashing and burning with guilt at the failure to be more perfect.

The other day, I read somewhere about creating 'margin' in your life. Being as frazzled as I've been lately, I have no clue where I read it; I couldn't immediately find it tonight and I'm doing well enough to be writing anything, so you'll just have to trust me. The gist of what the author was saying was that we get so overwhelmed and busy that we forget to focus in on things that really matter.

I didn't really have time to investigate further at that point, but I started thinking about it periodically - not usually as I should have thought about it, but more frequently alternating between the frustration of not being able to think of any particular Biblical passage that justified 'taking it easy' and wondering if 'margin' was just an excuse for laziness OR the feeling that RVA is a stinkin' hard place to work' stressful and unhealthy (explaining my highish blood-pressure reading during an AP Biology lab last week) and that God would OBVIOUSLY not approve. Neither perspective, I'm afraid, sheds a very flattering light on my maturity as a Christian or a missionary.

The last two days have included a couple of moments of 'margin' and valuable lessons for me. Yes, RVA is stressful. Yes, there are sometimes-unrealistic expectations for volunteering, for doing more, even self-righteous competition for sacrificing the most while sharing super-spiritual thoughts and a cheery attitude. But I was convicted of something: As 'margin' slipped away with an increasingly busy schedule, taking it easy did not. Instead, as 'margin' slipped away an outside observer would have first seen a truncated prayer time; followed by a rushed quiet-time and no prayer; followed by hitting the snooze button on the alarm, a longer day, less time with Heather, less time with the kids, a late night, climbing grumpily into bed...

It's as if each day I had a blank sheet of paper, and as more and more events were added to the page, the margin was reduced and eventually eliminated in order to fit everything in. Then the truly disturbing thought: The center of the sheet? My life? The things I've held sacred? Nothing but a to-do list! The margin? The stuff eliminated from my page for the things I gave priority? My relationship with Christ! While I had been pushing harder and harder to fit more in, I'd become blind to what was actually going on. This I have Biblical reference for: Not for taking it easy, but to "... fix your thoughts on Jesus, the apostle and high priest whom we confess. (Hebrews 3:1)" or to "Be still and know that I am God... (Psalm 46:10)" Now to re-center, refocus, pull Christ from the margins of life!

Climbing Mountains

2011-01-24T11:41:00.001-07:00

In the states, Heather and I used to love climbing mountains. She'll probably be upset with me, but for laughs, here's a picture from when we climbed Pikes Peak when we were dating... just before she left for Kenya for a semester abroad program.

Here we don't have as many peaks as Colorado, but there are two volcanos we can see from our front yard. At the very beginning of the term break, we climbed Mount Longonot. It was a welcome reprieve, and while it was nearly two months ago, pictures keep.

One obvious difference from the Rockies: seeing giraffes along the trail.

The hike up the outer rim of the crater was beautiful.

And for me, this view into the crater was a totally unique and beautiful mountain experience.

In the distance, we could see Lake Naivasha beyond a parasitic cinder cone.

After reaching the crater rim and enjoying a picnic lunch, we followed the ridge around to the peak.

Almost eight years older, we don't look so bad!

As we headed down the opposite rim, the fog rolled in.

The whole trip was a lot longer than we expected. I brought along a GPS; it read 22 kilometers - we didn't believe it, but looking on a map, we actually did make it that far. And just for a taste of amusing Kenyan culture - these made up the bulk of the litter near the top. Fuel for champions!!

Thanksgiving, Christmas and everything in between

2011-01-16T09:18:00.002-07:00

Well, we didn't exactly keep up with all of the last two months on the blog, so here's a massive photo post that I can't promise you'll stay awake through! Here goes nothing...

We shared Thanksgiving (which was the first day of our vacation) with four other families here on campus, two of which had extended family as well, so it was a wonderful time. Here's just the kids table!

After lunch, the kids all went outside to play, and even went sledding. Albeit with a suitcase lid on the green, grassy hill, but sledding all the same. Faith decided she liked this version best.

And Joel decided that no lid was even needed!

Faith was disappointed to be out of school for so long, so Jim concocted some science projects for her to do over the break. Here she is crafting the three different types of volcanoes out of play dough. Just after school ended, we had a four-day conference with all the Kenya AIM missionaries, held here at RVA. A church from the states came in to run a VBS-type program for the elementary students, which Faith absolutely loved. That helped take away some of the disappointment as well!

Once we had settled into the break a little more, Jim and I took off with some other staff members and climbed our local volcano, Mount Longonot. We have some beautiful pictures from that trip, but I decided to save them for the next post. So check back soon!

Soon after that, Jim took his infamous trip to Nakuru. Here's some proof he was there, and enjoyed himself. At least before that last night...

After Jim's trip, we headed off to the Mara as a family, and really enjoyed our time.

We returned for a week of Christmas festivities here on the mission station. But it didn't exactly feel like Christmas. It was really getting warm, so we had a little cookout that felt a little more like the Fourth of July!

All of first term, the Titchies collect an offering at Sunday school that will purchase hampers of food to distribute at Christmastime to local families. We took off on Christmas eve morning to the town of Mbau-ini, just up the hill a short drive's distance. This is where our inside helper, Hannah lives, and we had just visited her a few days previously, so it was fun for the kids to go back to the same place and know they were helping Hannah's neighbors.

Joel chose some of his matchbox cars to give to some little boys. It was funny, most of time time he didn't give them to the youngest boys, but chose some of the bigger kids! He had a good time giving them, and it filled our hearts with joy to see his generous attitude.

Faith brought a piece of candy for all the children we saw. We visited five families, and there were between four and eight children (or grandchildren) in each home.

What a blessing to hear each of the families praise God wholeheartedly, and to see the joy that a simple bag of food staples brought to each of them.

The last house was quite a hike, and some of the Kenyan children joined us along the way. Joel's hand (or foot) was held the entire time. It was so sweet.

We returned home, to our house of more-than-enough, and got ready to go down to a station family's Christmas open house. After the dinner, we went on down to the hospital and caroled in the wards for quite a while. Faith amazed us first by her willingness, and then by her desire, to shake hands with each and every patient in the hospital to wish them a Merry Christmas. What smiles it brought to so many patients, and for a little girl that has been hesitant to participate in the important cultural greeting of hand shaking, it was such a wonderful moment as parents to watch her heart almost visibly grow in love towards her Kenyan neighbors (and their customs!).

Then Christmas morning came, complete with stockings made from Kenyan kanga fabric,

And the branch of a cedar tree, stuck in a bucket of dirt, decorated sparsely with Kenyan ornaments.

The stockings contained treats I found in Nairobi, some colored chalk, post-it notes, kit-kat bars and chips ahoy cookies, and even some Turkish pop rock candy!

They each got a Kenyan present from us, Faith received beaded leather sandals, which were her shoe of choice for weeks to come...

Joel received a goat-skin drum. It is now his constant companion.

From the one package that arrived BEFORE Christmas, the kids enjoyed a coloring book and a veggie tales movie. Thanks Benjer and Jennifer!

