Nakuru Prison Visit

 By Anthony:

I had the privilege of visiting Nakuru prison this January with a missionary friend from Nakuru, Joel Beauchamp.  I have had always had a passion for prison ministry.  I used to lead jail ministry in Grand Rapids, Michigan with Madison Square Christian Reformed Church.  Actually I have always had a fascination with prison, which explains my huge collection of movies about life in prison.  In my daydreams, I imagine being put in prison during a time of persecution, and leading a simpler life focused on reading the Bible and ministering to others.  Sometimes I think there would be something comforting about having limited options, and less decisions to make.  More things doesn't mean more happiness.  See my old post - The paralysis of too much freedom.  However, I'm sure actually living in prison would be super tough.  But if I ever end up there, I'll just become a teacher and pastor there.

Anyway, since Joel does regular prison ministry as his main missionary work here, I jumped at the chance to visit, during the holiday break, just to see what prison ministry is like here in East Africa.  With my schedule at the college, this could only be a one time visit, but perhaps sometime in the future, somewhere in East Africa, I could do prison ministry part-time.

The prison has about 1000-1500 men, besides the women in their separate facility.  Life is hard for them, with limited food to eat, and no soap, toiletries, and things of that nature unless given as gifts by missionaries or local churches.  What is most interesting to me is that the vast majority of the people there have not been declared guilty or innocent yet. They are awaiting court dates and trials.  This means that many of them are actually innocent, and yet they can sit in these prisons for years waiting for a verdict.  Terrible suffering for those who don't deserve it.  Most of Joel's group that he teaches are these men waiting for their verdict.  Yet despite the challenges they are full of the joy of the Lord.  Here is a video of their worship:

I got to witness something very special that day.  They were at a part in their curriculum where they had to speak the truth in love to one another.  They do this every so often.  They each have to identify others in the group that they can say something positive about their spiritual growth, and identify someone to give constructive criticism to.  Iron sharpening iron.  There were other categories as well like work ethic, and how they deal with others in relationships.  They are not allowed to give defenses or say anything, except to accept the encouragement or criticism.

What made this whole session the most beautiful to me was that before each encouragement or criticism, they all would say, "Jacob, I love you my brother." And then Jacob would say, "I love you too."  Then they would say what they would have to say.  Then they exchanged words of love again at the end of their statement.  I could tell with so many of them that they really deeply meant those words of love, and they were criticizing out of a spirit of love to try to help each other grow.  For example, "Michael, you had a court date last week, and you didn't value prayer enough to tell us about it.  Next time you need to tell us so we can pray with you and go to God for help."  Or "David, I noticed you went to chapel to pray and that was the first time I had seen you do that.  You are growing in your walk with God."

These are the types of things that I think are critical to have real fellowship and community in our relationships and in our churches.  Yet unfortunately most of us are content to just make small talk and speak niceties and white lies.  These men are learning skills of love, communication, and spiritual growth, that I would say most Christians around the world are lacking.  They challenged me personally to be more intentional in seeking out constructive criticism, and also being willing to speak the truth in love to others.

Here is Joel teaching:

I was mostly just there to visit and see how things went.  But I had the opportunity to give them some encouragements, and they also encouraged me.  They laid hands on me and prayed for me before I left.  It was such a privilege and joy to have these brothers in Christ care for me like that.  You can pray that God continues to use Joel and this ministry, providing for him, giving him guidance and patience, and pray for these men that they would keep learning and growing in Christ, and that those who are innocent could go free, and those who are guilty would be comforted and make use of their time in prison to more deeply depend on God.

Baking at the Farm

By Sara:

I had the opportunity to teach the people who work at Berea Farm how to steam cakes. As usual, it is a really fun activity!  Also, I discovered that all of these people understand English WAY better than I speak Swahili because they were all copying down the recipes from English and could follow them without translation.  However, it's good for me that they choose to speak to me in Swahili because it forces me to keep practicing!

