It has been three months since we arrived in Nairobi.  I am finally getting around to blogging.  There is much to say.  I am not sure where to start.  I want this blog to be like a journal, an avenue to express
myself, but also a method of communicating and recording our family’s experience as missionaries in Africa.  I pray that I am open enough for you, the reader, to see into my heart. I hope that my words are transparent, that I will not keep anything hidden.  Only then, will you be able to know all that the Lord is doing in our lives.

We spent the first two months going through AIM’s orientation to African culture.  The program consisted of three weeks in Machakos while staying at Scott Theological College, followed by four weeks of living with a Kenyan family.  Needless to say, our family went through one transition after the other.  There was a full gamut of physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual challenges.  This is my main reason for not blogging earlier.  I have been trying to process it all.  Many times I have sat down at the computer, only to be staring at a blank screen.  I have missed our dear family and friends so much that it hurts.  Each amazing experience has been underlined by the fact that some of the most special people in my life aren’t physically here to share it.  There are times when I feel like my heart is going to explode.  I have never been put in this situation before.  Family and friends have always been a short drive away - or at least a phone call away.  Forgive me for not blogging earlier.  Originally, I desired to do so every week.  I wanted you to know exactly what was going on at the time.  However, when I started to write anything, I would start crying.  My words were weak in expressing the complexity of my emotions - pure joy at finally being in the place that God called us, mixed with an aching sadness of people and home. After three months of silence to the world of blogging, the numbness is passing and I am ready to share.  Instead of backtracking over the last three months, I am going to start with the present, knowing that the past will emerge.

This week was a huge milestone for me.  Paul went to Uganda for a couple of days to help out with IT. I took this opportunity to go on an adventure with the boys since we had the car.  This was to be my fourth time driving in Nairobi.  We set out to experience the city life, me with my handy street map and the boys with their sense of adventure. Let me start by saying that driving here in Africa is just pure craziness.  If you read some of Paul’s blogs, you will know what I am talking about.  If not, let me explain.  First of all, it is hard enough to remember that the car needs to be  on the LEFT side of the road. Then, throw in some traffic circles - most of which lack street signs, pedestrians crossing in front of you with no warning, and from every direction, men pulling wagons that take up most of the lane…oh, and there are rarely lanes painted on the roads.  Did I mention the potholes?  Everyone is trying their best to avoid them which means that you will go into their lane and they will come into yours.  Finally, come the Matatu drivers (public transportation), who follow no rules. The concept of defensive driving has a new meaning in Nairobi.  Well, I must say that I felt liberated to be able to drive my boys across town and return in one piece! Ten minutes into the journey, we found our selves in a traffic jam.  Our car was completely stopped.  The air conditioning ceased to work and it was a warm day.  In Nairobi, it is not safe to have the windows rolled down, especially in a jam. Therefore, we sweated it out.  The boys were troopers and I just kept reminding myself that this was PART of the adventure.  Traffic started picking up, but only to find us going through a traffic circle with no signs.  I had to guess which way to go.  After heading down the street, I finally spotted a street sign informing me we were on the wrong road.  After turning and backtracking, I did it again.  Oh, how I was wishing to be back where I knew the roads and there were no traffic circles! After an hour and a half of driving, it should have been only 40 minutes, we arrived at our destination.  We went to a mall where there was an outside market for the Masai people.  The boys and I enjoyed looking at all the hand made items and getting to talk with the people.  Petr learned how to bargain and bought a small stone in the shape of a heart.  He talked the lady down from 30 shillings (about 45 cents) to 20 shillings (about 30 cents).  I was so proud of him!  Somehow, Andrej got one for free from another lady.  I think he batted his big blue eyes….those eyes really stick out here!  After our LONG drive to the market, I decided to try a different route home, thinking that it would be easier.  I was very wrong.  I got completely lost after hitting another traffic circle with no street signs.  We ended up in the middle of downtown.  I realized that we were heading in a direction that lead to a very unsafe area.  After lots of prayer and an opportunity to study the map while stuck in traffic (once again!), I was able to find the way home.  During the chaos, Andrej fell asleep. But, Petr was wide awake. He was well aware that we were lost.  I was glad to have him to talk to and knowing I had to keep calm for him, helped me stay calm. I just kept driving with as much confidence as possible.  When I saw that we were going to make it home, I couldn’t help yelling out, “I know this street.  Petr, I know how to get home!” Petr replied, “Praise the Lord!”  And we did!

The youngest child at Morningstar Children’s Home was found as a newborn in a plastic bag thrown in a river.  Just a couple of weekends ago we were invited to go to his birthday party.  It was a great time, and since we had not seen the kids for a couple of weeks it was fun to see them all at their home again.

I am sure plenty of people are curious about our house in Nairobi.  There are a few pics in the gallery now so feel free to check them out.  Hopefully your bandwidth is faster than ours…

I have been thinking about this for a long time, and meant to write it here, but I never got around to it.  A friend emailed me recently and I wrote him a reply, the significant portions I have reproduced here.

God really does want us to abandon all and serve Him with everything in our being.  However, many people go off the deep end in a direction that He would not have them go.  I see some of those here.  The key is to figure out what He is saying.  John 10:4 has been really help for me, because I often wonder, “What would God have me do?”

“And when he brings out his own sheep, he goes before them; and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice.” NKJV

It is our job as sheep to know His voice. Before we go anywhere, we need to learn how He talks to us.  Every day, every moment, where is the shepherd?  I often feel like the lost sheep, but He promises to go after us.

