On My Knees

 

You faithfully answer our prayers with awesome deeds, O God our savior.
You are the hope of everyone on earth, even those who sail on distant seas.

Psalm 65:5 (NLT)

 

Usually I find my visits to the market a bit stressful, but yesterday was different.  As I strolled down the aisle with a grocery list in one hand and attempting to maneuver my cart with the other, I suddenly found myself swaying and singing along with the music that blared over the sound system.  It was a country rendition of "Take It to the Lord in Prayer," complete with steel guitar twang.  Not quite what you’d expect for western Kenya.

But as surreal as that moment was, it was also quite fitting, since you never quite know what will be on the shelves here.  A good portion of the staples on my list are usually not in stock, and so I’ve resorted to creating a “wish list.”  Well, actually, it’s more of a “Desperate Prayer List.”  I feel a bit silly knowing that other people pray for world peace while I pray for coffee creamer, but I think God understands. 

The cadets are praying now that the Lord will provide them with a Training College. The land that was originally purchased for that purpose five years ago is tied up in a legal dispute between two other parties, but Ken recently found a large plot of land that is perfect.  And the Army already owns it!  The cadets and Training College staff were so excited with this news that they piled into a bus and made the one-hour trip out to see the land and hold a prayer walk around its boundaries, claiming it as their Promised Land. Every time I think of those wonderful young people, who live every day without running water in the cramped little cubicles we’ve pieced together in the old bakery warehouse, I beg the Lord to answer their prayers.



Cadets praying for a Training College

Of course, we’ve also been praying for a lot of other thing. We prayed for the long rains to come so that the crops would grow.  The rains came.  We then prayed that the rains would stop, since all that rain was destroying the maize. The rains stopped.  Now, believe it or not, we’re praying that the rains will return before the harvest.  It’s exhausting.  Until I moved to Kakamega, I took corn and fresh produce for granted.  But seeing what our people go through to plant, nurture, and harvest their crops, and then get them safely to market for sale, has changed my thinking forever.  Above all, I’ve learned that it takes a lot of prayer!

 

The other day, a young mother came to Territorial Headquarters hoping that the Lord would answer her prayers.  Her husband died of AIDS, and now she is dying.  Totally disgraced, her family has disowned her.  Yet despite this, she is doing all she can in the midst of her illness to ensure that her children are cared for before she dies.  When she heard the woman’s story, our Social and Sponsorship Secretary, who had to fight back her own tears, quickly found some funds to pay for pain killer and school fees. She’s also started the hunt for a long-term sponsor, and Ken and I are joining her in prayer for that.

 

All those things I so easily take for granted are precisely the things that others pray for.  Their needs are so great, and I have so little to offer.  I now understand what Abraham Lincoln meant when he said, “I have been driven many times to my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go.”

I’m right there with you, Abe.  O Lord, hear our prayers.

 

 

It Is Enough!

 

If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it.

But if you give up your life for my sake and for the sake of the Good News,
you will save it.

  Mark 8:35

 

I love my excursions to the "big city" of Kisumu.  The drive is lovely, and the anticipation of what treasures I might find at the market makes me giddy with anticipation.  On one trip, I actually found Ragu spaghetti sauce and tinned pears.  Wow!!  We've also been fortunate enough to discover a dry cleaners, a beautician that has experience cutting "mzungu" hair, and a restaurant that serves cheeseburgers.  My cup runneth over! 

 

But our journeys to Kisumu have not been quite the same since I recently noticed a large white "X" painted on many of the buildings and gates along the way.  Our driver explained that the government is widening the road, and the marked structures are those that will be demolished (with no compensation, I might add).  So my heart sinks a little whenever I see an "X", knowing that it represents someone who will lose his home or his business.  In fact, until he checked on the proposed route with the local authorities, Ken was concerned that the Army might even lose the front gate at Territorial Headquarters.

