Through the Looking Glass...

Again, another two months has passed. But, it was an incredible two months. May parents came for a week in the beginning of March; we went on Safari, took them to the slums, had them do medical checkups for the kids at the center, etc. It was such a wicked opportunity for my parents to experience the joys and struggles of life and work in Kenya.

We successfully kicked off the God-Parent program with our kids at the center. Basically they have a donor in the states who writes them letters, prays for them, and contributes 100 dollars a month for school fees, food, clothes for the 35 kids at the center. We also had a donor give money for bibles, so we handed out bibles to all the kids and workers at the center; it was a good good day.

I finally finished the little Kibera Secondary School documentary/video companion piece. I think it turned out pretty well in the end, it should be posted soon on FB. I’m def. a bit nervous because hundreds of people will be watching this and I want to make sure it’s good enough, that people are informed and feel moved to partner with us, for the construction of this school/community.

We had a youth conference the other day in Limuru. There was a couple months of work put into this, getting speakers, a venue, advertising. In the end we had about 60 youth come and listen to talks on HIV, the environment, and Micro-Finance. I think some kids were really impacted by this event, even though I was stressed all day, as it was supposed to start at 8AM but in typical African style it did not begin to 11 AM.

I got to help out at a Vaction Bible School that the southern baptists were putting on for a discipleship group, led by my mates, that brought 50 youth from the tea fields together. It was a stellar week of the word, arts and crafts, songs and games. I was in charge of the games, and it was awesome. It felt like I was back at Camp. It was hilarious to watch these kids try and figure out all these brain games and team building games. A wizard time…

Me and my mates hiked around a volcano a few weeks ago called. Mt, Logonot. It was this wicked crazy extinct volcano and it took us all day just to hike the rim of the thing, but it was so beautiful.

We had a food relief program that was implemented successfully last week. A gal asked me a few months ago what could be done to help in Kenya, I mentioned that there was a famine in the region, and that she could raise money for food relief. She ran with this, raised 3,000 dollars and the other day we headed south to a Masaai Village called Namanga. The UN had put this area on priority one, in that it was in dire need of food relief. We had a truck filled with 960 5 kilo bags of maize meal, which we distributed to each head of the family. Like the youth conference, the food was scheduled to show up at 10 but didn’t arrive till 4, T.I.A….It was organized through the local church in the area, so there was about 2 hours of worship, preaching and me and my mates awkwardly fumbling through Swahili and trying to explain to a 1,000 masaai what we were doing there. It was quite a scene. In the end, the food was given out, and these people were given relief, even though the amount will only last about a week. We estimated that about 5,000 people were reached with this food.

So, that’s a wee rundown of the past few months. I’m heading to the states in a few hours, for a team meeting, fundraiser and just some general merry making with my best mates. Sorry I’m so lazy on blogging, but T.I.A. mate…
joe

2 months in the life of GC

so a thousand apologies for not writing for about two months.  i figured that i actually owed it to people that helped me get here to write updates about life and such.  back in mid-january, once all the groups and visitors had left, i jetted out with my buddy/boss A.B. to Zanzibar, an island off the coast of Tanzania for 5 days. It was super chill, and way more beautiful than the beaches in thailand.  Got back to Kenya, and then everybody left, and it was just me in the house for about a week.  It was a good time to reflect, come up with my own schedule and sift through the bullcrap from Iris, which I found myself shoveling through a lot. That first week was full of meetings, learning to drive stick on the other side of the road, getting groceries, getting to know the names of the kids at the center, etc.  One night I got an emergency call saying that Patrick (the head of the Limuru Children's Center) and I needed to take a child to the hospital the next day.  he had been born without a penis, and there were all these complications, so we drove him and his mom to the hospital.  Turns out it wasn't as bad as we thought.  But sitting there, in the kids wing, with a little girl whose legs were broken because someone in a Matatu (public transport buses/the bane of my existence) had moved their seat back and crushed her legs, and then some kid with just tubes and blood just gushing out of his head...i told God, i have to believe in a God that is good, i have to, because the world is so rotten.  