We shared a noon meal with our good friends, the Mathisons, complete with turkey AND ham, green beans, stuffing, sweet potatoes, cranberries, and rolls. It was absolutely delicious. Eating like this costs significantly more here, but for our first Christmas away from home, it was completely worth it!

The Mathison's daughter, Gracie, is giving Faith plenty of big-sister practice lately, and Faith is doing wonderfully! After our big meal, we walked over to our house for the kids to play and to enjoy some pies.

Soon after New Year's, the packages began to arrive, much to our delight. Let's just say we've had a few Christmases again!

Two of the single gals here at the school came over for a New Years Day dinner, and the kids' "second Christmas". The tree was still up so we did stockings and the works all over again, it was so much fun!

Skype is a wonderful thing. Grandma and Grandpa were able to watch "Christmas, part 2" that took place after the New Year's dinner with the contents of their box of gifts.

The holidays sure were different around here, but it was a delight to watch our children make wonderful memories just the same, and have experiences that they wouldn't have anywhere else. I am grateful for the developing character that God is molding in each one of us during the ups and downs of learning to live here in Kenya as a family. And hey, we survived our first holiday season away from "it all". Phew.

Marks of Glory

2011-01-10T20:44:00.000-07:00

I (Jim) was reading an excerpt of Thomas R. Kelly's "A Testament of Devotion" last night and ran across this quote:

"Marks of glory are upon all things and the marks are cruciform and blood-stained. And one sighs, like the convinced Thomas, 'My Lord and my God.' Dare one lift one's eyes and look? Nay, whither can one look and not see Him? For field and stream and teeming streets are full of Him. Yet as Moses knew, no man can look on God and live - live as his old self. Death comes, blessed death, death of one's alienating will. And one knows what Paul meant when he wrote, 'The life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God.' (Gal. 2:20)"

I've lately felt reminders to enter in or re-enter that new life or at least to seek out 'my Lord and my God' everywhere. This season, I've felt called to look on His face. Field and stream are full of Him but so are the teeming streets, the hungry masses seeking life. I will seek Him there. So often my searching is crowded into cursory glances for His grace as I rush to the next task or engagement; my vision is dimmed by the bright glare of Facebook statuses, my hearing dulled by the incessant noise of my own prideful thoughts, my judgement clouded by fantasies of my intellect.

"It is the drama of the lost sheep wandering in the wilderness, restless and lonely, feebly searching, while over the hills comes the wiser Shepherd. For His is a shepherd's heart, and He is restless until He holds His sheep in His arms."

Come and Listen...

2011-01-09T06:21:00.001-07:00

Wow! Can't believe we're already one week into our second term. We had a wonderful break - there's so much to recount from it, so many lessons learned, so many examples of God's provision - but here are some thoughts I (Jim) had on a little camping trip I took with a handful of colleagues here at RVA in the Aberdare Mountains about an hour and a half from here. It wasn't what I had in mind when I came to Kenya. If you squint, our camp could be sitting in an open meadow on a rainy day in some sage-brush flat in Colorado.

Walk over the next ridge, and you're suddenly fishing in some rain-soaked bamboo forest - not much like Colorado, but there I was wading around in Chacos pulling Rainbow Trout out of a stream on a gold-ribbed hare's ear.

And these, I think mom and dad would agree, look more than a little bit like those little 'straw-flowers' we would see in the Colorado high country.

And if you squint, just a little, this bushbuck is a reasonable facsimile of a skinny little Mule Deer in summer coat.

And when the skies cleared briefly one afternoon, the sky was almost Colorado blue.

But it was encounters like these that provided clear evidence that I wasn't back at home wandering old haunts chasing fish up and down the stream.

The place was THICK with brush and the only trails were slick, muddy ditches deeply pocked with the tracks of Cape Buffalo and Elephants. Obviously, the specter of rounding some bend in the trail and meeting face to face with one or the other gave this fishing trip a distinctly un-Coloradan feel. But something kept coming up in my mind I'd read sometime back by either Richard Foster or Dallas Willard about imagining what it would have been like to sit at the water's edge and listen to Christ speak.

Somehow I forget that Jesus caught fish, cooked them over an open fire, and had real conversations with real people - real people like me. So between worrying about buffalo and trying to determine whether that track was left by a hyena or a leopard and if that made any difference, I tried to imagine what it might have been like to be Peter and Andrew sitting with their nets, or James and John with theirs. (Mark 1:16) What was it like? What was HE like? What compelled these men to leave their nets and follow Him?

"Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men."

What were they thinking? What am I thinking?

How did we get here, from Colorado? Am I fishing for men?

"Follow Me."

It's amazing how He brought us here. Am I still listening? When the Spirit leads, am I quick to listen? When a student is hurting, am I following Christ? When students irritate me to the core, do I follow The Man by the shore? When fellow missionaries are jealous, or rude, or angry, do I respond as one who follows Him should?

When we got home, I was doing the dishes and listening to the iPod. I've really been enjoying David Crowder Band's 'A Collision' and the first real song on the album is "Come and Listen."

Come and listen,

Come to the water's edge all you

Who know and fear the Lord.

Come and listen,

Come to the water's edge, all you

Who are thirsty, come.

Let me tell you what He

has done for me,

He has done for you,

He has done for us.

Life here at RVA is hard. It's stressful. The days are long, the demands on our time come from all corners and at all hours, but this term I'm praying that whether it's junior high basketball practice, the dry valley floor, or the kitchen sink I take moments to come to the water's edge, sit at His feet, and listen.

1 Peter 5:7

2011-01-02T15:48:00.005-07:00

As most of you know, I (Jim) was robbed in Nakuru a couple of weeks ago. Back in November, we had scheduled a safari at a travel fair; we were to depart only four days after the robbery. Dealing with the emotional end of my being robbed while on safari in a National Park was much more difficult for Heather, and Faith had actually picked up on quite a lot of the details. Because of that, we were pretty apprehensive about our trip to Maasai Mara, but God knows best. We were able to borrow a camera from some friends of ours, hired a driver with the Gonzalez family, and took off.

We stayed in a 'tented camp.' It was nothing like camping, except for the feel of being outdoors and listening to night sounds through cloth walls.

All our meals were buffet-style in a beautiful restaurant, with foods from all over the world. We had tasty deserts, the kids enjoyed rabbit and duck (Joel was especially excited) and, generally, felt like we weren't in Africa - salve for our homesick hearts.

It was expensive; it probably cost $100 per day (thanks, Mom and Dad!) but we needed the distraction, and the security.

The kids thrived on the independence, the pool, time with friends... They even posed with the creepy-looking maasai statue.

Game drives were a fun diversion.

There was plenty of time for reading, Heather had a massage and a pedicure.

It all felt very un-missionary-like to be pampered, comfortable, and relaxed. For a few days we were sitting in the lap of luxury, away from the stresses of life at RVA, and from the constant wariness: hiding possessions, watching for pick-pockets, wondering about bribes and government corruption, looking at window-bars, tightly grasping our kids' hands.

In college I heard a quote: "You are a missionary or a mission field." I'm not sure who said it, some evangelist at an Urbana conference, I think. At first it excited me, then bothered me. In a later conversation, a friend said it shouldn't bother me at all because EVERY Christian SHOULD be BOTH a missionary and a mission field - it's when we spend most of our time as only a missionary or only a mission field that we run into problems.

