Snowboots

This is a journal entry after my visit to the Mathare slum...

Snowboots

It takes a lot for me to emotionally connect with something or someone outside of my sphere of influence. It takes alot for me to shed tears. But God has made my heart tender because I now have children of my own. I saw a boy today while in the Mathare slum. He was wearing snowboots. In his school uniform made up of a button up shirt, V-neck sweater, knee length shorts and probably a belt, he had on his feet black, mid-calf high, zip up, muddied snowboots. It was June in Kenya. While many others wore flip-flops, sneakers, plastic sandals or no shoes at all, these were his boots that day---everyday.

In my house we have all sorts of shoes. Shoes for summer, fall, winter, even spring shoes. Sneakers for school in the fall, Crocs for summer play, Wellies for springtime rain and mud, and snowboots for cold and snow. My four year old son has all of these shoes. Many of each kind to choose from daily. He may even change shoes four or five times a day! He has the same snowboots as the boy in Kenya. Lately his shoes of choice have been snowboots. It is June in Colorado. While most people have unearthed their flip-flops from last summer or bought new ones from Old Navy, and women, including myself, are showing off their pedicures, my son chooses to put on his snowboots. Wearing a tank top and shorts he traipses through our backyard hunting dinosaurs or picking dandelions...all the while LOVING his snowboots.

Today, God put his hands on my shoulders, turned me around to peek my head inside a small, dark school room in order to open my eyes to find a little boy wearing his snowboots. I didn't talk to the boy. I don't know his name, but I think he was proud of his boots. They are his only pair of shoes but they keep his feet dry from the rain and clean from the sewage and mud in the alleys of the slum. My son is proud of his boots too. They don't serve much of a purpose to him in June, they actually make his feet all sweaty. But he doesn't care, he loves his boots.

God brought me half-way around the world to the slums of Nairobi to see those snowboots. I now realize we really are all the same. My son loves his boots in the same way that boy in the slum loves his. When we stand before our Lord at judgment it will not matter if you died in the slum or in a penthouse--death is the ultimate equalizer. All that matters is did you love the Lord with all your heart, soul, mind and body and did you love your neighbor as yourself? Love is universal. Love can happen anywhere. I hope I loved well during my time in Kenya. Those boys of Fountain of Life have lived more life than I ever will. They came from the slums. But through Love they have been saved in body and eternally. I KNOW God is Love. And when we love God is there.

Trip of a Lifetime

Jambo from Africa!!! That means Hi in Kswahili

Our Kenya team returned Wednesday afternoon safe and sound. Stace and I want to thank everyone for praying throughout this entire journey process. For those of you who don't know, we went to Kenya in co-operation with a fabulous non-profit organization called World Orphans. This group believes in the local church: both here and around the world. Thy believe that churches working in partnership are the most strategic and long-term way to accomplish (ec)3: strengthening churches, rescuing children, and reaching communities with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Our team served with three Nairobi churches: Fountain of Life Nairobi, Fountain of Hope Church, and Fountain of Life Juja. Stace and I visited Mathare slum in the heart of Nairobi. During this morning we visited 6 homes that Fountain of Life ministers to on a weekly basis; either with prayer, money for daily living, or medicine. Through the Home Based Care program, these churches are keeping children vulnerable to orphaning under the care of their mother, father or extended family. We were able to bless the HBC families with our presence and listening ears, praying for them and giving each family a Bible.
On Thursday Stace and I traveled with some of our team to the outskirts of Nairobi to Fountain of Hope church and girls home. While there we visited widows who are part of a Micro Finance program designed to give these women small ($20-40 US dollars), interest-free loans, to start or strengthen their small businesses, empowering their capacity to care for themselves and their children. With minimal capital investments, this church is truly making a difference in the lives of these widows and children.
In addition, our Journey team split into three sub-teams to help provide two community outreach events at three different church locations: church-based children's sports outreach events and free church-based medical camps. Between the three churches, there were 175 children who got to participate in an afternoon of fun and games. I had a great time seeing all the kids show up from miles around!
The free medical camps held on-site at the three churches were a major success! In 3 ½ days, over 1500 women and children came to the three churches to receive free medical care and 150 people took advantage of free HIV/AIDS testing and counseling. I was involved in two of these medical camps; one at Fountain of Hope on Friday and one with Fountain of Life in Nairobi on Saturday where almost 600 people were seen by the doctors! Most of the ailments seen were: malaria, dysentery, cough, flu-like respiratory problems (most likely because this is the coldest part of the year for Kenya). I also got to help out in the pharmacy actually filling prescriptions!
These church-based outreach events are a great way to heighten the visibility of the local church. Connecting the HIV issue to the local church sends a wonderful message of acceptance and grace. The most important ministry that occurred during these events was the sharing of the Gospel through one on one prayer. All three churches experienced people coming to faith in Christ. The tangible love showed through these outreach events provided an opportunity for the church to reach the community with the Gospel. Praise God! The impact of church based outreach within communities was evident on Sunday at the first ever service held at the new Fountain of Life church in Nairobi when, in addition to the existing 70 members, 200 new adults attended the service.Stace and I could tell many, many stories of how children were blessed by the presence and love of our team members. The team ministered to orphaned and vulnerable children by spending time with them; praying with them; playing with them; holding their hands and listening to their stories. Perhaps the biggest blessing to the kids was simply our presence with them. They loved seeing their picture in our cameras and touching our 'hairy' arms! The children within the different communities really enjoyed the sports outreach events. These kids are soccer (football) fanatics!!! And they are good! It was amazing to see them playing barefoot on rough ground playing all day long! Many children were provided with much needed medical attention as well. The junior high kids at our church were able to raise money to provide the boys at Fountain of Life new shoes and another youth group provided each boy a new toothbrush and toothpaste. It was a real blessing to watch children be ministered to in so many different ways.
The three communities in proximity to the local churches were truly blessed throughout the week. All churches experienced new attendees this past Sunday and as I stated above, Fountain of Life had 200 new adult visitors to their service. Our teams truly blessed some of the most impoverished communities through the home visits into the Mathare, Kyole, and other slums. Throughout the week many people came to faith in Christ whether on a home visit into the slums, visiting widows, at a medical camp or at the Sunday worship services. The Spirit of God was redeeming people from all tongues, tribes, and nations. What a blessing to see the hand of God at work and, to be a part of it. There is nothing more encouraging then seeing a local church making a difference in the communities they serve.
This short wrap-up doesn't even begin to tell all our stories; there were many more amazing things that God did during our Journey to Kenya. It was a true blessing to see God work in and through the lives of our team and we pray that the Journey in our hearts will continue as we passionately pursue Christ and his Kingdom. I will never be the same.