The next day I went with Duncan and Cornell, two kenyans who run a program called Care for AIDS, to Jamii Bora, a micro-credit organization in Nairobi.  Care for AIDS helps medically and spiritually with AIDS patients in Limuru, who are cast out from their communities, shunned by their churches, and treated almost as lepers. A lot of stigma's like that going around.  Care for AIDS has the desire to seek out micro-credit loans for their clients, empowering them financially to start small businesses in their community, such as grocers, charcoal sellers, shop owners, tailors, donkey cart operators, etc.  The meeting was fruitful and the conclusion was that CFA clients would partner with Jamii Bora to help them receive loans and start small businesses.  We've spent time as an organization thinking about ways to assist the poor without undermining them, or treating them as inferior and helpless.  Never give anyone anything that they can get for themselves, and empower them to feel ownership, aka provdie them a loan so they can work for the money to buy their food, don't just give them free food or money, which creates dependency and entitlement.  Allow ownership, pride and self-worth to grow.  

I've hung out with Patrick and his family at their farm, milking the cows, running around the fields with his daughter, nieces and nephews, and taking many dinners at his house, cooked by his darling and sassy wife, Annastasia.  One day the kids at the LCC all came to our farm, and spent the day plucking weeds, pulling their own beans, playing games, and running away from the dogs, haha.

We're also working on building a school in Kibera, an enormous slum in Nairobi, nearly a million people in a square mile, but it's more of a big snake, not a square.  Anyways, so we're working on building a secondary school there, and getting prices for the building materials, labor, administrative costs, etc.  We stopped by the school the other day, and they were having parent-teacher day, and they kinda plopped us in front of some 100 parents, and had us say hi and such.  It was actually kinda cool, definitely very Kenyan with the white folks on display, but we got a chance to share our heart and vision to partner with this school, and provide for the students here, in front of all their parents.  I think it was good for them to see the white man as not exploiting them, or taking anything from them, but that we were there because of a mandate of love, and we were spending our lives and time to empower and give their children access to a better life, through an education rooted in the knowledge of Christ (horrible run on sentence, sorry, too lazy to fix it).

The next day we had a birthday party at the LCC, played techno music and ate biscuits and chocolate.  We are also working on having a talent competition with other children's schools in the area and having a youth symposium in which we will talk about pressing issues, AIDS, the environment, micro-finance with the youth of limuru. (thanks and acknowledgments to War/Dance and CG for the previous ideas.)  Our little group is called the Mustard Seed Revolution, and I'm the only white fella for miles, brillant.  We're also looking to buy bibles for the kids at the center, buy some cows for a partner of ours who is opening a home for street boys, and just living life in this crazy country of Kenya.  So, there it is....

Oh, and all of this takes money, so if you've got some quid lying around that you want to put to good use, many good options, haha.

Much Peace... 

The Kenya Edition

So, world's worst blogger; sorry. I arrived in Kenya on the 23rd of December, and it has been a whirlwind since then. Global Connections had two teams from the U.S. come in and there were like 37 of us total, thats a lot of white people...haha. But, Christmas Eve was a lovely affair at Mzungu Manor, we had food and sang old christmas carols by candlelight, Christmas Day was a day of eating, with a huge dinner with people from the LCC (Limuru Children Centre) and other Kenyan/Mzungus in attendance; it was quite a merry attendance. The house here is phenomenal and Kenya is like Europe in terms of convenience and development compared to Mozambique. Hot Showers, no malaria, no worms in the food, a personal chef...good grief, its kinda the lush life, but if so many phenomenal things were not taking place in the community through Global Connections, i might have time to worry, but i don't.
Being here I see that GC partners with indigenious programs rather than just barging in and planting new programs just for the sense of self-importance or worth. We've gone to tons of programs, a feeding program for widows, the LCC (GC's like linchpin, school with 35 orphans or "boarders" as they are more affectionately called, they aren't orphans, they have a home, it's just with 30 other kids and some awesome house mom's) a sewing program, and AIDS program (which i'm hoping to work with in terms of microfinance projects, which i know squat about, better brush up on my easterly and sachs) a environmental program, a church in the Kibera slum. Just so much sexy stuff, and im so stoked that i don't have to leave. I think i'll be here, God willing, for years.
At the moment me and some folks just got back from a primary school in Kibera (which i really want to spend some time at, writing about it and such, it enthralled me the first time i was in kenya, and now it's sucking me back in, the place is ridiculous) but we sat down with the headmaster, went over a list of needs, prices, goals, vision, and the American team expressed an interest in funding some projects. like for instance, there is no food at the school, and kids who go to school for 8 hours a day with no food in their belly, what are they going to retain, especially if they are already coming to school hungry. plans for expanded classrooms. So, there is too much capital in the west and too much potential in the rest for the two not too collide. (catchphrase #1). So, its neat because we can look at a need find a donor, spend time praying into a situation God put's forth, here on the ground we can build a relationship with the nationals, hold them accountable, make sure the funds and resources that donors are allocating are being used properly; its interesting for sure, and exciting to be a part of. And part of you thinks, wait there need to be 274 more hoops to jump through, and maybe there are only 15, and you are at the precipice, and you are there, with your holy spirit gut instincts, and you can think will i act, or will i be idle. its like the tip of the spear here, there is so much transformation needed, and you feel like you can help facilitate it, its exhilirating. and this was just one afternoon.
You don't need to reinvent the wheel, just make the wheel go faster. (catchphrase #2) so discipleship and development, and raising up kids in Christ, with education, who can reach the highest spheres of influence in the country so that there are systems in place where basic infrastructure is in place, people aren't dying from dirty water, and there is a space and funds set aside so that every child has the opportunity for education that way we don't need to keep fundrasing and convince people in the west that 750 dollars is a worthwhile investment to keep a child in high school, because his parents have no capital to send him, and so he can one day get a job and not starve to death from lack of income. Change the policy, and you'll change a country. anyways, ramble ramble ramble. Life is good, another fella on the ground here, Will, is stellar, and were going to get into a lot of trouble together, i'm stoked. We've already got plans in theworks for a trip to Mombassa, to climb Mt. Kenya, raft the Nile in Uganda, and help out at an Iris compound in Sudan, with carpentry and such (looks like those birdhouse days in cub scouts could come in handy). So, life moves along, sometimes slowly, sometimes with frustration...
prayer requests: that i can figure out how to drive stick so that i won't crash our car in the mean streets of Nairobi...haha.
P.S. everybody should come to kenya, theres a team forming for this summer, or come whenever, there is a lot to see and a lot to do....

im a horrible blogger....ha

so its been nearly two months in mozambique, and how can my life not be changed by what is around me. much of my previous bitterness has melted away as God prunes me, gives me desire and purpose and a direction that focuses on him, his word, and his people, to turn a deaf ear to the negativity. the past month has been stellar. my and another girl have worked every day at a village feeding program that Iris puts on. with some 500 village kids every day, it can be kind of overwhelming but its always a blast, especially when the kids are behaving and singing and clapping to Jesus at the top of their lungs. the kids sit in the dirt/sand under a big tent and we lead them in songs, games go over the gospel every day, and then have a bible story to share with the kids, and then at the end kids who can answer questions about the story get wee prizes, and then we feed them, serving up 500 plates of rice and beans every day is so dirty, haha, but for most kids, this is the largest if only meal of the day for them. so thats village feeding, class is good, there are speakers from around the world, and they have just shared stories and taught about some funky mysteries of the lord. one day a fella spoke on Jesus command that we love our neighbor, free the oppressed, clothe the naked, plead for the orphans and the widows and tied it into the 8 millenium development goals set for 2025 to reduce poverty. development economics has really been laid deep on my heart. and the phrase the lord put in my heart, even though its super trendy is: there is too much capital in the west and too much potential in the rest, for the two not to meet. but, i've been reading jeffrey sachs "end of poverty" and it is phenomenal, and it is crazy for him to be talking about an impoverished substinence farming african community and then to go on outreach and be in the midst of poverty and extreme poverty. these villages which don't have access to clean water, good sanitation, soap, electricity, and they don't have enough capital to invest in better farming techniques (irrigation, fertilizer, better tools) because they don't produce to a surplus which would allow them to sell at a market and make a marginal income, but as it is, they spin about in the poverty trap and are economically unable to hoist themselves out without a strategically and carefully placed economic boost. i mean, the governments duty is too provide basic infrastructure to its citizens but this is not possible in a country that is either too corrupt or doesn't tax their citizens, thus the available capital is not present. anyways, i've been on two outreaches, basically we go into bush villages, and set up camp for a couple days, the first outreach, there was an established iris church, and we evangelised, showed the Jesus video, prayed for the sick, had the alter (altar?) call, anyways, kinda chill, the second night, these african witch doctors were banging on their drums just a few feet from where we were sleeping, and this was done in direct response to the "christian presence" that we carried with us, its a crazy world sometimes. second outreach was even better. the village kids are so curious/skittish around akuna's (white man) for many its the first time that a white person has been in close contact with them for a prolonged amount of time, a good game is just to chase the kids throughout the village, and its quite labryinth back there, but you do it with a smile and its agame for the kids, and the mamas all laugh, but you never catch them, in case they actually got scared, but after showing the jesus video they had us pray for like 150 sick people, and that is just exhausting, and my team and i were getting kinda fed up that the mozambican pastors were not preaching the word of God, just the video and then pray for healing, which are both good things, but we were insistent that we needed to preach the word to these people, so the next day with like 100 people, some team members and i preached on parts of the Word that were on our heart, and that we felt these people could benefit from, like, what the flip does it mean to live a christian lifestyle, what is grace, how do you love jesus, how do you love your neighbor/enemy, for me, this time of teaching was one of the hightlights of mozambique. later that day, we went around the village praying for the sick, and they brought this sick man to me, and he had an eye infection, the same infection i had had the week before, so i told him, i will definitely pray for you, but i am also going to treat you, so we scrounged together some gloves and 2 or 3 small med kits, and i cleaned out his eyes, then i did the same for 4 others, now there is a crowd, and this kid comes with infections all over his legs, so we clean it with what we have, antiseptic wipes, hand sanitizer and neosporin and bandaged it up, after about an hour its getting dark and this man walks up, and shows us a hole the size of an acorn and about 3/4 inch deep in the back of his leg, i couldn't really see, so i put a head lamp on, got close, and almost threw up, it was so gross and smelled so bad, so we laid him on a "bed" and i did my best to clean out the wound, then we dumped sanitizer in there, and his leg was shaking cause it must have hurt so bad, it was intense, at this point all the med kits are exhausted, but we have one roll of tape left, but no bandage, so i ask a girl if she had a sanitary pad, we took it cut it in half, put it over the wound and taped him up, it was definitely a unique way to spend my birthday, and i'll never forget it, so, after this short novella, there are two days left of class, graduation on monday, and then another 6 day outreach, and then on the 23rd of december i fly to kenya, for chapter two of this crazy/sexy adventure.....