'Cast your anxiety on Him for he cares for you'
1 Peter 5:7

God is incredibly good. We felt so blessed by our week away. The timing and the activities of our safari trip were the perfect antidote for our anxiety and worry and through it, God really gave our family comfort and boldness. Faith was first very scared about the idea of going on safari because that was where I was robbed, but now she wants to go to Nakuru and stay in the SAME PLACE with her Grandmom who arrives next month. I even bought a rungu stick our last day in the Mara - just like the ones that glowered over me in Nakuru - as a memento and souvenir of the moment.

Maasai Mara Safari

2011-01-02T05:04:00.001-07:00

Just before Christmas, we went on a family safari to the Maasai Mara National Game Reserve about four hours from here on the border of Tanzania and Serengeti National Park. We had a wonderful time! Everything about the trip was a real God-send (more about that next post). Here are some of the views we saw on our game drives. A big thank-you to the Mathisons who loaned us their camera for the trip.

Faith looked like this most of the time - and her daddy felt like it.

Bare-Faced Go-Away-Bird

We saw some incredible scenery.

Black-Chested Snake-Eagle

Dik-Dik

You see these everywhere, but they're impossible to get a good picture of. They're always running away through the brush.

Baby Hippo whose mother made an appearance in our Christmas Card HERE which happens also to contain an exciting announcement that you might have missed. If you don't know what I'm talking about, I suggest you take a close look!

Leopard in low light in the early morning. Kind of a grainy photo, but here's the proof: we saw one! It was Heather's first, despite a semester of wildlife biology here in Kenya seven years ago.

We got some really great shots of lions.

Joel had a blast like his sister, but the pictures don't show it so well. Here, he just didn't want to look away from the elephants.

So... Which is your favorite?

2010-12-24T12:55:00.001-07:00

(click on photo card to enlarge)

Homesick

2010-12-22T05:30:00.001-07:00

Our family really enjoyed our safari to the Maasai Mara last week. Pictures will be posted soon, I think. We've just got a lot to share right now! This picture is just a teaser for a more extensive photoblog to follow.

I share it because it was on one of our evening game drives with this view that I suddenly felt like I was back at home, not so much because of the view itself which IS quite a bit like a western Colorado summer early evening, but more because of the way it felt. The cool air of evening replacing the heat of the day, the mingled smells of dust and animals; I've heard that memories are often most closely tied to scents. Smelling the moist, cool air rising up through the grass I was suddenly a kid again, sitting on a tractor in a hayfield at the end of a long day, thinking.

Most farmers are philosophers; Some are theologians. My Grandpa is both. Much of farming is sitting, watching, performing some simple task over and over again; it gives plenty of time to wonder and ponder. Most of my theology was reasoned out on a tractor, first as my Grandpa or Dad sat on the fender, teaching me to drive, then as I was driving on my own.

For a few minutes, I was alone with my thoughts on the Savannah contemplating man, his condition, MY condition.

It has been a while. I've been too busy, with too many things to take care of. But it's not busyness so much as the fact that everything is so removed from life and death. I'm on the computer doing research, writing, or Facebook. I'm reading a book or cleaning up the house; Everything is so far removed from the actual business of living.

I get stuck in ruts where I go days or weeks without thinking about my life, my death or my place in the world; stuck in a plastic, pen and paper, electrical, networking, virtual world. In our virtual worlds, we're big men: always in control, in charge, gods.

Looking across the Earth it's easy to see one man is no big thing. I needed to look out at this view, needed to smell the smells and feel my own smallness, to see the big picture. It's then I recognize my place and my need. I miss home. I want a 'real' Christmas with cold and snow and clear starry nights but in the scheme of things, thinking of eternity, home is much bigger.

Compassion

2010-12-21T08:00:00.002-07:00

Last week we went on safari with another family here at RVA. They have kids the same ages and gender as Faith and Joel. We booked the trip at a travel fair back in early November. The plan was to stay at a tented camp in the Maasai Mara Game Reserve. Given the events of my (Jim's) very first Safari, we were all a little bit apprehensive, but God really knew what we needed. The camp was beautiful. Even though the Mara is not fenced, we were several kilometers from the nearest entrance and village and the camp had its own security and intimidating electric fence. We felt safe. Not only that, but the 'tents' were really nice. A full bathroom, wood floors, king-sized bed for us, a bed for Faith and a crib for Joel (Which he loved). The buffet was full of good food from many different regions of the world. We felt pampered. There was time to read books, play with the kids and watch animals. It's been a while since we really relaxed like that.

I also had a lot of time to think, especially on the ride to and from the Mara where the road is so rough our driver chose to drive off-road because it really was smoother. Still, I think he tried to get as close to the 80 kilometer per hour speed limit as possible, which rendered any conversation impossible.

At the end of our time there, as we were checking out at the Reserve gate, the van was swarmed by the Maasai women (the Maasai Mamas) trying to sell trinkets. They are very persistent, and it can be quite intimidating for even an adult. As we were puling away, the other girl Faith's age said, "Those ladies were being mean!" To be fair, they kind of are, but it's the kind of meanness borne of desperation.

Faith then said something that I was really impressed by. She said, "They're not being mean, they're just poor. If nobody buys anything, they might not be able to eat." Perceptive, for a five year old. And it made me think.

The Maasai were traditionally nomadic cattle herders, warriors and raiders. Their houses were made of mud and sticks, surrounded by a fence of cut thornbrush where the livestock were kept at night. When grazing resources were exhausted, they'd move on and build a new house and fence. Today, as you drive through Maasai land, you see some of these compounds (called bomas) built in the traditional way, but most have added a tin roof. Some homes are made of concrete, some fences are now barbed wire with permanent posts. In all the bomas, there are signs the Maasai are no longer moving. Pasture is overgrazed; the cattle are thin. The Maasai, as a people, have been passed by. Poverty is everywhere.

Some, like the mamas, have turned to peddling trinkets. Others do traditional dances and songs to entertain tourists. Most are now herding goats and fat-tailed sheep which can survive on poor-quality browse much better than cattle, but even they look malnourished.

The sights on our drive are raw, heartbreaking. 'Poor' is on display. Some men stand along the road throwing dirt into potholes, hoping a grateful traveler will toss them a few shillings. Women and children carry muddy water from dammed-up culverts. A roadkill zebra with the legs hacked off - free dinner. Miles and miles of trees cut and burned to sell as charcoal - most of the trees have already been cut; what happens when they're gone? It's hard to know how to help.

We drove basically from here in Kijabe to the Tanzanian border and the whole way the picture was the same. It's almost revolting; I want, most of the time, to push them away. There's no way to help all of them.

Eventually, my thoughts returned to the thieves from the week before. I don't know much at all about them. They were obviously desperate. The blue flip-flop one of them lost in the kitchen was pretty old and worn.

"They're not being mean, they're just poor..."

The way Faith said it didn't sound like simple justification, more like compassion. I pray for the same thing - compassion.

