2015 North Survey Part 3

May 15-May 18

     Friday we spent the morning in Hola visiting with a couple pastors. The first pastor we visited was Pastor Amos at the AIC church. He has been in Hola for a few years. We got similar information from him that we got from Garissa as far as his congregation being workers that have come to Hola and no locals. The difference is that there is no fear or danger.  Pastor Amos confirmed that Roger Scheenstra an AIC missionary was still working 100KM interior from Hola among the Orma. Unfortunately Pastor Amos did not have a contact for Roger but he said that the AIC office would have it. Pastor Amos knew of Pastor Bocha also but our visit was cut a little short because Pastor Amos had a meeting he needed to attend. We were able to get a contact for the chairman of the local pastors association for future visits. 

      After we left the AIC church we went in search of the Samaritan’s Purse office in Hola. Pastor Aaron Johnson of Life Point are the sending church of a missionary family in Honduras working with Samaritans’ Purse so we thought it would be good to see the Samaritan’s Purse office in Hola to greet them. We spent our remaining time in Hola with pastor Franklin at the Samaritans Purse office. Pastor Franklin oversees the spiritual side of Samaritan’s Purse ministry efforts in Hola. Pastor Franklin gave us a great overview of the area and what they were doing and the spiritual condition of the local churches. Samaritin’s Purse has several projects going on in the community in an effort to preach the gospel. Pastor Franklin was very encouraging and shared that there were no safety concerns in Hola. We had a great time talking with Pastor Franklin he had such a big personality. We got some contacts for others in their office for future visits. 

     After our visit with Pastor Franklin we headed for Malindi. It was so good to get back home. Especially for Taco Friday and for cake and ice cream for John’s birthday! Our trip was so good. We had plans to go back up to Garzen on Saturday, but our appointments fell through and Pastor Bocha was no going to be in Garzen for another two weeks. On Saturday Clayton took the team to the fields in Gede to do some Farming God’s way and to see the progress. I stayed in the office and got a few things done and then rested a bit. Lindsey and Clayton had us all over for dinner Saturday, it was a great time of fellowship.

     Sunday we all attended services in Malindi and had a great service. Ryan taught SS and brother Chad preached the morning message. We had lunch at People of Kenya restaurant in town. Brother Chad took our kids to the beach in the afternoon and they built a massive sand castle. The rest of us took some time to visit. In the evening we had a sweet worship service. Brother Chad brought the word and it was AWESOME. It was such a great cap on an amazing trip. 

 

 

     Monday we had to say good-bye to the team. We are so grateful for Brother Chad, Ryan, Aaron and Daren for coming and doing this survey trip with Clayton, John, and me. Everyone added different perspectives and processed the information from various angles. The value of having this many spiritually discerning men together was invaluable. Thank you all so much. 

Now what? Pray as we process all that we learned and will continue to learn from the trip. We have more meetings to come and more trips to make. We need God to give clarity and direction.