back im pemba...

so, i write this for myself, because i need to...after driving 3 days back from beira to the iris base in pemba, i had time to think, pray, debate and discuss with my friends what we had been hearing and seeing. First, Beira was a brillant opportunity for 20 countries to come together, worship the Lord, dance with each other, share each others houses and food and intentionally love each other even with limited communication. i am becoming increasingly aware that for sustainable change in an area, you have to learn the language, regardless of the approach you are taking, missions, youth work, hotels, whatever, mastery of the language is essential if you wish to move past the hello how are you, what is your name stage. it is imperative to LIVE the gospel, and this can be done brillantly by playing games with kids, giving em high fives, sharing your food with them, praying with them, and joining in on all their crazy songs and chants. but true relationship is based in the ability to communicate. anyways, beira had a lot of good things, and a lot of things that i did not understand. On Miracles.........we brought the blind and deaf into church, and we prayed for them, i have no problem with this. I love that God chooses to pour out his love and mercy on people, however that manifests. We prayed for nearly an hour for 12 deaf children, towards the end, one could hear, i don't know how much he could hear before in comparision to now, but he could hear, so regardless it was good. but they were all up in the front, and there were some 80 of us surrounding them, praying, praying in tongues, yelling at demons of infirmity to come out, and i looked at one of the kids, and he looked scared, God nugded me, "your prayer for this child is humanity" i took his hand, and squeezed it, and each time he would squeeze back, then i just sat with him and cried, said i was sorry that he could not hear, that i loved him, that i was sorry he had never heard music or the voices of his family or the sound of water or a thousand other things....and i cried. and i wrestled, does God want/need to heal him of deafness, does God deem for His church to be edified through this child who is deaf, what if he was saved and then could preach the gospel in sign language to his friends, what a ministry that would be! i had no easy answer. the next morning, the pastor of the conference got in front and gloriously proclaimed that all 12 deaf children had been healed, and that was just not true, and this lie broke my heart. this chasing after signs and wonders, this falsity that does not spread Jesus, but almost a lust and frenzy, and a worship of the signs and fire of God, and not the God of love. I believe with all my heart, that God can move and do miracles, can raise the dead, he has done it before...but it is not based on our ability, and i've had many discussions about the nature of prayer, that i know it is effective, but how, it is not a chant or a mad lib to fill in, if God wants to move, then we need to be obedient, but we can shout for 8 hours and if God is not in it, then nothing will happen, but maybe make us believe that we need to try harder and they need to believe more. Woe to us if we overspiritualize the world, if every headache, cough, and flat tire is an attack from the enemy, there is physical life and then supernatural darkness whcih sometimes we give more credit than it deserves. I long to see the blind eyes opened, the love of God so overwhelm someone that they realize their life was bought, with love, and that their joy is to live a humbled life before the lord, i long to feel the fire of God and to have the Holy spirit manifest in me however he sees fit. i know God has given me/placed in me deep compassion for the broken, for children with nothing. i have had many remarkable moments here, was given a good teachable moment when i was able to describe to someone in favor of the death penalty the radical love and redemptive grace of jesus, and what it means to physically and emotionally, love the person in front of you, and consider them above you; and this was an Iris Student. she then went on to tell me that she loved angels, and had visions and loved all the crazy supernatural stuff of the bible. which is good. but if we have not love, then these are just a clanging gong or worthless prophesy if we have not love as the radical foundation. (radical, latin word: radix, which means root, thank you shane claiborne, haha). but, i am learning so much, we have organized a gentlemans debate panel, where the 20 guys from the school will meet weekly and discuss such issues as original sin, creationism/evolution, grace to the unreached, the answer to africa, the male role in church, and a myriad of other topics, then we'll drink cokes and tell fart jokes, can't be esoteric all the time. but, i am learning a lot, seeking discernment from the lord on what is Him, what is our emotions, and what is flat out wrong or a lie. Woe to us if we lie about the workings of God for the sake of presenting a miraculous or healing ministry, there is more to God then just the Fire of the Spirit, what about love, joy, peace, wisdom, discernment...of the Spirit. alright, my thoughts end here.
peace to all of you in the name of Jesus,