Merry Christmas?

2010-12-20T10:57:00.000-07:00

I (Jim) have always loved the changing of the seasons. Having spent my entire life (until moving here) living within a couple of miles of the same latitude in Colorado, I've marked time by changes in seasons and by the ebb and flow of the day's length. Today I played flag football with some other teachers and station kids. It was hot; by the end we were all drenched in sweat. The sun still comes over the hill just before 7:00 and sets on the other side of the valley just before 7:00; none of that's really changed at all since we got here.

Christmas is only five days away, but it doesn't feel like it. I'm used to Christmas overload; last year Heather began putting up ornaments at the beginning of November!

Last week, we spent the last few days at Maasai Mara Game Reserve and the hotel there was just beginning to decorate for Christmas - just a few lights and streamers. We swam in the pool and like too many things, Christmas was out of sight, out of mind.

I used to not like the commercialization of Christmas. I still prefer to think of Christmas simply, but I think my attitude about all the extra stuff has changed a bit. Honestly, I could go for a few mall Santas, Elves selling lottery tickets, Black Friday shopping, Parades of lights, snow - All things that can distract, but right now all things that could go a long ways to remind me to remember: He came. Small Child. Empty Stable. Manger Bed. Fearful Parents. Lowly Shepherds. No lights or streamers, tinsel, bells, snow or gifts. Easy to miss. Maybe all the extra stuff isn't all that bad if it gives us cause to remember.

Nakuru Robbery

2010-12-14T08:35:00.000-07:00

We were thrown quite a curve ball last weekend. Jim went on an all-guys three day, two night trip a few hours away, while I stayed here at RVA with Faith and Joel. It's never a good thing when, on the third morning, another wife calls you and the first thing she says is "Everyone is okay, but..."

Here is Jim's careful recollection of the story.

__________________________________

A few weeks ago, I was invited on a photo safari to Nakuru National Park. I was really excited about going when I first heard about it and the details, as I began to learn them, made the trip sound sweeter and sweeter. To begin, I’d not yet seen ANY wild Kenyan mammals except Baboons, Colobus and Syke’s monkeys, and this park is the best place in Kenya to see Rhinoceros, Rothschild’s Giraffe and Leopard, in addition to many other animals. Not only that, but we were going to focus on taking pictures. I began to envision enlargement-quality wall-hangers. The deal was sweetened when I found out that one of the men from Rift Valley Academy had been planning this photo safari for quite some time with a couple of his friends from Canada who were professional wildlife photographers; we were getting to tag along for three days of their trip.

We planned to stay in a small guesthouse – an old farmhouse – on the park property. It was cheap, and we’d be ideally positioned for early morning and late evening game drives. When we got there late last Thursday afternoon we had a wonderful time. One of the first animals we spotted was a Black Rhino (critically endangered) after being inside the park for maybe twenty minutes. We got great photos. The next day was even better – over 20 white rhinos, another black rhino, 12 lions, hyena, flamingos… many, many animals. That second night, as we pulled into the farmhouse gate, we marveled at an enormous herd of Cape buffalo. They are Africa’s most temperamental and dangerous large mammals. I was grateful for the fence surrounding the farmhouse yard, and we were obviously careful to close the gate behind us!

After supper, I began deleting photos like mad, as I was running out of storage space for all these beautiful pictures. I was really picky and deleted everything I wouldn’t be willing to pay for an enlargement of; I ended up with about 600 pictures.

We went to bed at around 9:30, ready for a 5:30 early-morning photo-shoot for our last morning in the park. I carefully arranged the things I’d need in the morning around my bed so that I’d be ready to go when the time came. I hadn’t slept much at all the night before, and I was dead-tired. As always, morning came far too soon.

_______________________________

I awake to headlamps shining in my eyes. “Is it time for our drive?” I ask.

No reply. As I ask again, it hits me. The men with the headlamps are whispering in Swahili! There are three with headlamps, and I see movement elsewhere in the room – no telling exactly how many intruders there might be.

As if to make perfectly clear to me the situation and my position in it, the three lamps look at me. The knobby heads of three rungus, cocked and ready, appear in the glaring light just beyond my blue mosquito net. Not much protection there.

The rungu is a traditional Maasai warrior’s hunting or war club, usually just under two feet in length and carefully carved from dense acacia wood. With a narrow handle and a curve carved into it just before the business end – a rounded, heavy ball about the size of a doorknob – it is a crude but intimidating weapon.

I try to see more clearly. The rungu above my head flinches, threatening.

A harsh whisper. “Where is da money?”

I say the first thing that comes into my mind. “We don’t have any money!” I try to speak calmly, but hope to wake the others. There are three of us in the room – all teachers at RVA. Brian who’s been here in Kenya for 13 years, and John who’s been at RVA for 11 years. The words come out only as loud as normal conversation but edgy, emphatic. Too much? Too loud? Too soft?

On the opposite side of the room Brian wakes groggily. “Is it time to get up?”

One rungu remains above my head. Again I say the first thing that comes to mind.

“They’re going through our stuff!”

All three headlamps snap to attention. All three shine into my eyes. The other rungus reappear, hovering over my bed. Swahili whispers intensify. John is moving now. All eyes are on me for an instant. Brian lunges out of bed shouting.

“Thieves! Thieves!”

A mad rush for the door. Feet rushing in the darkness. They are all fleeing. John and I join in the chase. Brian pursues men out the back door. John and I follow a man through the living room and out the front door. He throws a pair of pants at us, probably to slow us down. Afraid of thorns, John and I return for our shoes before giving chase, but mine are gone; nothing is where I left it. John’s shoes are gone too. I find my sandals and rush out. The whole thing has taken only a few seconds.

The other four men in our group and two caretakers who were asleep in other rooms and outbuildings join in the search for thieves or things they have dropped. John’s pants are found by the front door, his cash and car keys still in them. Brian’s camera bag, passport and empty wallet are by the back door. The robbers are long gone, the gate wide open. After a quick search of the yard we return to the house. There we discover the refrigerator and gas canister are gone too. A couple of men venture down the road in a vehicle to search for the thieves, the rest of us begin to investigate.

_______________________________

Within a few minutes, a truckload of Kenya Wildlife Service Guards arrived, followed by another, then a couple more trucks loaded with Kenya police. Their response was amazing. We pieced together quite a bit of what must have happened.

At about 1:00 AM, the regular KWS night patrol woke the caretaker because the gate was open. The caretaker wasn’t sure why it is open, but they don’t immediately see anything of concern and don’t investigate further after closing the gate.

At about 3:00 AM, John woke and went to use the bathroom. He noticed that the security light outside the bathroom window was out. We later found the bulb, unscrewed and lying beneath a bush.

At around 3:45AM I was awakened and things got crazy.

We couldn’t figure out how they’d gotten into the house. The doors were wide open, but we were sure they’d been bolted from the inside before we went to bed. It took us quite a while to find where they’d used bolt-cutters to cut the window bars in the living room on the opposite side of the house. They had to cut in five places, and even then, it was a VERY skinny man who made it through to let his buddies in. We’re pretty sure they must have come for the refrigerator and gas canister. They had obviously started before 1:00 AM. That’s why the gate was open. After successfully removing those from the park through a hole they’d cut in the electric fence (the entire park is surrounded by one) over 600 yards from the farmhouse they were apparently emboldened to come back and take another look. After having a little picnic outside the gate with the contents of the refrigerator, they came in and began to rummage through our things.