 

X Marks the Spot

 

 

Actually, we've seen a great deal of loss in the past two weeks.  The Kaptanai Corps hall was destroyed in a storm, and wind blew the roof off the home of one of our dear retired officers.  She had nowhere else to go, of course, so she is still living there.  On top of that, there has been a renewal of politically-motivated violence, and twelve Salvationist families at the Mayanja Corps have been senselessly attacked at night in their beds.  They've not only been injured, but they've also lost any sense of personal security. 

 

Most tragic, however, has been the loss of several children at our schools.  Sudden illness claims the lives of children here with depressing frequency, and we were deeply saddened when one of our brightest and most delightful students passed away.  She was a young lady with big dreams.

 

But we've also seen victories.  Last month, for example, Ken commissioned thirty-six new lieutenants.  These are men and women who have been praying for an opportunity to attend the Training College, but for one reason or another, had been told that they did not qualify.  Yet they never gave up, instead accepting leadership responsibilities at some of our poorest and most isolated corps.  Without adequate compensation, and receiving even less recognition, these dear servants have remained faithful to their calling for years, some of them for more than a decade.

One young woman in particular will always have a special place in my heart.  She suffered a stroke some years ago, but although the allowance she received was inadequate to pay for proper medical treatment and therapy, she stayed at her post.  On the day of her commissioning, she limped across the platform and did her best to raise her right hand in a Salvation Army salute.  I thought I saw Ken's eyes water as he presented her with an officer's commission, and my thoughts turned to a quote I heard some years ago:

  

 If God is all you have, you have all you need.

 

Another lesson from my Kenyan family.

 

 

 

Falling Together

So we’re not giving up. How could we? Even though on the outside it often looks like things are falling apart on us, on the inside, where God is making new life, not a day goes by without his unfolding grace. These hard times are small potatoes compared to the coming good times, the lavish celebration prepared for us.

 

                                                                                         --   2 Corinthians 4:16-17 (The Message)



It has been a wild couple of weeks.  So on this national holiday of Labour Day, Ken and I decided to stay home and rest.  Wanting to get in a bit of exercise and try to process all that has happened recently, we got up at sunrise, donned our sweatsuits, strapped on our hiking boots, and left the house to hike the muddy paths behind our compound.

Our solitude did not last long, though.  Every few yards, someone stopped us on the trail to say hello.  Others looked up from back-breaking work in their small shambas and waved to us with broad smiles on their faces.  When we eventually reached the main road, motorcyclists honked, children standing at the doors of their mud-walled homes yelled out greetings in various local languages, and one car even stopped to ask how we were today.  It seemed to make no difference to the driver, or to anyone else for that matter, that traffic on the road had come to a complete halt.  Oh, the warmth and friendliness of Kenyans!

 

Now that I think about it, that road is still a bit of a challenge for me.  I have driven to work several times since coming to Kakamega, of course, but I still have not had the nerve to drive to the market.  It's only ten minutes up the road, but those ten minutes present the driver with a challenging obstacle course that includes unsteady old men with canes, women straining under the weight of firewood balanced precariously on their heads, children in school uniforms running to and fro, all types of vehicles in various stages of disrepair, a roaming collectionn of cows, chickens, and pigs, potholes large enough to swallow you whole, and a police checkpoint.  On top of all that, the GPS system in my van is in Japanese, and no one has been able to figure out how to turn it off.  So whenever I'm trying to negotiate my way down that road, I hear an insistent female voice giving what I am sure are urgent instructions in a language I can't understand.

But I'm not to be defeated.  So last week, I got up early, spent a few minutes praying for courage and protection, grabbed the car keys, and marched out to the van, determined to drive where I had never driven before.  I unlocked the door, put the key in the ignition, and turned it.  It promptly broke in half.  I called Ken, and he sent a driver to pick me up.  But I didn't have enough money to buy what I needed at the market, so the driver went back to the office to get my husband.  On the way there, his car was hit by a motorcycle.

When I finally reached home later that day, I attempted to apologize for having caused so much trouble by making Ken's favorite dessert, apple crumble, with a few apples that I had been able to find.  Of course, about halfway through the process, the power went out.  I left the pan in the oven, thinking that perhaps it might stay hot enough to finish the dessert.  But after doing other things for fifteen minutes or so, I realized to my horror that power had been restored.  Well, it's not that I simply realized this.  It was more a matter of smelling something burning.  I frantically ran back to the kitchen to get the potholders, and the handle on the drawer they were in broke off in my hand.  What a day. 

 

But it didn't end there.  In fact, that day seemed to trigger a chain of events in which a number of things simply fell apart.  For example, we've since had several massive thunderstorms in Kakamega, one of which pelted us with hailstones as big as golf balls.  Our buildings and vehicles paid the price.  I also came down with a sore throat, but the local chemist says that he won't have any antibiotics until this weekend.  We've had to cancel or postpone several Territorial events due to lack of funds, and the normal flow of requests from our corps, schools, and institutions for everything from roofs to water tanks has seemingly become a raging torrent.

 

So now that I'm finally sitting here in my quiet home on a national holiday, I asked the Lord a few minutes ago to speak to me.  And I never thought that He would use Marilyn Monroe to do that.  But for some reason I remembered an occasion on which she said, "Sometimes good things fall apart, so better things can fall together."  Yes, that's right.  God is still in control, and he will often use broken things to bring Him glory.  So I won't give up.  And besides, it's going to be interesting to see what great things the Lord is going to accomplish in and through broken little me.

 

Another Jolene - Kakamega Central

 

Planting a tree in Kapsabet

                   

Donating Soap-Making Supplies to a Women's Group

 

An Everyday Celebration

While we are living in the present, we must celebrate life every day, knowing that we are becoming history with every work, every action, every deed. - Mattie Stepanek

It's strange what one misses when serving so far from home.  This Easter, for example, I missed colored eggs, lilies, and spring dresses.  I often miss birthday cakes with candles, decorative ribbon and fluffy bows.  I constantly think about roast turkey and baked ham, and what I wouldn't give for a good old-fashioned holiday barbeque!

I also miss certain days, including American national holidays and family birthdays.  Although I never used to think it would be possible, such celebrations have become even more precious to me since I left the United States over seven years ago.

 

A "celebration" is usually defined as a joyful occasion that marks a significant event.  But I noticed this past week that Webster's Dictionary also defines it as "any joyous diversion."  There's a lesson in that for me, because although I cannot always celebrate holidays and special occasions as I would like, the Lord often sprinkles a variety of joyous diversions into my days of service in Kenya. 
 

I was reminded of this twice last weekend.  While conducting Officers' Councils in the Eldoret Division, Ken and I noticed that one young couple had brought their baby girl with them, which is never done.  When we inquired about it, we were told that the little girl's name is Precious Jolene Shivisi.  The parents had brought her hoping that Ken would agree to dedicate her to the Lord, which he was glad to do.  I recalled as I watched that, although I had missed celebrating my own little girl's 21st birthday last week, the Lord was granting me a joyous diversion.

 

But that wasn't all.  After Officers Councils had concluded, we visited the Race Course Corps, which essentially consists of two mud structures in the slums of Eldoret.  Yet the entire community lined the road to welcome us.  The Army band and timbrels played as they marched behind our vehicle.  There was singing and dancing, and children surrounded our car to get a good look at the "wazungu" (white people).  It was overwhelming.

 

 

   

Arriving on the Race Course Corps compound

 

After Ken proudly laid the foundation stone for a new corps building, we were ushered into the little corps building.  Once my eyes adjusted to the dark, I was amazed to see that the building was so jammed with people that children literally stuffed themselves in through the windows.  They simply did not want to miss the celebration.  Of course, there was lots of singing and dancing, but Ken later told me why this particular celebration was different.

After the elections of 2007, the slums around the Race Course Corps were among the nation's most violent.  Scores of residents were slaughtered in the streets, many of them right outside the Army compound.  But in the midst of it all, the corps officer at the time determined that his corps would be a refuge for those in need.  So he put on his full white uniform, donned his Army cap, and stood boldly at the entrance to the compound, all the while clutching his Bible to his chest.  He loudly declared sanctuary, and those who were in danger streamed into the corps.  But the rioters never dared to enter.

So for me, the "joyous diversions" I experienced at Officers' Councils and the Race Course Corps were ultimately an affirmation of life itself.  But that's just like Kenyans, because these wonderful people celebrate life every day.  In fact, they've taught me what it really means to live.  Their joy constantly reminds me that, if we are faithful in His service, there will be cause for celebration every single day.

  

 Blessed are the people who know the passwords of praise,
who shout on parade in the bright presence of God.
Delighted, they dance all day long; they know
who you are, what you do—they can’t keep it quiet!
Your vibrant beauty has gotten inside us—
you’ve been so good to us! We’re walking on air!
All we are and have we owe to God,
Holy God of Israel, our King! 

Psalm 89:15-18 (THE MESSAGE)

 

Showers of Blessings

Many a man curses the rain that falls upon his head,

and knows not that it brings abundance to drive away the hunger. 

Saint Basil

 

 

How many officers and employess does it take to get Territorial leaders into their vehicle during a fierce rain storm?  Well, it takes one to fetch the vehicle, another to turn it around, a third to hold the umbrella while Mama is climbing in, a fourth to help Ken get in on his side, a fifth to put our briefcases in the back, and one more to open the gate, give us a smart salute, and wave goodbye with a broad smile.  Boy, how I love my Kenyan family!
 

Over the last few months, which have been characterized by sweltering heat, I have been dreaming of the cooler days that accompany the 'long rains' of March through May.  I think it is now safe to say that they have arrived.  Last night, for example, there was lots of thunder and lightning, and it rained so long and so hard that Ken and I ended up praying earnestly that the Lord would protect our home and Headquarters building.  A quick inspection this morning revealed that our prayers were answered, as our home suffered no damage, and we found nothing at THQ that was completely under water.  In fact, God went above and beyond and actually provided electricity to our home throughout the storm, something which my colleagues tell me is a true miracle. 

 

The long rains are late here in Kakamega, but thankfully, we need no longer fear that the farmers (and our officers) will lose their crops.  So everyone seems to be breathing a sigh of relief.  Indeed, we are all thanking the Lord for His provision.




The Hodder's banana tree on our shamba (farm plot)

Still, even as we celebrate the heavy rains, my heart aches for our people who live in Turkana, a remote and arid part of the Territory.  According to Oxfam International , Turkana has suffered greatly over the past twenty years due to climate change, and water is very scarce.  As the rivers dry up, open-pit wells are dug in order to water livestock and obtain drinking water.  There are only a handful of such wells, though, and families must often travel several hours with their small herds in order to reach them.  On top of that, the water is often contaminated. 

 

So whenever our staff visits any village or town in Turkana,  the entire community shows up, all of them hoping to get a bite of food and a little water.  And the officers who serve there often go without fruit or vegetables on their dinner tables.

 

Children collecting water from The Salvation Army mobile water tank.

The Army does everything we can to help our people.  But even when our limited resources run low, we still distribute hope.  That's because we always share the gospel, the source of living water.

 

Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said,
 rivers of living water will flow from within them.

John 7:38 (NIV)

Thank you, Lord, for the showers of blessings that are promised to those who look to you. 

Our Precious Children

Whoever receives a little child because of me, receives me.

Matthew 18:5 (NLT)

 

The Salvation Army is known in this Territory for its operation and sponsorship of more than 800 schools.  This includes kindergartens, primary schools, and secondary schools, as well as a range of special institutions for those who are disabled, deaf, blind, or mentally challenged.  In sum, the Army supervises the education of more than 288,000 students every year in Kenya West, and so it is not uncommon for a businessman or woman to walk up to Ken and me and proudly tell us which Army school they attended.

But, as you can imagine, the responsibility of caring for so many children is often overwhelming.

 

Recently our Mayoyo School heard about some deaf children living nearby in the bush.  They were not going to school.  So without thinking how they would be housed or fed, the staff simply went out and brought them in.  Now, the children are being educated, but at night, they have to sleep on the floor in a room that serves both as a library and a classroom under the watchful eye of a volunteer.  We hope to build a dormitory and purchase proper beds. 

