Physically and spiritually running with Kenyans
And let us run with perseverance (endurance, patience) the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith…Consider him who endured…so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. (Hebrews 12:1-3).
Sun. Aug 5
I accomplished my life-long goal to run with some world renown local runners while in Kenya! …
… well, it actually was never a goal of mine, but when I jokingly told that to the five Kenyan men I was running with on Saturday morning, they thought it was pretty funny. Even if it wasn’t actually a goal of mine, I was still very excited to be running with Kenyans while in Kenya. (In Rwanda, I actually did meet some of the Rwandan olympians who were headed to London. That's because the olympic track stadium was near our house and I ran there a couple of days a week last month). They ran me into the ground too on Saturday. I was sporting my running shoes that I had picked up in Malaysia and the Kenyans ran in flip flops and jeans. First, let me back up a few days before that.
Here are a couple of my running buddies and brothers in Christ. We've also teamed up with some of them to do ministry this month. We are blessed to be working along side them. Most of the guys are in their early 20s and they are awesome examples of young men pursuing the heart of God.
We arrived in Kenya on Wednesday (Aug. 1), having been re-routed here from Uganda due to the Ebola outbreak. It’s a wonderful surprise blessing to be in Kenya. We were never scheduled to have ministry here but I had always wanted Kenya to be a part of our itinerary. The men from our squad, all ten of them, are in South Sudan this month: the newest country in the world. There are four women teams in western Kenya and my lucky team gets to be in the capital, Nairobi. Nairobi is the largest city in East Africa with about 3 million people.
(Side note: Out of all the people on our 38 person squad, I’ve managed to be on the team that always gets placed in the main city of the countries we visit. I am probably the last person on our squad that would want to be located in a large city, but for some reason, I’ve been okay with it. A valuable lesson I’ve learned on this race is surrender and recognizing that God has me where he wants me. Rumor has it we are going to have a “bush” experience next month while in Tanzania, so I’m looking forward to that. I’m also praying that while in Nepal in October – the country I’ve been most looking forward to visiting – I will be on a team that will have a trekking ministry, meaning we go from village to village in the mountains sharing Jesus’ love. Hint, hint for whoever might be reading this and assigning teams to ministries in the coming months.)
It took us about 15 hours to travel by bus and matatu between Entebbe, Uganda and Nairobi, Kenya. (A matatu is essentially a minibus that seats 14 but we’ve squeezed as many as 20 this month). So we took our first full day off in Nairobi and rested. We were able to check out the latest Batman movie. It’s always a blessing to be able to do some type of western-like excursion while gone this year. Even flushing toilets and (hot) running water can be a treat, of which we have this month! (Last month I didn’t have those two luxuries so I’m very grateful [think bucket shower and squatty potty]). Yeah!
Packing it in…my teammate Paige is sharing her seat in the matatu.
So, this month my team is living in west Nairobi and we are partnered with Langata Deliverance Church. Upon arrival, we found out the church was sending a leadership team to oversee a weekend ‘challenge’ for 800 young girls. They asked my team if we wanted to attend and help out. YES!! We weren’t really sure what we would be doing but we all easily agreed it’d be awesome to spend the weekend pouring into the lives of 800 young girls. In total, we were a leadership team of about 20 people, seven of which were us mzungus (“foreigners”). Looking back now, I really can't believe that I was a part of a leadership team that had such a significant role in the lives of these girls. Wow.
We departed Nairobi that Friday afternoon and drove about 1.5 hours away. We arrived to the campus and walked into the school gymnasium. If only you could have been there to experience walking into a gymnasium of more than 800 young girls who were on fire for Jesus. I walked into heaven on earth. That’s what it felt like! The girls were singing and dancing in a way of worship that I had never seen or experienced before. I couldn’t believe it. As I walked in and girls started turning around to see our team entering, they started screaming. They were so excited to see us. I started giving the girls high fives as I walked towards the front. I felt like I was on the winning Chicago Bulls team walking onto the basketball court back in the mid 1990s. It made me think that this might be a snippet of what heaven might be like. The body of Christian believers who are re-united together to worship in eternal glory with God in heaven. There was so much joy there. The presence of the Holy Spirit was there. My teammate said she had seen angels surrounding the building as we had walked up. The girls’ worship was inspiring and convicting. It was an incredible kick off for the weekend.
The next morning I woke up and found myself running with some of the fellas from the leadership team as I wrote about earlier.
Part of the leadership team: my running buddies and teammates.
Saturday and Sunday were full days. In the afternoons, we divided the students into small groups to talk about character development. Myself and another Kenyan woman named Ruth facilitated a group of about 50 girls. The aim for the group discussions was to give a platform to the students to open up on issues affecting their lives, whether it was related to faith, academics, relationships, etc. The girls were very excited to ask us all sorts of random questions. Many of the girls said that the weekend had changed their life and had given them new insight.
Here's our small discussion group meeting outside on the football field. Here I'm hanging out with Dorothy, one of my favorite gals from the school!
Probably the highlight of the weekend for me was pouring into the girls individually. I got to sit down with probably 30 or so girls over the two days. They would pull us aside and tell us their stories. We prayed for them and encouraged them. I prayed for a variety of things for these young gals. I prayed with them the sinners’ prayer. I prayed for the girls and for their studies. I prayed for a girl and for the love of her father that she so craved but who hadn’t spoken to her in many years. I prayed for a girl who was addicted to pornography. I prayed for girls who came from broken homes. I prayed for freedom from legalistic religion. I prayed for girls who had been abused by their mothers or fathers. And on and on. My heart ached as I couldn’t believe some of the stories these girls shared with me. But my heart also rejoiced because these young girls were so strong and eager to grow and overcome their challenges. We all have the choice to either walk in freedom/truth/Spirith or walk in bondage/fear/sin. I also got to see a girl freed from being possessed by a demon spirit.
The weekend was such a blessing to be a part of. Being with the girls and pouring into them brought me so much joy. It will be one of my favorite ministries on the race.
We were invited to attend the national girls challenge gathering the following weekend but it fell through for us to go. It would have been a neat opportunity (though exhausing!) to pour into the lives of approx. 7,000 young girls.
As I post this blog, we've been in Kenya for nearly two weeks now. We've done a variety of other ministries, mostly near our church. In my next blog, I'll tell you about the slum we visited that is located behind our church. It's the largest slum in Kenya and the second largest in Africa.
Love from Kenya….