I lost quite a bit of stuff: My passport, our camera set-up that was a wonderful gift from my parents (and sadly the beautiful photos I’d taken), my hiking boots, a cell phone, watch, pocketknife, and a good chunk of cash I had carefully hidden in three different places and had planned to use for a run to the butcher’s after our Safari. They found all of it. Thankfully, they removed my glasses from the camera bag before they absconded with it – also my GPS. I think the removal of the GPS must have been an accident.

The search for missing items was massive. Kenya Wildlife Service used a couple of sniffing dogs, and there were tons of officers on foot. When we noticed a small plane flying overhead just after dawn and asked about it, the head of KWS for Nakuru National Park replied, “We are trying to spot the refrigerator.”

A few items did turn up: a very expensive flash that John was borrowing, two tripod mounts, a bag of microwave popcorn, John’s glasses (found a hundred yards away from the farmhouse in waist-high grass), Brian’s swimming trunks and a pair of his dirty underwear.

Looking back a couple of things strike me:

God is Good:

So many things could have gone much worse. Suppose I had said something that translated from English more easily than, “They’re going through our stuff.” Suppose their attention hadn’t been mostly on me when Brian began his charge. Suppose the rungu, which gave Brian a nasty bruise on his hip, had actually found its mark. Suppose they had gone first into the professionals’ room next door, where well over 60,000 dollars of camera and computer equipment was. At our orientation school in Machakos we were told that waking during a robbery in progress is one of the most dangerous scenarios we might face. God’s hand in the words spoken and actions taken were almost immediately evident to us.

Kenyans Are Desperate For A Future:

Poverty is everywhere. These men probably live in one of Nakuru’s slums. They’ll probably sell the full-sized refrigerator/freezer for around 120 dollars, the half-full gas cylinder for 100. My 15 year-old watch for four or five. The camera and lenses for maybe ten dollars. Different priorities are found here. People are poor. We have really been blessed. These thieves felt they had nothing to lose. They were so desperate they cut through an electric fence to enter a game park – some of the most heavily patrolled areas in Kenya - walked through an area in which only a couple of hours earlier we had seen an enormous herd of buffalo bedding down for the night and in which we had that morning photographed 7 lions, in order to steal a refrigerator and some cooking fuel. People Need Hope. People need a Savior. (Jeremiah 29:11)

Comfort food

2010-12-13T08:31:00.000-07:00

There's a pretty heavy post coming your way soon, but in the meantime, here's something fun.

On lucky days in Nairobi, at the Nakumatt grocery store, we can find little tastes of home. Lately, I've been thrilled with the selection of Old El Paso cans of green chilies and enchilada sauces, and jars of hot sauce and salsa. We can also get jars of Ragu pasta sauce. All of these things and more come from the states. The prices also reflect the long journey.

Here are some other tastes of home... but surprisingly, they're not from home! The prices on these items also reflect the fact they are rather uncommon pantry items in this part of the world. So, we splurged a little to enjoy a taste of home over our holiday break. Here's what we found:

Pringles from Belgium

Soup mix from South Africa

Ritz crackers from Ireland or England

Pop Tarts, from England

Canned peaches from South Africa

Oreos from Saudi Arabia

The back of the box. Yep. We're not in Kansas anymore.

Tic Tacs from... where else? Ecuador.

So there you go... our globetrotting pantry that doesn't look too much different from the grocery stores we left 5 months ago!

DEFINITELY worth a read...

2010-12-10T11:08:00.003-07:00

WORLD magazine just named their Daniel of the Year, the Christian news magazine version of Time's Man of the Year. This year, it happens to be a doctor that has served here at Kijabe hospital since 1977. His youngest son is still here attending RVA, and his other six children graduated from RVA. The work he's done here is simply amazing. This article is definitely worth your time to read. Get a glimpse into the life of a long-term medical missionary in East Africa.

(We know it's been a while since an update or story on the blog. We are hoping to do some catch-up in the next few days. Thanks for your patience!)

Bird Banding

2010-11-21T06:52:00.000-07:00

The other day, we had an opportunity to band some birds. Here in Kenya, they use the queen's English which apparently dictates the term 'Bird Ringing,' but at any rate, some friends of ours here have been involved for quite some time with ecological studies of birds here in Kenya. Right now there are both local species and those which pass through on their migration from Europe and West Asia. I (Jim) have had a wonderful time chasing around birds in my spare time (not a lot) and it's fun to learn about how biology works here. I know. I'm a big nerd. Here are some pictures of our banding adventures. Maybe I'll post some more general photos of birds soon. This area is really a beautiful place! Above are some red-fronted parrots we saw as we were setting up the nets.

A female Baglafecht Weaver waiting in the net. They're the ones that build the crazy hanging nests in Acacia trees.

Cape Robin Chat in hand and a Rufous Sparrow waiting.

The kids getting an up-close and personal view of the action.

A Bronze Sunbird

Our friend Jeff taking some vital statistics.

A month of activity

2010-11-01T11:05:00.000-06:00

Here are some picture highlights from the last few weeks. There's been plenty to keep the students and teachers busy. Only three and a half week left to the end of term. We can't believe it!

Multicultural day is held on one of the Kenyan holidays. There are no classes, but RVA turns the day into a huge celebration of all the nations represented at the school. We got decked out in our red, white and blue. And who knew that kids dried tempera paints sufficed as face paint?! In the land of 'not-what-we're-used-to', I was pleased with my last-minute success.

A long assembly is held in the morning, where there are lots of songs, cultural presentations, and finally a flag presentation. The student who has been at RVA the longest from his or her home country gets the honor of carrying the flag. It was such an amazing celebration of the diversity that is found here. Next year, we'll make sure the camera batteries are fully charged!

Here's Joel enjoying our cheap calling rates to the states. Our phone carrier just lowered the rate from 10/= (shillings) to 3/= per minute. The ten shillings was a pretty good deal, but now it's about $0.04/minute.

The next weekend was pinewood derby and senior store. Senior store is a "restaurant" put on by the senior class to raise money for their 'Senior Safari' trip to the coast. This means fresh, homemade donuts, and yummy American-style lunch choices like pizza, hamburgers, taco salads, and hot dogs. Donuts can even be delivered Friday night to your home!

Students and staff alike work for weeks and weeks on their pinewood derby cars. Faith and Jim's is front and center... the spotted convertible! Jim did all the carving, which was beautiful, and Faith added her special touch with the painting. Once students are in 4th grade, they can work individually on their cars in the wood shop, but until then, many make cars with their parents.

Some go for speed and the hopes to be the fastest in their division, others focus on design and creativity. It was fun to see all the cars on display before they were raced.

The track is set up in the gym (the varsity girls basketball team even had to play on the outdoor court the afternoon before) and is quite elaborate. It races six cars at a time, has an electronic sensor that times and places the cars. We can sit right above the track in the stands and see all the action.

