This trip has become part of the summer routine for Andi and I. But I pray that it never does become "routine". It is always an amazing trip, filled with friends old and new, the awesome country of Kenya, and daily experiences seeing the hand of God at work. And we see His hand working here in the States long before we even get on a plane.
Some of you have probably read my blogs in earlier years and are well familiar with our annual Kenya missions work, but I'm sure some of you are reading about this for the first time. So for the reading veterans, please bear with me as I give a little background to put things in perspective.
Our church, Bethlehem United Methodist Church (BUMC) in Thornton, Pa, has always been missionally focused. Most of the missions activity has been local community or sometimes further away in the US such as Hurricane Katrina or Hurricane Sandy relief and construction, but some efforts were put into evangelistic trips to Ukraine, Peru, Holland, etc. But these were often to different areas each time and not focused on building long term relationships and committing to long term projects to improve the lives of the local people. When Tom Wolff, one of our pastors, was introduced to the ministry of Start With One Kenya (SWOK) in 2011, he felt the Lord's leading to establish a relationship and get involved. After he visited and did the necessary due diligence into the ministry and their goals and activities, our church planned wholeheartedly to get involved. The first team of 29 individuals began preparations in January, 2013 and went to Kenya in late July for two weeks. Our trip was to be multi-faceted, working in orphanages, training in hygiene and distributing personal water filtration systems, and doing construction projects. The fact that I'm a general contractor, doing construction every day, should have made this a natural choice for me. But I have to admit that I wasn't fully committed to the mission at the beginning. Fortunately, one of the individuals who fully caught the excitement for the mission was my wife, Andi. She was firmly committed to going, and I reluctantly (without acknowledging it) agreed to go to the planning meetings and to sign on.
I'm really not sure at this point why I was against going in the beginning. It might have just been apprehension at going to Africa, a country I had never visited. Although I've been a lot of places throughout Europe, lived in Switzerland three years, been to a few countries in South America, etc., Africa for me was an unknown. Whatever the reason, I dragged my feet. I thought I had an ace in the hole and that the trip would never happen. We anticipated taking 30 people, and we had to raise $90000. to cover the costs of the trip. Where in the world were we, a small church in a rural area, going to raise that kind of money?? I had my "Get out of Africa Free" card!!
What I didn't fully understand at that point was that if the Lord is in something, NOTHING can stand against it! When we ultimately raised $117,000 for the trip without difficulty, it was obvious that He was in control and wanted His mission to succeed. The smartest thing I could do was get involved with both feet in! And since that first year as a member of the team, I have continuously seen the Lord's hand guiding our trips in so many ways that there can be no doubt we are where he wants us to be.
Our team has always been blessed to be comprised of members of our church and a contingent from Hope Community Church in Ridley Park Pa. This year will be no different. We are a team of 18 individuals across the age spectrum. We have varied in team size from 14 to 31 over the last five years, but the Lord always selects just the right people to accomplish His purposes.
In the previous four trips, we have done multiple hygiene trainings and water filter distributions. Even in the cities of Kenya, it is extremely rare to have clean water to drink. The people of Kenya walk miles a day to draw and carry home water that is polluted with sanitary waste. There is no other choice. Bottled water is just about as expensive there as it is here, and the average Kenyan lives on as little as $2./day. There is little money for food, let alone the luxury of buying drinking water. They can boil water or treat it with bleach, but that costs money for charcoal and chemicals. The options are few. But Start With One Kenya has been instrumental in training and distributing personal water filtration systems that are provided free to families and will turn the polluted water into water that is safe to drink, simply using gravity and a long-life filter that just needs to be back-flushed daily with some of the clean water it has produced. SWOK raised funds and started an initiative earlier this year to distribute Uzima water filtration systems to all the family units (approximately 12000) on the four populated islands within the Kenya border in Lake Victoria. They have completed a major portion of this project, and we will be completing it by doing the training and distribution to 2000 families in our first three days on the ground in Kenya.
We will also be doing some significant construction work. Each year, we have done construction work at Gituamba, one of the former IDP camps in Kenya. These camps were originally tent cities where displaced persons were sheltered after ethnic cleansing following the presidential election in 2008, when the winning tribe turned on the losers. Ultimately, the government resettled the residents on land with no support structure: no electricity, water, roads, or any of the needs of civilization. Over the last four years, we have been involved in installing eco-latrines, converting an old stone barn into a primary school, constructing walls and classrooms, and constructing a dining hall. This year, it looks like we will be able to construct a kitchen building to replace the hut where food is cooked over an open pit with charcoal. We even hope to be able to provide modern equipment for this facility (it's unclear at this point what "modern" really means, since there is no power to run electric ovens, but we'll see what shakes out and I'll keep you posted!).
I'd like to share a few things about our trip logistics. Once again this year, the Lord has poured out his blessing on this trip financially. We needed to raise $54000 to cover the anticipated expenses of this trip - as of Thursday night, we had raised $87356! We have always firmly believed that people donate to a cause, expecting it to be used specifically for that cause at the time donated. We have never been led to believe that we should hold on to excess funds to use to fund the trip the next year. It's obvious the Lord knows the needs and we always ask for His leading and wisdom in how to use those excess funds. Previous years (yes, we have been blessed each year with more resources than we needed!) we have been able to coordinate with SWOK to purchase text books for every grade for a school of 1200, provide significant funds for water filters over and above what we had anticipated, fund teacher's college for two Kenyans who committed to returning to teach in the Gituamba school after graduation, and to arrange for numerous Kenyans to be hired to work with us on construction, allowing them to earn a wage to help feed their families. We pray that the Lord will give us clear guidance on where our excess resources would best be directed to help the Kenyan people.
We have been blessed by so many individuals in supporting this mission, and a lot of the people reading this blog are among the supporters. You know who you are, and I want to publicly (but anonymously). I have been overwhelmed by friends who have opened their hearts and pocketbooks and blessed us. Some of these contributions have been astounding. But they have all been significant and a testimony to the Lord's goodness and the faithfulness of friends. I have had friends intentionally forego a meal and give me the meal cost to give to SWOK to buy more water filters. SWOK couldn't do what they do to help the Kenyan people without you and your support. And we couldn't be there to aid them in their mission without you. I am blessed to be a part of this team and in awe that the Lord chose me to be a part of it. It is truly a privilege to be able to do it.
We as a team covet your prayers as we go. This is always a grueling trip because of the travel, and it has gotten even moreso this year. We are flying out of Philadelphia on Qatar Airlines, and if you haven't followed the international news, you may not know. The nation of Qatar has been condemned recently by Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and the United States for allegedly supporting terrorism. Although they deny it, relations have been strained and the middle eastern nations have cut ties with Qatar. As a result, Qatar Airlines is not permitted to fly over their airspace, and our already 14+ hour flight from Philadelphia to Doha, Qatar (first and last legs of our trips) has grown significantly in length (on top of a 14 hour flight leg, what's a few more hours!). I ask that you keep us in your prayers for all aspects of our trip, but especially for logistics. I also ask that you pray that we would represent the Lord well, that we would function as His hands and feet, and that we would make our will subservient to His.
Well, I've taken up enough of your time already. I will try to post a few pictures as we get underway tomorrow morning on our 10:40 am flight. After that, I probably won't have internet access until sometime on Monday after we arrive in Nairobi, and I will try to get a post with pictures up every day we are there. Thanks for reading this and for your thoughts and prayers!
Jim, Thanks for this... prayers for you and the team!! be safe
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