So I realized I never told you what happened with the street kids! This blog post is here to remedy that.
After we met them that day a lot happened. The first thing was that we actually met them. Once we arrived with Gideon he spoke to the group, met the leader, and began to hear from them all that they needed; he then told them about himself and how the Lord had laid them on his heart and because of that he was there to help them. The first thing they wanted was food. I mean these kids put a new meaning to "I'm hungry". So we promised them that we would return with breakfast the following morning and asked what they wanted to eat, there was a resounding request for chapati and chai tea. From there we left and went home to really soak in what had just happened, what we just promised, and to start planning how to make 100 plus chapati and a ton of chai tea.
That night we stayed up until about 1 am with Gideon making all the food, and seriously had some of the funniest moments of the trip so far. We woke up the next morning bright and early to make the tea and then headed back to the kids by like 630am so that we could deliver the food by 7. Ha okay so something to be known about Africa is that they do not run on time. Time just doesn't really matter here and its a beautiful, beautiful thing and also one of the most frustrating things. For instance the church service every sunday starts at about 8am, so we were pretty surprised when Rev. Gideon.. the Pastor… said that we didn't need to leave the house until about 815 and we actually didn't leave until 830. That was a regular occurrence. BUT the funny thing about this morning was that Gideon was all about being there RIGHT at 7 and sure enough we got there right now on time, for the first time all month. Immediately after our arrival the kids swarmed around us, ready and excited for their breakfast. For being street kids, though, these were the most well behaved bunch of youngsters I've seen; we asked them to form a line to get their chapati and then to sit and wait to receive a cup of tea and low and behold.. they actually listened. In the midst of their unstructured, chaotic lives when loved and provided for got to see all these beautiful qualities come of out them.
After we gave them the food we told them that the next time we came back we wanted to bring them new clothes, because all of them were wearing torn, dirty, way too big or way too small everything. So the next time we came back, we brought with us a bunch of new clothes for all of them. It was a ton of fun to hand it all out and see them immediately put the clothes on. This was during our last week in Busia so we decided that after that we wanted to give them breakfast once again before we had to leave, so two days later we went back with the Kenya version of donuts and more chia tea for them.
The coolest part about everything we got to do with the street kids though, is that even though we only got to spend about a week and half with them we know that they are going to continue to be loved and cared for even after we have left. In just one week the Lord laid them so heavily upon Gideon's heart that he knew he needed to do something big for them, like for instance get them off the streets. And in that same week the Lord opened up a crazy amount of doors to start making that happen. One of the women in the church Florence, she's actually like 22, so rather one of the young adults in the church stepped up after coming with us to meet the street kids one time and said that she had wanted to open an orphanage her whole life and believed that now was the time the Lord had been preparing her for. She even began talking to her mom about building more onto their home, where they already have 3 orphans living, in order to begin housing some of the street kids and her mom agreed that that would be a good use of what the Lord has blessed them with. I think one of the most beautiful things about the people I met through ministry here is seeing that heart come out them; they truly believe and know that what they have has been given to them by the Lord and so in the end it is still His, not there's.
But so basically we got to leave busia knowing that Gideon and Deliverance Church are going to carry on loving these children the way we got to during our short time there. Gideon has promised to keep me posted about the building onto the house, where they hope to be able to keep 10 kids to start with, and about how everything is going in general with their ministry with the kids. It's not going to be an easy road or a light thing to jump into, but the Lord has blessed them so much in regards to it in just one week that we are all full of faith for what will come. I will continue to keep you updated with it all as I get emails from him, and will you all please join me and my team in prayer for them as they continue to pursue this calling.