The cars are carefully lined up at the top and released.

As you can see from Joel, it's an all-day affair. The 4th grade races begin after breakfast, with the men's, women's, and 11th/12th grade races finishing up in the mid-afternoon. Joel was asleep by the time Faith's turn came!

There's even instant replay and a rapidly-updated spreadsheet projected for everyone to see. If you look closely, you can see that Faith and Jim had the fastest time for the men's division! There are many heats/semi-finals before the final six cars race their three championship races. It's a very thorough system!

Here's Jim and Faith watching their car race. While Jim didn't build the car for speed it did quite well. It was the fastest car overall for the men's division, but raced its slowest times in the championship, only making third place. But that's probably okay... we didn't want to get Faith's hopes too high for next year!

Here are the kiddos with the car and their trophy. Faith had a wonderful time with Jim working on the car. They made some great memories.

This past Saturday night was carnival. As a school, there is no acknowledgement of Halloween, similar to many Christian institutions. But, there always seems to be an excuse to dress up and eat candy! Joel was a very cute clown.

And Faith was a sweet ballerina. Here she is with her two big sisters, Sarah and Naomi. They occasionally take her for "coke dates" and other activities. All the titchies have a big brother or big sister. She had a fun time with them, even with mom and dad tagging along.

The carnival had many different games and activities, where the students could earn "dollars" which would later be "spent" on candy. This was the first activity the kids did. The idea was to do it against your big brother or sister, but Faith insisted on competing against Joel. They had to stay in the circle and get the flag of the other person's belt. Here they are sizing each other up.

They've never really competed like this before. We figured it could go well... or go badly. So we watched a little hesitantly...

They had a blast! They ran in circles with huge smiles on their faces, really trying to get the other's flag, but they didn't pull each other over, so that was good. They laughed so hard the whole time. In the end, Faith got Joel's flag, but it was a pretty fair match. Joel is still convinced he got his sister's first. So they're both happy with the outcome!

Joel loves apples so much (which are a treat here) he was very enthusiastic about bobbing for apples!

Faith tried her hardest to get a basket!

It's getting warmer, so the hair is getting shorter around here. Faith got her hair cut yesterday, Heather got hers cut today, and Joel's on the list for tomorrow!

So there you have it... now we're ready for November!

Under the Tree

2010-10-16T13:45:00.000-06:00

Right now we're in the middle of a week of spiritual emphasis here at RVA. The students have had chapel sessions every evening with a special speaker. I (Jim) have been a good staff-member and have attended all the sessions until tonight. I showed up, we had a great time of worship, and Tim (the speaker) began to share about grace and what an incredible gift we as Christians are given. I'd already been thinking about that all afternoon, and I was having a really hard time focusing - I'm really tired - and I felt like I just needed to leave. So I did. Snuck out the back door and headed for home. I happened to have the iPod with me, so I stuck the earphones in as I walked. I was listening to Jars of Clay - the first song was 'Frail.' Basically a song about grace.

I walked into our yard and felt the urge to lay down under the Jacaranda tree in the yard, still listening. The next song was 'Worlds Apart.' A prayer about grace. And suddenly there under the tree, I felt a bit like the rich young ruler in Luke 18:18 who was so secure in his possessions he could not bear to leave them and follow Christ. There I lay - in Kenya - a world away from Colorado, USA, but still a world away from really trusting my savior as I should.

I still worry about the future - and I shouldn't.

When I don't worry about the future, it's because I have confidence in our worldly possessions:
Enough money in the bank to fly the whole family anywhere in the world.
A house in our name in Woodland Park, CO.
A well-stocked pantry.

Edward, our yard worker, was ecstatic about Tuesday night's rain, because his garden would grow and his family would have food to eat - he says he doesn't worry about it, he just plants the garden, prays, and waits. My thought was that Edward has it easy - he's got NOTHING ELSE to trust in!

So tonight, as I lay under the tree watching the moon with an iPod Edward would have to work two months to buy, I felt lousy. Like the rich young ruler - wanting to trust HIM with all I am, but saddened because my 'possessions were great.' Then it hit me: How cheaply I view His Grace!! Then the lyrics through the headphones: "I look beyond the empty cross, Forgetting what my life has cost..." So I laid there and listened to the song again, and again - in the rain - and prayed. I still have a heaviness in my soul, but am feeling awed by His Grace. May we grow to trust Him more!

(The links above are youtube versions of the songs, should you wish to listen.)

2010-10-12T12:19:00.005-06:00

Midterm:

   Four trips to Nairobi in five days.
Two 7 am departures. (Moving to Africa did NOT make me a morning person.)
   FURNITURE PURCHASED.
   A street of fabric shops explored.
Meat market braved, tilapia and chicken purchased for two dollars a pound.

CRAZY TRAFFIC.

Immigration paperwork processed downtown.
Fingerprinted by the Kenyan government.

Family time at "the mall."

Milkshakes for two precious little ones.
And then ice cream for two precious little ones.
Groceries purchased. Nine bags of flour will get us through one more month.

Rest of birthday money gleefully spent at Kitengela glassblowers.

Hamburger and french fries savored.

FELLOWSHIP WITH FRIENDS.

...And now it's good to be back HOME.

It's midterm!

2010-10-10T03:51:00.000-06:00

Well, we made it through the first half of first term here at RVA. We are currently enjoying a 4-day break before the students return to campus Tuesday night. Wednesday marks the beginning of spiritual emphasis week, during which RVA brings in an outside speaker and the students attend sessions every evening, as well as some extended chapel times during the week.

So what has life been like here? We feel our pace of life has been about the same as our last year in Woodland Park when we kept up with teaching, MOPS ministry, and support raising. (As well as Faith and Joel!)

Jim heads off to school at 7:30, in time for classes to start at 7:45. Faith walks out the door at 7:53 and her class starts at 8, right behind our house. (She walks all by herself and is loving it!) Our helpers come at 8, by which time Joel is usually dressed and ready to start his day too. Three times a week, I (Heather) walk around the guard trail with a friend for thirty minutes for a little exercise. Joel sometimes tags along in the kid carrier. He's a good 25 pound pack for weight training! The other two days a week I watch one of Joel's friends for an hour or two while his mom teaches a class of Chemistry. Later in the morning, we have playgroup on Tuesday, preschool on Wednesday, I attend a bible study on Thursdays and there's storytime in the Titchie (elementary) library on Friday. When we can make it, Joel and I attend staff chai at 10:10 with Jim for thirty minutes. The staff prays together and shares announcements before returning to classes. The students also take a break at this time. Faith has recess and snack with the titchies, and the junior and senior high students have chai and snacks outside. After these activities, we wander on home, often chatting with other moms or staff who aren't teaching the next class period. Faith gets finished with school at 11:55, Jim at 12:10.