joe

Mozambique bro...

greetings to anyone and everyone checking into this blog. all 5 of you, haha. right now i am in Beira Mozambique, a city in the south, and we just finished attending a 5 day international super crazy church conference. It was nuts! over 20 nations attended and there was just wicked worship and teaching every day, it was stellar if not a little exhausting. The best part of the conference for me was when we did street outreach, which was awesome. we just went into this little village, with interpreters and told people about jesus, we had one fella, celino, give his life to the lord right on the spot, then he ended up attending the rest of the conference with us, but in the streets, when there is a big white thrombus there are bound to be kids, so we had like 30 kids and i got to sing some songs and do some dances and just get crazy with them, i loved it. my favorite part of the week. then we had a big crowd, we preached through our interpreter, prayed for people and then sang more songs, with a lot of hand motions, cause they really don't know what they are singing, haha! but, it took 3 days on the back of flatbead trucks to get here, man, that was exhausting and hot, but kinda forced you into community, in a good way. i have met loads of awesome people here from all over the world, the mission students are awesome, there are 20 guys or so and we are all really close, and about 70 girls, too many to handle. but, the base in pemba is awesome, there is a student compound, prayer gardens, cafeteria, orphanage, school, church, mozambican pastors school, its stellar, one day for class...which was just worship, the mozambican pastors came up and 200 of us in this tiny hut sang and dang mozambican worship songs to jesus. it was beautiful. after dinner every night, it gets dark at 5:30, the iris kids just grab a drum and in the dirt we all just dance together and get funky, its beautiful, that is definitely my favorite part of this whole experience. playing soccer or eating a meal or trying to learn Makua, the local language, and singing and dancing, and the crazier i dance, the more the kids get into it. so fun. iris has a cool village feeding every day, and thats cool to be a part of, some 200 village kids come in, we sing songs, there is a bible lesson and then they chow down on some stellar rice and beans. the kids are adorable, if not prematurely old, with having to deal with the pressures and harsh nature of life for impoverished mozambicans. anyways, there is just way too many things happening for me to write them all down, it would fill volumes, but this is a good time to soak in the Lord, he has given me a good and healthy hunger for his word, and to see the authentic gospel lived out, to learn what is God, what is hype, and what is the most effective and selfless way to live my life in such a way, so that children don't die, spiritually and physically. but, community is stellar, food is actually really good, teaching is stretching me, and God is good, and i want him so badly, i just want to search after the things of the lord, and its a good search. we spend our nights drinking coffee, sitting on each others porches, discussing the bible, philosophy of religion, ideas about creation, predestination, adam and eve, original sin, truth about the holy spirit....it is good stuff. so life is good, i'll try to blog more frequently, so its less scattered, but yeah....
"Do you love the Lord? Do you love the Lord?"
"Yes, we love the Lord!"

bandito for peace,

joe

3 days to go

i leave on friday morning at 1:20 pm.  the 10,000 needed for this trip has indeed come in in full.  Praise God! All my tickets, shots, visa's and such are all in order.  I can't believe it is so close.  Love on me Father so that I may love others well.  

bandito for peace, 

joe