Hello family & friends,
I hope you are all doing well and enjoying the holiday season. Even here in
Kenya, despite the warm temperatures, it’s starting to feel somewhat like
Christmas. There is no “Santa” in
Kenya, but instead they have “Father
Christmas.” A shopping center in town has even put
Christmas lights up to be festive.
This semester has flown by and in less than 2 short weeks, we’ll be heading our separate ways for the
Christmas break. I am very excited about being home for the holidays! We’ll all be tackling jet lag and reverse culture shock, but we’ll gladly deal with these inconveniences to be home with family and friends for a bit.
The next 2 weeks here will be extremely busy for us. We’ve already hosted an end of year party for the primary school that we sponsor. It was quite a day! We were able to find a projector to rent and trekked through the slum with a generator, a projector, a white bed sheet (turned movie screen) 800 cookies, and 400 cokes. We arrived at the small school to find all 400 students anxiously awaiting our arrival. They were all crammed in a room measuring about 30 feet square. We passed out cookies & cokes while the “cinema” was set up. Then we all enjoyed the movie “Finding Nemo.” It was a lot of fun!
This next week we are hosting another
Christmas party although on a much smaller scale. This one will be for the 11 kids that live at the orphanage that we sponsor and run. We have a small tree already decorated and are currently getting together gifts for each child. We will share the
Christmas story with them and talk about what
Christmas is really all about.
Before I close here, I’d like to share something that the Lord has been teaching me here. Not long ago I finished reading a book called “Choosing Rest” that’s got me thinking about some things. I have many valuable relationships with people here in
Kenya. These people come from all different areas, social classes, backgrounds, and even different religions as several of my closest friends are Muslims. These relationships are a blessing. Matter of fact, the relationships I have serve as an opportunity to worship God. There are times when I wonder if my work is making any difference. Are the people changing? Do they understand that I am pouring out my heart for them? I was reading about Paul’s work in Philippians 2. He said, “even if I am being poured out like a drink offering…I rejoice.” In the Old Testament, when a sacrifice was offered to the Lord and burnt on the altar, every sacrifice left something behind, even if it was a pile of ashes. That is, every sacrifice except for the drink offering. After the drink offering, there was no substance that lingered, nothing could be seen, smelt, or shown for the worship that had occurred by the sacrifice. Because when a drink offering of wine was poured on a burnt offering, it flashed in flame and then disappeared. There was nothing to show for the sacrifice.
Paul admitted that he was not sure if his ministry was going to produce obvious results in peoples’ lives. Perhaps it was as short-lived as a drink offering. None the less, he chose to rejoice. His rest of heart did not depend on knowing that he had helped people change or on his sense of being blessed and appreciated. His relationships were about something far more important – they were about worship.
Similarly, by my choice to care, to keep giving my best to another, to be Jesus to my neighbors, I worship. That worship brings delight to the heart of God.
Knowing this, I begin to find rest for my heart in the midst of a world I cannot fix. I am grateful, not for what my ministry does for people, but because my involvement in their lives is my opportunity to worship God.
With the craziness of these next 2 weeks, this will be my last update until January. I look forward to seeing many of you as I’m home for a short time. Thank you all for your continued prayer & words of encouragement. Also, thank you for your continued financial support as I honestly couldn’t be here without your support. Have a blessed
Christmas & holiday season.
Love,
Kayla
