January 2017 Prayer Letter

Friends, thank you so much for your faithful support and prayers.  You can download our latest prayer letter from this - download link.

Anthony's Road Rage

By Sara:

In case you weren't aware, Nairobi is a very modern big city.  Like all big cities, it has its problems with massive amounts of traffic.  Here are some glimpses of minor traffic jams in Nairobi (I say minor because the car we were in was moving - we've heard tales of how bad it can get and this wasn't as bad as the stories...):

You might remember Anthony's struggles with road rage.  The good news is that in this situation, we were riding with friends, so neither of us was the one driving!  But it's still stressful to be stuck in a seemingly endless line of cars like this.

Anyway, as you can tell, it's a challenge for people to get to work in Nairobi.  Either you live far away from work where the rent/housing is cheaper and have a 2-3 hour drive through the jam or you live close to work where housing is much more expensive and have maybe only a 30 minute-1 hour trip.  We admire the willingness of our World Renew colleagues to deal with this every day to get to work.

Update Video we made for Churches

By Anthony:

We sent this video to all of our supporting churches, but in case you missed it, you can download it - here - and watch it.   It's just a summary update of what we've been doing.

It's about 7 minutes long and you get a really good view of Sara's demonstration garden at the college and some of the potatoes that were grown there.

Random Things

By Sara:

First of all, I'm teaching another class at Berea College!  I have my practical class, but also a class that's basically a survey of the Old Testament.  I taught that while in Uganda at the Pentecostal Bible College, so it's exciting to get to teach it again.  I love teaching skills and I also love teaching about the Bible.  Basically, I get to teach about the two best things between my two classes.

Here are some other random fun things.  I taught some of the women who work for Anglican Development Services (ADS) and the Anglican Diocese how to steam cakes.  They really enjoyed it and Charity (in the red and yellow sweatshirt) has lost count of how many cakes she's baked since the lesson!

 A rollerblader near Nakuru.  I really don't understand how this could be fun when you're sharing the road with cars, trucks, bicycles, motorcycles, donkey carts, and pedestrians. 

 Our Christmas decorations and Advent wreath.

And some kind of really cool fungus that I found in my garden.  It looks either like bird nests or oyster shells filled with pearls.

Caleb has become more cuddly than normal.  One time when I sat on the porch, he tried to jump into my lap:

A swarm of bees that was on the ground by our neighbor's house - I didn't notice it until I was closer than I wanted to be...I just slowly backed away.

We found this mouse in the potato field:

Our friends Emily and Levy came to visit after Christmas.  We visited a nearby attraction where they have some animals and model villages for some of the different tribes of Kenya.  This is the style of hut in the old tradition of Levy's tribe, so he and Emily posed in front of the 1st wife hut since Emily is his first and only wife!

Since we have a bigger freezer than in Uganda, we bought ice cream and made oreo dessert for Anthony's birthday.  It was a pretty special treat, despite the fact that the freezer didn't keep the ice cream completely frozen.

A dog at the college had puppies and some of them followed me home one day.  I had to bring them back to their mom, but they were super cute and playful!

Soroti Visit

By Sara:

We took a short sort-of vacation to Soroti after the college modular term ended in December.  It was very short (only two full days there), but surprisingly restful.

On the way, we took an alternate route from Nakuru to Eldoret, which was maybe some few kilometers longer, but it had way less traffic and we weren't stuck behind all sorts of big trucks the whole way.  Not only that, but there was some beautiful scenery and we saw a giant tortoise walking along the side of the road (didn't stop to get a picture though) and also a group of black and white colobus monkeys (which we did stop to photograph):

It is a long day of driving, so we were relieved to arrive and get out of the car.  At the same time, though, we were also really excited just when we could see Soroti Rock in the distance because it felt like we were coming home:

On Sunday, we went to Pamba PAG, our Soroti home church.  Anthony preached, so we were there for both services.  He preached about justification and how we are saved by the righteousness of Jesus, not by our good works, so we can be confident in our salvation and not fear death.  We don't need to wonder whether we're good enough to go to heaven or not.

Since it was the Sunday before Christmas, lots of people had gone home, so the church wasn't as packed as normal.  The Ateso service also usually has less people (I think every seat was filled during the English service, but I didn't get a picture of that one).

