Nakuru for the Night

We slept well at the guest house on Monday night and headed for Nakuru - home of the Africa Gospel Baby Center and Lakeview Africa Gospel Church. Our first stop was lunch in Nakuru and then over to the church.

Lakeview Africa Gospel Church was once on an empty plot of land - 25 years ago. This was the place I spent a summer working with the Kenya 8445 Team to build a Christian Education building out of brick. At the same time we were building, they were building their very first sanctuary. I was only 15 years old. It was here I met the Holy Spirit - out in the middle of the field in "prayer closet."

I could not imagine the changes. I am thrilled to report, the church now has over 1000 people coming on Sunday mornings in addition to a school of over 100 kids. The school has ages 2-6th grade for now. They have built an additional sanctuary and now use the first one for classroom space. Pastor Michael introduced our team to the children in school at the time and shared my story. I had a chance to pray for the school and the church - what a gift. The building we built is still standing and being used for classrooms for the school.

I had just been reading in Hebrews 11 about the heroes of the faith - who never got to experience the promises - but had faith anyway. I was so blessed to be able to go back and see the little efforts from 25 years ago were continuing to bless the Kingdom of God and lives were being touched.

The other highlight for the team was going to the Baby Center. This is the current home for 28 orphaned babies all under age 4. There is a team of incredibly devoted people that take care of these children and pray for permanent homes. Soon, the Baby Center will welcome a set of triplets from Tenwek.

It was hard to say goodbye to these sweet angels. The hugs, giggles, snuggles and smiles warmed out hearts and gave us faces and names to pray for. Please pray for the families who will one day adopt these children.

We have arrived at Tenwek today and will get a tour of the hospital compound tomorrow. The trip to Tenwek reminded so many of us of the Northwest. The stark contrast was the animals on the roadside, or on the road, multiple produce stands, brightly painted buildings advertising the local cell phone companies and the mad dashes towards our vehicles when we stopped with people trying to sell their goods. the sweetest pineapples I've ever tasted for only 35 cents each.

The most beautiful view today, other than the sunrise in the morning, was the thousands of acres of tea fields. THOUSANDS all picked by hand. The best tea comes from Kenya and is exported. They say what you can buy here in the country isn't the best - but they send it away. (Red Rose is Kenyan Tea for you Kenyan Chai lovers.)

God is good, we are all doing well and we send greetings back home. Today I send greetings from the school at Lakeview Africa Gospel Church - to my Kenya 8445 friends, and those of you reading. They are so thankful to God.

Until our next post - be blessed!
Nancy