This blog is just to catch everyone up to the fact that I am in Africa! I am so excited to be back in the continent that I spent the first 8 years of my life in. As I first entered into Kenya, I was so overwhelmed with emotions. Happy to be here, anxious to experience all that this country has to offer, struggling to remember my childhood, anticipation for what God is trying to tell me and a little bit of nervousness for what this month will hold. In all honesty, Africa scares me. I never would have imagined that this would be the place that scared me the most, I mean I did grow up here and I should be used to this. I should be comfortable with these people and I should be more than ready for this experience.
But at the beginning of the month, I didn’t feel fully prepared for this whole thing. We have been here for about a week now and it has been a whirlwind.We started out in Nairobi and then we traveled about 8 hours to our ministry site just outside of a town called El Doret. And yes, on the way here, I stopped the bus driver so that I could pee outside by a bush, and it happened to be during a hailstorm. It has been a month of prayer, intentionality, and community. We live in a house made of mud; the walls actually crumble at times. We fetch our water from a well out back for our bucket showers and we are blessed to be living with a family that is passionate about the Lord.
I know that God has a lot to tell me because Africa has remained in my heart for so many years. I have always struggled with this innate fear that I won’t fully get what God has for me-that I won’t really hear His voice. When I think about it, I know that this is an irrational fear, but the doubt still finds its way in. All I can do is remember that I was not given a spirit of fear and I was not created to have anxiety and worry for what God has planned for me. I don’t have to worry about missing something as long as I am passionately seeking to understand the heart of Jesus. All that God wants from me at this point is my availability and my desire to know Him more. He has already shown up so big in this short time and I feel like some of the walls I had up, walls I didn’t even know about, are beginning to crash down as I make myself open to what God has, even if it seems completely wacky and foreign. Bring it on Africa. Here I am, ready for what you have for me. We don’t have Internet very often here, but I will follow up with an update on what I am experiencing soon.
But for now…here are some pictures of Africa so far!