It has been a real joy living here.  At first the prospect of living in the midst of such poverty was a bit scary.  I knew, living so close to Kibera, that people were going to be coming by all the time asking for money.  I hate that.  I used to hate that.  On the advice of another missionary, I see each of those circumstances a chance to see “where the shepherd is.” I try to understand what the Holy Spirit is telling me to do, just at that time.  Should I give a job, food, milk, money, or not?  Eventually that kind of thinking starts to invade (in a good way) the rest of your life.  God is always there, we just act like we have to go somewhere to see Him.

Abandon all and follow the Shepherd.  You will not regret it.  I cannot give you that guarantee, but then it would not mean anything coming from me.  Take it from Him.

I just spent the last few days in Entebbe with a trip to Kampala for some computer equipment. It has been a great time, and it has been a real jump start to my vision to be able to serve missionaries all across (East?) Africa. Other than the logistical firsts, I wanted to share some fun things that happened here.
I went to Kampala with Fred, the day guard at the house where I was staying. We took a boda-boda in Kampala. In Kenya that usually refers to bicycles, but here in Uganda they are mostly scooters. Mine was a motorcyle, with at least a 125cc engine (not small for here). It serves the purpose of a taxi, with more cargo than any taxi you may have used. So the driver, Fred and myself rode up through town to the Equitoria Hotel. We did not have a 30kg bag of matoke (bananas) so the engine did not have any trouble.
We took a “taxi” back to Entebbe (which is what they call a matatu in Kenya, a 15 passenger minivan). There was one woman with a box of chickens on board.
I will post more later, and maybe some pictures.

Three times a week, at Chai time, we have devotions at the hangar.  As our staff pastor was talking about Isaiah something hit me.  We serve and awesome God.

Think about that for a moment…

He is the creator of all the universe. He is great beyond measure, beyond description.  And He loves you beyond as well.

That should change everything in your life. You should be willing to do anything for Him. If you are not excited to serve Him, you do not know Him well enough.

I came to this conclusion over the weekend, and it is important.  I am not a volunteer, I am a servant.  I am not doing God a favor by being here, by serving Him. I am simply obeying. A servant does not get kudos for doing his job, he does what he is told and that is the end of it. God does not need you.

Having said that, know that God is love.  He knows what is best.  He will take care of His children.

I am being taken care of better now than when I had a “real” job.  I have less of what I want, but more of what I need.

What do you want,  easy or good?  Once you realize that God’s way is the best, you do not miss the conveniences of life.

Life here is very different.  I cannot explain it in a blog post, I am not even sure I can explain it at all.

As humans we tend to like to simplify things.  So coming here, the idea that life in Africa is slower is an easy one to get your head around.  Some things are slower, much slower.  It is true that everything moves at a different speed, but it is not uniformly different.  Some things actually move faster (including, but not limted to, public transportation).

We finally have a fuel cylinder for our stove.  We purchased a stove that is half electric, half gas.  This give us the flexability to cook if we have no gas, or if there is no power.  Everyday for about 2 weeks I went to a grocery store on my way home.  Each day he assured me they would bring it tomorrow.  Eventually, he was right.  That is just a little story to set the stage for what I want to say.

When everything changes, your basis for what is normal, and what is acceptable begins to float.  It has no anchor.  It is going to take a while to even understand what is normal and acceptable here.  When I am driving, sometimes I feel like I’ve really angered someone and they do not seem to even notice.  Other times I will do something I think is normal and get lots of honks and hands waving.

All of this points to more of the same cultural things that I have been thinking about and what we talked about extensively at ABO.  But it is not just about culture, it is about what you think is normal, or acceptable.  Much of what we think is not informed by God, but by our experience.  Not that all experience is bad, but we need to be careful about how we construct our normal and what we accept.

It boils down to, “What does the Bible really say?” And since that is a very complicated question, it would behoove us all to spend more time figuring it out, and for every context in which we find ourselves.

I know we have not been writing much and you are probably interested in what is going on here. Work for me is pretty busy as I am trying to get up to speed at the hangar as well as starting to plan on how to help missions with IT across other parts of Africa. As you might imagine, this does not leave a lot of down time at the office. We still do not have internet at home, something I am working on, so it makes blogging a bit tough. So I am posting this from my phone.
We are settled into the house, and the boys have started home school. We even had tacos for dinner last Friday. I did not know how much I missed tortillas.
Hopefully more to come soon.

I finished off my first week at work last week and it was an interesting time.  I have not been to “work” for over 2 months and it felt nice to sit at a computer and hammer out some things. IT is completely different now.  Not only am I in Africa where many things work differently, but I am working for a missions organization where there is no profit motive.  That changes everything around.  It is going to take me a while to figure it all out, not technically, but spiritually.

We finished off the week by going back up to Harvesters in Karuri where I was priviledged to preach.  I guess I am getting more accustomed to being here, I did not even have a watch or a clock and no one commented on how short it was (anything under 75 minutes is considered a short message, especially  outside Nairobi). I had been preparing a message, but Saturday night it did not seem to be the right one.  So I started with a different one sort of feeling lost, but after worship and hearing from the visitors to the church I knew God had given me the right one.

After church we were able to have lunch with the translator and his wife and the wife of another Pastor who was preaching at Umoja.  It was a special time because the house we ate in was partly paid for by the sale of our house in La Mesa over a year ago.

Mungu ni mwema, wakati wote. (God is good all the time)