 

 

One of the biggest challenges in our schools is the chigoe flea, which is very common in western Kenya.  It's a small flea that lives in the dirt and will burrow into exposed skin in order to lay its eggs.  Once there, a chigoe flea can do a great deal of damage.  So at our Emuhaya Primary School, the children bring cow dung from home every Friday to spread on the ground.  In the absence of a floor, it's the best way to protect their feet.  The dung is smeared over the dirt floor of the classrooms and then allowed to dry over the weekend.  Needless to say, we're looking for funds to provide concrete floors instead.

  

 

 

 

Illula Special Primary is our school for albino children.  Albinos face a good deal of discrimination in African society, and because some witchcraft cults consider their organs to have magical powers, they often face physical danger as well.  So Illula Primary is where these children come to be protected, accepted, and educated.  We work hard to see that they have a good supply of hats and sunscreen!
 

 

Sochoi Primary School is one of those places that desperately needs new facilities.  Its timber structures, which are still in use, were built in 1953.  Here's a picture of the dormitory in which the boarding students live.

 

 

 

These are just a few of our special cases.  More generally, it's absolutely routine for our children to walk to school barefoot.  Many also arrive hungry.  And all of them need love.  In fact, for those who are orphans, the Army is the only family they will ever know. 

So while it is clearly a privilege to be entrusted with these children, it is also a great responsibility.  Magic Johnson once said, "All kids need is a little help, a little hope, and somebody to believe in them."  That's true, but I also think that man can't do it alone.  This place has taught me that it takes more than programmes and well-wishers.  It takes the Lord.

Ken and I pray every day that, through what our colleagues are doing here, the children will find hope, a better future, and ultimately, a relationship with God through Christ.

Dear God, help us to care for your children!

 

Just Enough Faith

Show me loving-kindness, O God, show me loving-kindness.
For my soul goes to You to be safe. And I will be safe in the shadow of Your wings until the trouble has passed. 

Psalm 57:1 (NLV)

 



As he held me in his arms and kissed me goodbye, Ken looked directly into my eyes and gave me the warning he gives every time he leaves the compound:  "Stay on the path."  I have to admit that the first few times he gave me that warning, I quickly dismissed his words from my mind.  But since learning recently that this area is known for its cobras and vipers, I've started to pay attention. 

 

Of course, I have my warnings for Ken too.  Whenever he attempts to fix anything electrical or climbs on a ladder, I run to his side with the words, "Be careful!"  Then I remind him how far away the nearest emergency facilities are.

 

We also received a series of warnings before the recent elections.  Frankly, there was a lot of fear in Kenya leading up to that process.  Schools and business closed, and residents stocked up on supplies.  Since I was designated by the American Embassy as the warden for this area, I tried to track down some of the other Americans living here.  I found that many had already left the country, and that most others were planning to leave.  It just wasn't considered a good time to be in Kenya.

 



Political demonstration in Kakamega

 

The Salvation Army's March for Peace in Kakamega



Election Day was declared a national holiday, which gave citizens an opportunity to make the safari back to their homes in order to vote.  For several days, the streets were strangely quiet . . . too quiet, really, as the community braced itself for a repeat of the violence that took place after the 2007 election.  Ken and I were glued to the TV, and I ran to my phone every time I received a text update from the Embassy. 

 

The results were finally announced last Saturday, and despite the fact that there will be an appeal by the losing side to the Supreme Court, there was no violence, and the streets of Kakamega have slowly returned to normal.  Still, since our newly elected President and Vice President are scheduled to go on trial in the International Criminal Court later this year, who knows what the future holds?

 

It's a simple fact of life.  There will always be fear.  I will always be afraid of snakes and large spiders.  I will always worry about my husband, and I will always be concerned about those whom I love and serve.

But if I make sure that my faith is always just slightly bigger than my fear, I will be just fine.  So I ask the Lord every day to give me the confidence that comes only from relying upon Him.  When I do, fear is gone.