The church is working on putting in an addition so the overflow people don't have to sit outside anymore.  They've made a lot of progress since we left last January - the only thing we had seen then was the foundation for the new structure!

After church, we were served tea, bread, and termites (they remembered that we like them).  A lady from the church collects, cooks, and sells those termites and we learned that she had started doing that after she became a Christian and gave up making local alcohol.  She decided to make it her business (people actually use the Ateso word for these termites as her second name so everyone in the community knows her for that business) and has been able to use the proceeds to send a child to school and build herself a house!

We enjoyed talking to some of our friends from church over tea.

While in Soroti, we stayed with our friends, the Tiesengas.  We all enjoyed a quick visit from Emmanuel, who Anthony and I met when we were teaching in Mbale in 2009 and who used to live in Soroti.  Now, he has moved, but was passing through, so we got to have some good conversation together.

We played lightning for a lot of hours while we were at the Tiesengas' house.  It was especially exciting playing at night!  Since it's the dry season, there was a lot of dust and wind too, which made for an interesting experience.

On Monday, our friend Edward, from World Renew, let us have friends come visit with us at his house throughout the afternoon.   These are just some of the people who came to see us.  We can't express how much we love these people and what wonderful servants of God they are!

So overall, it was a nice break from our normal work.  We are very thankful for these good friends that we have in Soroti.

Teaching Discussions and Graduation Photos

By Anthony:

Sorry for the random nature of this post but I think you will enjoy it.  I wanted to share with you some interesting topics and conversations we had in my classes throughout the last semester that did not make it in to any of the other blog posts.  And just to break up all the reading in this post, I'll intersperse some videos and pictures from the recent graduation we had here at the college right in front of our house.  The students who were graduating had finished their studies last May before we came.  College choir:

• One of the best assignments I gave last semester, was that for my New Testament introduction class each student had to read the entire New Testament over the term and answer a few questions about what they were reading.  I made them write out a promise and put their signature beneath it saying that they actually read every word.  Although we've caught some students cheating on exams here at the college (which was extremely discouraging to me), I do believe that each New Testament student faithfully completed this whole assignment.  And they loved it.  Some of them told me that most Christians here don't really think it's reasonable to think of reading the whole Bible, but now they know that they can do it, and so now some students are getting started on reading through the Old Testament on their own initiative.
• In systematic theology as well as in church history, we had difficult discussions about the Trinity and what a hard doctrine it is to understand.  It doesn't matter what culture you are in, it's a hard doctrine to accept by faith when we can't understand it fully.  My students deal with Muslims attacking their belief in the Trinity all the time, telling them that they are foolish to believe it when it doesn't make sense.
• We talked about the Donatist controversy in church history in which some church leaders suggested that if you were baptized by a priest who later denied Christ during times of persecution, that you should be baptized again now that you know the priest was a fraud.  In response, Augustine argued that the power and efficacy of the baptism depends on Christ, not on the person officiating, and so people should not be baptized again.  This was interestingly a really relevant discussion for today in Kenya.  I was told many church members do not want to take communion at church because they know their pastor is corrupt.  But the application would be that we can still take communion without trying to judge the holiness of the priest.  (Though I also insisted that they should put such pastors under church discipline).
• In systematic theology, we had a discussion about African Christian theology.  There is a great emphasis on what God can do for me now, about God as healer, God as provider, and God as the conqueror of Satan and witchcraft, our protector.  But there is little emphasis on the cross in general.  I think the opposite is true for many of us Americans.  We look at the cross a lot, but we don't see the relevance of God in our current lives now, that he is living and active and can actually heal our diseases and actually work in our lives.  We should all be more balanced, though I do think the cross is the most important, as it is the central message of each Gospel story in the Bible.
• Also in systematic theology, we had a discussion about work.  Some of the students, like so many I have come across in East Africa, view work itself as a curse, not a gift.  I then teach that work is a gift from God, part of what it means to be human, but it has been cursed and become more difficult, but it is not a curse in itself.  This greatly transforms the way you think about your daily work and how to get out of poverty.
• I had a private discussion with a student who has been getting pressure to get married yet who does not want to get married, and perhaps even feels called to celibacy.  But it is extremely difficult in this culture, just like in Uganda, to not get married, especially if you want to be a church leader.