The fire was super smoky, but we didn't have to sit and watch the cakes cook, just to go check on them or to take them out.

The final product - a maize cake! (cornbread)

As you can see, everyone had a great time.  Baking cakes might not necessarily earn people money, but it certainly fills lives with joy, which is a gift from God.  The next week, I asked if anyone had made any cakes at home.  Three of these ladies said that they had already made several each!

Skillet Baking with Students

By Sara:

On the first week of classes at Berea this term, most of the students came late.  Since my practical class fell on the first day of class, I decided to do something fun with the three 3rd year students who were there.  We invited the one 2nd year student who had arrived at the college to join us as well as the cooks.  Everyone had lots of fun making biscuits and scones and seeing how easy they are to bake.  (The best part was tasting them, of course!)

We used a slice of plastic water bottle to cut our baked goods into circles:

At the end, since we had time and the materials, we also made flour tortillas, which the students said were like healthy chapatti and would be nice for those who don't like eating things with lots of cooking oil!

Not much was left after everyone had eaten their fill!  (They saved most of the tortillas to eat with their dinner that night)

Baringo Church Visit

By Sara:

After six months of being in Kenya, we finally went out of Nakuru for our first church visit (in early January)!  One of the part-time lecturers at Berea College is a pastor in the main Anglican church in Marigat, which is in a district called Baringo.  It is to the north-west of where we live and is at a lower elevation, so it is much hotter and drier than Nakuru.

It was really nice to be able to visit a church again.  We've been so busy during the school term that it is too tiring to also have Sunday be a long work day.  But over the Christmas holiday, between terms, we were able to do it.

Here we are with Rev. John, his wife Jane, and their son Parmenas (named after one of the Seven in Acts 6:

Here is the front of the church.  The service was in Swahili and we were able to follow along in the prayer books.  Our Swahili is not that good, but we know enough that we understood what was going on!  Anthony preached in English, though, and the members of the congregation understood him.  I think that a lot of times, people know English very well, but are nervous to try speaking it.  I can definitely feel for them, because they know English WAY better than I know Swahili and even when I can understand someone speaking in Swahili, I don't feel very confident in my ability to respond.

We had the interesting experience of meeting Donald Trump at this church...  Okay, not the US president, but this child who was baptized that Sunday:

(Anthony wants you to know that his hair isn't weird in this photo below - there are just flowers on the wall behind him!)  Rev. John's son Parmenas is a very active kid and enjoyed hanging out in front of Anthony while he preached.  Anthony preached about justification, the same topic as he preached about in Soroti in December.  The church appreciated it very much and Rev. John commented that it is a very clear and important message for people to know and understand.

After church, as people go out, they shake hands with the pastor, then join the greeting line.  As more people come out, they keep shaking hands and going to the end of the line.  By the time everyone has come outside, the whole congregation has greeted everyone else and then they stand in this big circle and share the grace ("May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with us all now and forevermore").  It was a really nice way to end the service because all of the members of the church got to see and greet each other and show their unity as the body of Christ.

After the service, I had the opportunity to teach some of the church members how to bake cakes by steaming them.  The people I taught are part of a microfinance group in the church (like a savings group) and Rev. John made it clear to them that they were learning these skills so they can teach other people (he even mentioned this to the whole church!) so I hope that they will indeed share with others.  Here I am explaining what different ingredients are in the recipes and what they do for a cake.

What better way to end a training than tasting cake?

We talked about how you can tell whether a cake is done or not by sticking a toothpick in the middle and seeing if there is batter or crumbs left on it.

It was a new experience for me to teach without a translator, since all of the people there were able to speak and understand English.  It's something that encourages me to keep studying hard on Swahili, because when you can communicate with people, you can get to know them better and actually form more than a superficial relationship with each other.  Below is me with a friend of John and Jane who was visiting them this weekend, and Jane.

And the two reverends: