outreach pt II

week one: we went to masai land. the masai are a relatively well-known tribe in kenya & tanzania. we slept in an empty home next to the church. the land was flat and beautiful and enormous. the sky was bigger than ive ever seen before. the stars were brighter than ive ever seen before. the people were so friendly & welcoming. our stay there was first class. my team of 12 managed to consume 10 chickens and two goats within a span of 6 days. figure that one out.
the ministry was relatively slow. most of the people around were believers already, and so we spent most of our time working within the church and at the church members houses.
this week i got pretty personal with the Lord. i sat and watched the sunset one night, and realized He painted it just for me. i remembered asking my own dad to draw unicorns for me when i was little, and God showed me He can do alot better than that. also, one night i asked for a shooting star. i sat there and waited and waited, and then it came. it all occured to me at once that the God who is so big He controls the stars, actually listens to me when i speak to Him. that blew my mind. i got to spend my birthday with the masai people and my team. they overwhelmed me with blessing. i was amazed at God. i was amazed i was in africa at my age, i was amazed that i am who i am at this age, i was amazed at what God has done for,to,through me for the last 18 years. i was amazed.
there was this guy, his name was lapapa. he is lame, and he crawls by himself everywhere he goes. he can't really communicate. he loves dancing. he always comes to church, and he always sits in the back. i noticed him right from the beginning, and my heart moved inside of me. this week, i spent much time praying for him, talking with him, being with him.
i realized this week that my ministry will be to the forgotten ones. the ones in the background, the ones left out by the other people, the other christians. these are the ones that draw my attention. this week blessed my heart.

week two: we spent in olololunga- or something like that. still in masai land. this place was very different. it was closer to town and the people were very different. more closed. less hospitable. we went for door to door for the first few days. i got to stay with a beautiful family- the saderas. they were so precious. i could only speak to them in swahili, so after about an hour, communication was limited. the mother, mary, was so sweet. i felt pretty at home there, although we had to pee in the bush and i didnt shower all week. we got to do devotions with them in the evening, and upon leaving the father said "you have reminded us what it means to be a family, to be united again." this was a miracle.
i got to see three people meet Jesus for the first time this week. one was a little girl that we met in the neighbors house, the other was a young guy who tended to the cows, and the other was a boy that stayed with the family i stayed with. these were beautiful experiences.
at the end of the week i got food poisoning and moved to a different house and laid in bed all day. thats about it.