The library at the college:

Graduation tents on the lawn right in front of our house:

College student choir:

People love to get up close to take photos:

• In systematic theology, we had a very important discussion about justification, how we are saved completely by faith, not by works.  That Jesus took our punishment completely, and gave us his righteousness, so that we can be declared righteous before God.  African theologian Matthew Michael claims that justification is one of the least preached doctrines in Africa.  In my experience, this is true.  Pastors fear that preaching this will cause people to have an excuse to sin.   If we are saved even if we sin, then we can go out and sin!  So instead people don't believe in justification and live in fear, not knowing whether they will be saved or not.  They trust in Christ.  But they believe on judgment day God will examine us to see whether we've done more good than bad, and they are not sure if they will be let into heaven.  Some also believe if you happen to die before confessing a sin from that week, that you will go to Hell.  It was a privilege to be able to teach about this and help my students to make sure first for themselves that they are accepting God's grace fully and living without fear.  I now think they are doing so.  They are really getting it.  I know they are getting it when I get bombarded with questions continually.  They are a good class, eager to learn.  They now understand that those who are truly born again, will want to live for God and please him, and while we won't be perfect, we will try to fight against sin, and live a life characterized by repentance and confession.
• In church history we talked about simony, the buying and selling of church positions.  Several of the students were worried that such things still happen behind the scenes today in Kenya.  There is rampant corruption in the Kenyan government, but it appears it affects the Church as well.  You should know that this is one of the most discouraging and depressing things getting me down lately, seeing how much corruption is in the Church, and seeing that even some of the students at the college act dishonestly.  Please pray for me about this that I can help such students to grow in Christ and become more honest.  In our development class also, we talked long about the issue of corruption in Kenya.  It was discouraging to see that the students' conclusion is that there is nothing that they can do to get rid of corruption in Kenya, and they don't want to suffer or die by trying to change things.  But by the end, they decided at the very least that they can set a good example by doing things right themselves and keep their own integrity.
• In church history, we were talking about icons and images.  This led into an interesting discussion about pictures of Jesus being a mzungu (white person).  Some of the students lamented about Sunday School materials and pictures they had seen as kids that showed Satan as a black man, and Jesus as a white man.
• In a special session outside of class, the students led a discussion among themselves about homosexuality.  I attended to listen, but also gave some comments at the end.  I was really surprised because it could have been in any American classroom.  Just as back at home, here some were having difficulty seeing homosexual relations as sinful.  Others advocated giving love and compassion to homosexuals while still calling them out of a sinful life of giving in to homosexuality.  One of the big problems they saw was that to call homosexuals out of sin, or to give unrepentant homosexuals church discipline, is seen as a hypocritical activity because they don't do much church discipline for other sins anymore.  This is the same problem we have back in the US.  We don't want to put homosexuals under church discipline because we also don't put people under church discipline for adultery, divorce, fornication, or pornography.  Naturally, we don't want to be hypocrites.  So it seems churches worldwide are instead going in the direction of tolerating all sexual sin, instead of being hypocritical..  I wish we took the third choice, of being serious about all sin and trying to help each other live for Christ.
• We had a discussion about pluralism (all religions being equal and all leading to salvation).  This was another surprise for me.  As rampant as pluralism is in the US, it is rampant here as well, and I was shocked to hear that the way some of the students thought of their faith was very pluralistic.  They fully trust in Christ and the Bible, but think other religions can still be saved by being good people in their religions.  You can see how much this is connected to other issues, such as not understanding the doctrine of justification, that we are saved completely by faith in Christ, and not by works, not by being a good person.
• I'm excited to teach preaching next year (homiletics).  75% of sermons I've heard since being in Kenya are inspirational messages - "People will discourage you from being a leader, but you can do it!"  There is urgent need for teaching about really preaching what a biblical passage says, and focusing on God and his grace.

Some of the college's teachers - next to Sara is our good friend Charles.  He has definitely been our best friend here so far, but we are really sad because he took a new job at another school and so he moved away at the end of December.  We will keep in touch, but we are losing not only our good friend to talk to, but my jogging partner, ping pong partner, our Swahili teacher, animal sitter, and our colleague.

This is our bishop of Nakuru Diocese, also a friend.