Here, we get to do something differently as a family. Something that happened only once in six years at Woodland Park. We eat lunch together! Hannah and Edward, our workers, leave at noon for their lunch, and we enjoy some moments together as a family. Next year, Faith will be back at school by 1, so it won't feel as leisurely next year, but we are sure enjoying it right now! This year, Jim has an open period right after lunch, so it makes for time together that isn't too rushed. Joel naps after lunch, but Faith is often busy as a bee, even if she is "resting." Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, we have Hannah and Edward in the afternoons, so at three o'clock, we share afternoon chai with them. The kids already cannot go a day without chai, and have been deemed "Kenyan." Hannah, Edward, and I often talk about culture, swahili, or the kids. It is nice to take a break with them, laugh a little, and learn a lot.

During the week, there are other things to keep up with as well. I keep up with the milk and eggs, and take a trip or two a week to the market and dukas here in town to get fruits, vegetables, and staples. It is a nice 15 minute (or less) walk outside the RVA gate. If I'm in a pinch, Hannah will also go to get things for me, but it is nice to get out a little bit every once in a while!

Jim gets home anywhere between 4 and 5. In the afternoon there is chapel for the junior and senior high students, and then there is "8th period." It can be used as detention time or time for questions and make up tests. Jim if often at school for one or the other each day. Around 4:15 on various days, RVA hosts athletic games. This term, they are playing boys football (soccer), girls basketball, and tennis. So the kids and I make the short walk to watch a few of the students we are getting to know.

In the evenings, we stay just about as busy. Once a week, Jim sits in the library to supervise the study hall. Which has quickly become a biology study hall... the students know he is there and they show up! So it's not as productive for Jim as he thought it might be, but it's great to spend some more time with the students outside the classroom. Thursday nights, Jim likes to take off and play soccer with staff or work on projects in the wood shop. I like to have other women over for tea and a quiet chat. We often have weekend activities as well. Caring community meets once a month, we have eight sophomores (boys and girls) that will come over for food, games, and fellowship this year. We've helped with the two variety nights (where the jr/sr high can chose from different activities after supper) that have happened so far, as well as a few of the titchie evening activities. Faith had a "hayride and bonfire" night last weekend. Unfortunately, it was a little rainy, so it was a hayride and bonfire night without the hayride and bonfire. She had a great time, nonetheless.

The first Sunday of each month (and when school is not in session, like this weekend), we attend the AIC church, which is the local church. All other Sundays, RVA holds its own church in our chapel, which is more like we were used to in Colorado. We then eat lunch in the cafeteria (many staff choose to do this on Sundays for the fellowship time) and have a quiet afternoon. We also supervise supper in the evenings (for a free meal) so I enjoy having a day off from cooking on Sundays (but again... only when school is in session, I'm out of luck today)!

So hopefully that gives you a glimpse of what life is like here at RVA. There are plenty of other details that fill in the cracks, but that's that big picture. And yes, it's often easy to forget that we are in Africa, especially when it's been a few days or weeks since we've walked off the campus. But then again... that's the purpose of this school: to help these kids get ready for a more western university setting. We are slowly learning what it looks like to serve here, and are looking forward to feeling more settled and at home as time goes on!

A tour of our house

2010-10-01T23:02:00.002-06:00

We want to take some time in the next few posts to share a little more of the day-to-day life here at Rift Valley Academy. We've already been here over a month, so I think it's time to share some pictures of our home!

This is our yard from the playhouse corner. It is quite large. And a hedge goes around most of it, so it is such a great place for the kids. In another post, we'll give you a tour of the other surroundings.

Here's the front door, which enters into the dining room. The cards in the window are thanks to many of you... mail is so special to get here! We just bought some yellow paint, so soon this will be a bright cheery room.

When you enter, on the right is the living room. We just purchased the bookcase from another family, which has been fun to have. The couches and rug are all rental (and all the other furniture you will see in this post) so we'll work on replacing those, slowly but surely. That's our cozy fireplace, which we are grateful to have. We miss the efficiency of our wood stove in Colorado, but this at least adds a few degrees of warmth!

We brought a few pictures from home which are so nice to have. These grace the fireplace wall. The students get a pretty good kick out of the one of Jim and Joel on the tractor!

Through the door on the other side of the living room is the hallway which leads to the two bedrooms, the upstairs and the back room. You can see the kids' beds are just platforms for the matresses. Poor Joel has fallen out of bed a number of times, but seems to be getting the hang of it now. Their window looks out to the front of the house, and is so nice and sunny in the afternoon.

This is the closet in their room. The door goes to the bathroom that is shared with the master bedroom.

Down the hall is our room. It faces the backyard, and beyond that is the Titchie basketball court. It can be loud when there are evening activities, so it is nice the kids are toward the front of the house. Our walls are just painted stone. I think we have the coldest room in the house as well. Something I know we'll be thankful for when it warms up. But lately it's been downright chilly!

This is our bathroom. We've never had such a big bathroom! Or even our own. It's been very nice. Much easier to keep clean when there's a place to put things. The walls are a nice brown that match the shower curtain we brought!

Back out in the hallway, you can go upstairs. We are using it as a play area (something else we've never had before!) and a guest bedroom (aka. YOUR room)! It's a nice space.

Here's where the kids play.

This is the guest room, you can see the railing for the stairs out the door. If our kiddos were older, it would make a fun bedroom.

This is our second bathroom, the "kids bathroom". It's the size we were more accustomed to!

On around the back of the house is the "green room". We are enjoying the paint colors that were already here, and thankful that we only have a few more rooms to paint if we want something other than white. This might be Faith's room, but for now the kids are quite set on still sharing a room, which is fine with us. So in the meantime, it can be an office or sewing room.

And on through that room is the kitchen, which is just off the dining room. That window looks out to the side of the house. Another fun paint match was in here. The curtains in this window I made out of a tablecloth that I brought which I just loved. The blues match perfectly! You can see we have a microwave, oven and refrigerator. The oven is full sized, the refrigerator is not.

Not pictured, through a door to the right is our laundry/utility room. It has a freezer which we purchased to cope with the less than full-size fridge, and our washing machine. It's nice to have a freezer so that I can cook ahead a little more, and have the flexibility to make Africa-style cooking a little simpler. For example, I cook up a whole kilo of dried beans at once and freeze them in "can-sized" portions for recipes. Or I make large batches of pizza and spaghetti sauce. That are painstakingly made from fresh tomatoes. Delicious, but time consuming.

Well, that's our house here. We are looking forward to making it our home over the next two years!

First Service Day

2010-09-18T13:03:00.000-06:00

One week ago, approximately two thirds of the 500 students here at RVA took the opportunity to participate in numerous outreach projects around our region. I (Jim) led a group of about ten high school boys on an outreach project just down the hill from our campus helping to set up a new nursery for native tree species here in Kijabe. Deforestation is a huge problem throughout the African continent. Most remaining trees here in Kenya are found in specially protected forest reserves, and even those are being rapidly exploited. In fact, one of the largest of these forests lies just above our home here, but short hikes into the reserve reveal numerous illegal charcoal pits, and tree cutting for posts. After nightfall, when sitting out in the yard, we'll hear trees crashing to the ground to be chopped up and sold as charcoal for cooking fires in Nairobi.