Still mulling things over

I'm busily getting my thoughts together and editing my pictures (a couple thousand) but some of our team members have gathered their thoughts already. Here's a couple of blogs from them: http://fallenscales.blogspot.com/ (our team leader) and http://www.dougsfoggiestideas.com/ (my pastor)

Weather excitement...

If you live in the Denver area, you might know that we had some tornado warnings and watches late this afternoon. We well were in the thick of it here in Castle Rock. This is a picture from the back porch!

Tonight on the news we found out that 3 tornadoes actually touched down in a 30 minute period all with 15-20 miles of us.

The long awaited photos..........

Photo session

I've posted a small sampling of our photo shoot at the Stanley Hotel. The pictures in the blog title are from our day.

Someone hasn't blogged in awhile....

Sorry for the lack of updates... summer has hit and we're going in all directions. Here's the very abbreviated lowdown... Right after school ended, we had a great gathering of friends for Memorial Day, Jack potty trained in a week right after Memorial Day (this was my choice because I found out that his next pre-school class is a potty trained class, so I thus had a deadline... he's doing GREAT by the way), we had a quick but very fun visit from baby cousin Riley and Nana and Papa Riley from Montana, Nana Sherry came home from NYC for a quick 2 week visit, Connor finally started walking on Father's Day, Jack had swim lessons for the month of June and did OK, much more playing and splashing than actually learning, then the big BOMB of the month....JURY duty. I knew I had to go on June 17th but didn't expect to get picked for a criminal trial that lasted the rest of the week! Uck! Short wrap-up of that....we found the defendant NOT Guilty (unfortunately) of sexual assault on a child because there was a lack of evidence and we had slight doubts that something happened. This was not an easy decision for the 12 of us but according to the law we had to go with a not guilty decision. Thank Goodness that my mom was still home and helped take care of the boys. Jack did get a couple of fun-filled days at work with Daddy, though. He was very proud to go to "work" with Daddy--so grown up. Jack also had his first dentist appointment that week and did amazingly well, says Stace. As Stace says, "he just sat there and opened his mouth and got his teeth cleaned and polished!" I still can't believe he didn't put up a fight. Now he LOVES brushing his teeth! And THAT was June...........

July started off with a fun-filled trip to Loveland Heights Cottages in Estes Park for the 4th of July weekend. We had a blast and got great pictures of the boys. Jack learned to fish by a fairly non-fisherman (Stace) and now he's a pro. I am so amazed by that kid. He can cast better than me. Here's a clip of him fishing.

We also went up to the Stanley Hotel and did a photo shoot for Jack's 3rd birthday and Connor's 18month pictures. GREAT location, and perfect weather for shooting (overcast but warm). WAY better than Sears and cheaper too! I took about 600 pictures that morning so needless to say, I'm still going through them and I'll get some on here as soon as I pick some out.

Boy...am I tired!!!!!! July won't slow down, as Jack starts day camp at his pre-school next Monday for two weeks! Then we leave less than a week later for the big event of the summer....Auntie Casidee's wedding in Montana! The invites are done (I designed them), Stace and I are singing at the ceremony and the reception AND Jack is the ring-bearer! Holy Cow! So, don't be surprised if I don't post again until Fall!