As we were in the airport waiting for our flight to Eldoret, a member of our team commented that the conference was a gift from God for the means of relationship building. That made me reflect on our few days in Nairobi and realize that the entire purpose of our time there may have been just that, relationships. We may not have done much in the way of service or ministry, but we spent much time building relationships. We built relationships as a Running the Race team, we built relationships with the Kenyan sports medicine community, and we built relationships with our Kenyan family. All of these relationships will be vital to our upcoming and ongoing ministry and God graciously gave us the time for those relationships. God is a relational God. He created us to be in relationship with Him, and He created us to do ministry in relationship to one another.
We spent the morning worshiping in a church with friends. What a blessing it was!
It is always a blessing to travel to another country and worship The One True God in unity with other believers. In America, church is often a spectator sport, but not so in Kenya. The entire congregation this morning sang and danced with such joy and conviction. The prayers were often the voices of many speaking their own praises to the Lord. The theme verse for 2019 in this church is Zechariah 4: 6, “Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit says the Lord of hosts.” The pastor spoke from Zechariah 1 and 3 and called us to repentance and reformation, reminding us of God’s mercy. At the end of the service the pastor prayed over our team and our time in Iten. He even acknowledged that fear from the recent terrorist attacks could have kept us home.
Again, it seems that God is preparing us. Our home church just started studying Mark. In the first chapter of Mark we see the people being prepared for the coming of the gospel, and we see Jesus being prepared for His earthly ministry. Through the struggle against satan regarding the terrorist attack, through the relationship building, through the worship this morning, and through the prayer of sending out by the pastor, we have been made ready. We arrive in Iten expectant that God has great things in store for the sake of His name. And what a perfect reminder that it will not be by our might nor power, but by His Spirt.
Contributions from Lisa and Christine