week three: pokot. so, the journey there was 2 days long. after an overnight bus ride (on which none of us slept), we took a matatu from kitale to some other town. then, we waited there for like 3 hours and got to speak to the street kids- that was touching. then, went on a lori to kapanguria. i got to sit on the very top for 4 hours straight. although i felt like my butt was going to fall off, it was incredible. i was so thankful and free. the scenery was beautiful- like nothing ive ever seen before. it was a once in a lifetime experience. then, our wheel broke and we waited in a small town until dark- for 2 hours. after that, we went for about 7km more until the lori finally broke down completely. this was at about 10 at night. the girls took another lori to the nearest town- sigor. we slept on benches in a restaurant-type thing that was open all night. the guys slept in the back of the truck with the luggage, while it was raining. all of us were so tired that we didnt even care what happened. it was hilarious. the next morning at 4, we found a different lori and finally went to the place we were staying. we were staying at a church building that a team from the previous year built there. all of the sudden, the lori pulled over on the side of the road and we had arrived. everything looked exactly the same and the church was so subtle that we were like, "we travelled two days to get..here?" we were welcomed by several old women that spoke no swahili. they had slept under the trees that night waiting for us.
that week was intense. the days were boiling! and there were no buildings beside the church, so there was no shade. there was one well that we got our water from. the water was so salty that when you drank it, you felt more thirsty. we did door to door for a few days. this means we just walked in the bush for a few hours until we stumbled across someone's manyatta. we saw most everyone come to salvation after we shared Jesus with them. at night, some of us slept in the tents, some outside under the stars. i slept under the stars, it was so great! my favorite. we had no toilet, so we all peed in the bush. we had no shower, so we also showered in the bush near the well. it was hilarious because all of the young girls would just come and stare at us showering, and they didn't even speak swahili so there is nothing we could do except smile. so good.
connecting with the people was by far the biggest challenge for me. there was a huge language barrier, we needed 2 different translators most of the time, which were scarcely available. so talking wasnt always an option. but there were always people from the community at our place. they just sat under the trees and talked all day long.
i learned more this week than any other week ive ever lived through.
-as we were sitting inside of a manyatta, struggling to all fit through the door and find places to sit inside, we discussed what life here would really be like. i imagined what it would be like to really sleep here every night, to be uncertain about the food id eat that day, and what it would like when i first woke up in the morning, knowing all i would do that day would be fetch water, take care of cows, cook, sit and talk. it hit me all at once that these people know no different. most of them arent educated at all, especially the adults. it made that verse, "my people perish for lack of knowledge" very real to me. the truth of it was staring me in the face. i thanked God for the knowledge i had, and i still do.
-another thing that occured to me was that God defies logic sometimes. there isnt even a reliable doctor available to these people, they drink salty water straight from the well and milk treated with herbs. they dont eat daily and they are in the hot sun all day. the kids dont wear clothes and their mothers leave them unattended to for long periods of time. they dont have shoes and thorn trees are everywhere. the land is so dry, it produces nothing. how do people live here? how does any of this happen? the grace of God, thats the only answer. His hand is upon them daily. it made me realize not only how big He is, but also how simple He is. to them, that literally is all that He means to them. "the One who gives me food, takes care of my cows, keeps me alive." and as long as they acknowledge that, they are good to go, because we are all held accountable to our knowledge. who can understand the mind of God, right?
-the girls here are basically sold for marriage as young as age 12. they are taken out of school, circumcised, and forced to marry someone so that father gets the cows. when fathers speak of their daughters, they speak of how many cows they are worth. usually after marriage, the wife's job is only to produce kids. if she can't do that, the man usually gets another wife. if the wife doesnt want to have any more kids, she wont shower for months so the man loses his attraction for her and moves on. the strangest thing is- most women don't express dissatisfaction with this life, especially the ones with no education. again, they dont know any different. they dont know what its like to be in relationship or feel loved. this birthed in me a deep realization that the only reason i am who i am, i live where i live, i do what i do, i believe what i believe- is because of God. He could easily have chosen to make me one of these girls in pokot that wouldnt know any different, but He didnt. He put me in the family im in, gave me the opportunities ive had, showed me all these things about Him. and it occured to me that this life i have really isnt mine, its His. and i decided to give it all back to Him.
-i really value relationships now. with my friends and with my family- especially my parents. i see now that relationships arent just automatic or natural, they are really a gift from God. and i know now they are one of the greatest gifts He could ever give us. i am deeply, deeply changed by this new gratefulness.

this place really struck a chord in me. i knew i didnt want the only thing to come out of this time here to be "now, im really thankful." i knew i couldnt just turn my back on this place and continue to forget it like the rest of the world. i knew that the only appropriate response was to do something. what that is exactly, which specific role i play, im not sure. but i know God will show me.
also, we made a documentary about this place and these people. whenever its finished, ill put it on the internet or something & show it in churches and things.

week four & five: these weeks we spent just outside of nairobi. we did mostly school ministry the first week, and the second week i spent working on the documentary at a friends house in nairobi. i got to speak to many highschoolers the first week, and it was a blessing to share God's heart with them.

i think the biggest over arching lesson i learned on this outreach was that God is not finished with me yet. there are parts of my life and my heart that are incomplete. there is insecurity that really keeps me in hiding sometimes, especially in ministry- in expressing Gods heart for people. i know that deeper healing needs to take place so that i can be a lot more like Jesus in my interactions with people. i am ready to wait as long as it takes and do what i need to do in order to go through this process. Jesus' ministry was only 3 years long, but it was the most effective and earth-shattering one because it came from a life of total wholeness. He had much wholeness to offer people. i want this wholeness also. and im willing to wait.
another thing is that ministry is not about the words said, its not about preaching and door to door. its about the atmosphere we create for people. an atmosphere of love and true compassion moves people into the heart of God. an atmosphere of "im only here because i have to be" simply doesnt.
it all boils down to love. per usual.
knowing God, that makes complete sense.