This hillside seen from RVA was entirely forested in the late 1980s but is now totally denuded. At this point, there is little hope of any forest regrowing in this area without some type of intervention. Here much of the moisture isn't rain so much as condensation which drips from the leaves of trees every night. Our friends in Woodland Park know the type of 'rain' I'm talking about. The problem is, that this type of moisture leaves bare earth or grass dry. As a result of this deforestation, many of the streams in our area which used to carry good water all year now run only during the rainiest seasons.

Our group teamed up with Craig Sorely from Care of Creation, Kenya as he worked to set up a new tree nursery to raise some of this area's most useful and vulnerable tree species. Additionally, the Nursery will have a small teaching farm where people from the organization Farming God's Way can help to educate farmers in the Kijabe area about healthy farming habits which stress good stewardship of God's creation. Most of our time was spent stringing wire through fenceposts made of old grocery sacks. It was hard work, but when I saw Craig today, he was still very grateful for the help.

It's hard to imagine how problems like this can be corrected. It will probably be at least thirty years before that hillside has a decent stand of trees growing on it, and who knows if the streamflow can be restored. Sometimes it feels like it is still a losing battle and that trees as disappearing more quickly from the forest reserve than they can possibly be replaced, but it was encouraging to work hard with some high school boys and see seeds of change growing in their minds and in the minds of the Kenyans we were working with about our role as Christians in caring for the environment.

Only in Kenya...

2010-09-15T11:15:00.002-06:00

Okay, maybe a few other places too, but we wanted to share some things that are a bit different about our lives here before they become 'normal'!

Our milk is brought to the school fresh six days a week. The cafeteria pasteurizes it, we drop off our large tin milk pail in the morning and pick it up full of warm milk in the afternoon. (It's a funny accessory to be carrying around campus... between that and going to pick up eggs from the Kenyan who sells them in the maintenance department every few days, I feel like we're on a farm!) The milk is not homogenized, so when I pour it in our glass pitcher and we finish it, this is what is left on the sides of the glass.

Here's our washing machine. It seems kind of space-age compared to what we were used to seeing in the states. It doesn't hold quite as much as we are used to washing in a load, but we are so thankful to have it! The name of it is "Fuzzy Logic." Also different.

Here are flowers I purchased in Nairobi that lasted us at least two weeks, and guess how much they cost? $2.50. Oh... and avocados? They're twelve cents. And twice as big. (Many other things do cost a fortune compared to what we were used to in the states, so we'll enjoy our flowers and avocados!)

This is the tank that our washing machine drains into. Our yard worker then scoops the water out and waters our plants with it. (We don't have a faucet or hose or anything like that.) Something maybe we should catch on to when we go back to the states!

These are two switches, up high, in one of the bedrooms. One is for a red outside light, the other for an outside alarm. If we have 'unexpected company', this is how we can alert the guards and those around us. Just so you know, these are rarely used. Mostly we test them to see if they are still working!

You can see the light and bell outside the upstairs window here.

This is our cell phone. It has provided quite a bit of amusement. From the spelling of 'dialing' (see below), to the instructions as to unlocking the keypad 'long press the * key' to the explanation in the users manual for making the phone ring as if you are receiving a call so that you can get out of a meeting or unwanted conversation. Yep, that's really in there.

So there's a little peek into some of the changes in our lives. Some make us smile, and some make us cringe, but I imagine they'll all be 'normal' here pretty soon!

We're still here...

2010-09-14T00:25:00.000-06:00

We've been having spotty access to the internet, and difficulty accessing Blogger when we do have access, for the last week or so. We have lots we want to share, so hopefully soon the times we have to spend posting pictures and thoughts and the availability of access will line up. Thanks for being patient!

Friends... already??

2010-09-08T12:36:00.000-06:00

While we were preparing to come to RVA, we looked forward to the community that we would have here. One hundred adults living on a school compound, with the same goals and vision; we knew we were bound to have some friends and not feel lonely or isolated in Kenya. BUT, I (Heather) also set my expectations rather low, and expected some tough times until those connections really formed. Or maybe I'm just skeptical because it took two, three, four years, to make friends (or to know anyone!) back in Woodland Park.

Let's just say I was more than pleasantly surprised last week, and the Father blessed me more than I could have ever expected in just the first week of school. Here's the story:

Monday: first day of kindergarten for Faith. First day of teaching at a new school for Jim. Big changes for our family.

Friday: my birthday, away from the extended family and great friends who often helped me celebrate it.

Well, Sunday I was not feeling so great, and by the time the evening came, I was bed-ridden, with a fever and other unpleasant side-effects of traveling in a foreign country and drinking the water and eating the food... you get the idea. Monday morning was worse. Jim sprang to action, and so did everyone else. A neighbor took Faith to school (she didn't miss a beat), came back to watch Joel and to help me get my house help and yard worker set up for the day (their first days too). Another mom picked up Joel for the rest of the morning, our neighbor went back to pick up Faith at lunchtime. A long-time staff here brought me medicine, Sprite, a heavy comforter, and checked in every hour or so, and the whole staff prayed for me at chai time (morning break). Faith went to a friend's house in the afternoon, Joel napped here and was picked up again for playtime until Jim could get home. Another long-time staff family brought Jim and the kids supper.

I hadn't worried about a thing all day long.

Tuesday and Wednesday I slowly recovered, and was feeling great by Thursday, which brings us to part two. One of the single gals who has been here a few years, who also joined us at ABO, invited our family over for supper, along with another family who we've really gotten to love. She fixed a fabulous dinner and surprised me with birthday brownies and ice cream! Then the dads and kids left and in walked all sorts of wonderful women! They showered me with cards and little gifts and love. And Sarah had even more in store: homemade ice cream for the ladies, which is a huge treat here. It was such a blessing to have her work so hard to honor me, and for other women to take the time to celebrate a newcomer too. It was very humbling... much more than I ever expected.

Friday, the real birthday, was just as wonderful. I had people drop by all day (something I love...) with more cards, flowers, little gifts, and many encouraging words. Even a hand painted card from the new art teacher. And a package that we had been expecting for a while arrived with perfect timing! We were invited to dinner at the staff chaplain's house, where we had a wonderful meal and delicious cake. Faith went off to an ice cream social with the elementary schoolers, while the three of us stayed and chatted and were loved until it was way past bedtime.

I honestly thought that birthdays were something that might not be too celebrated at RVA among the staff when life gets busy here and the focus is on the students. Jim had asked me what I wanted for my birthday, and I told him I just didn't want to be lonely. Without Jim doing anything, this is what God provided for me.

While there are plenty of challenges: getting food is always an ordeal, our cookie sheets seem to burn whatever is on them, I forgot to pick up Faith from school on Monday (picture day... which I also forgot), we have no idea how to budget, but there's always plenty to buy, and there's always that much more to learn; we are also very aware that this IS the place the Lord has made for us, and while we will stumble through for a while, we have been shown, very clearly, that we will be LOVED.

It's been a big week!

2010-09-04T13:52:00.001-06:00

Right now it's time to crash into bed, but we wanted to share a picture of our new kindergartener with you before it seemed like old news. This is the sign in front of the elementary school, known as "Titchie Swot." It means "little learner", and we have a little learner indeed!