March 30, 2011

Usually when I sit down to write this weekly update, I know exactly what I want to say, but this week I’ve had trouble. As usual, the list of potential joys/ blessings/requests exceeds the amount of space to share. Another reason: a blessing that leads to a problem – lots of flowers are blooming in our part of the world, thanks to recent needed rains, but there is a definite negative side for those of us who have allergy battles and at the moment I’m not sure which is making me feel worse – the congestion or the medicine! But as I ponder on what to share this week, I keep returning to the word HOPE!

HOPE is what Jack felt this week as he received reports from students trained in a late February Church Planting Methodology seminar. In our March 2nd Prayer Update I shared that we were “praising God for the (twelve men and women) from all parts of Kenya who desire to teach others to plant reproducing churches - especially in areas with no or few churches.” One report and photo (can be found on Yates/IMB/Kenya blog) arrived from two of the men who traveled north of their homes in western Kenya to train church leaders among the Turkana, a people group where God’s love and salvation is being shared, but there are still thousands of their nomadic members who have not heard our Good News. The newly trained Church Planting Trainers reported that 65 Turkana Christians from 19 Baptist churches and one from another denomination came for the three day training!

Pray with us that those trained in this new round of training will catch the vision shared by one student at that first CPM Training for Trainers seminar: "Planting churches does not mean forming a body of those who have responded to a proclamation of the eternal gospel - planting a church means producing a group of discipled believers who will share their faith and disciple others who will continue multiplying disciples!"

HOPE is also the word that came to mind as we’ve read daily updates on the “Loliondo drink of life” (1) in our local news this last week. We often see newspaper ads and flyers glued on walls/ trees/ light poles advertising the services of miracle healers/ spiritual leaders/ doctors who can heal everything from straying husbands and broken hearts to illnesses such as diabetes, TB, AID, cancer, etc. Those traveling to visit the “former Christian preacher … turned into a miracle healer … people of all walks of life; the rich flying in by helicopter, thousands others driving in and even more trekking the distance” (1) has been halted to clear the “24,000 ailing people and their relatives … stranded in a queue of more than 4,000 vehicles that extended several miles.”(2)

Living in a part of the world where many people have no access to quality medical care or no money to pay for what is available teaches you a lot about trust in prayer and miracles. I will always remember sitting in church several years ago and hearing members of our new small church share how God had answered their prayers and healed them in the past week. As I listened to their illnesses, I realized they had suffered the same bug our family had experienced, BUT to be honest, we had responded by purchasing medicine and using techniques we knew would help and never doubted that we would survive, THUS we had not prayed for healing!

Listening that day, I realized that I had money to buy medicines/see doctors and had a level of education not shared by most of our church friends who could only rely upon prayer and God’s touch for healing! So … I will not share my thoughts about this miracle healer and other situations we face like this daily, but simply ask you to read at least one of the articles sited below which will definitely strengthen your ability to pray for those in our world searching for HOPE as you for Christians who are seeking to share the Good News of our loving Savior!

Thank you again for your prayer support – we and our missionary coworkers and African Christian brothers and sisters do depend upon your prayers, BERT
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(1) On the trail of the Loliondo drink of life (Daily Nation/3/25/11): http://www.nation.co.ke/Features/DN2/On+the+trail+of+the+Loliondo+drink+of+life+/-/957860/1132222/-/sd243g/-/index.html
(2) Wonder drug gets a clean bill of health (Daily Nation/3/30/11): http://www.nation.co.ke/News/Wonder+drug+gets+a+clean+bill+of+health+/-/1056/1135350/-/ybcoqez/-/index.html
‘Magic herb’ is well known to Kenyan scientists (Daily Nation/3/30/11): http://www.nation.co.ke/News/+Magic+herb++is+well+known+to+Kenyan+scientists+/-/1056/1135354/-/jnh894z/-/index.html
2011 PRAYER NUDGES FROM EAST AFRICA: http://easternafrica2011prayernudges.blogspot.com/

March 23, 2011

I guess I should back-up and preface the comment that I had already written to say: Jack and I do pray often for God’s guidance in our lives and we know that many of you pray this for us, but… Now I will share my first try at beginning this update: Have you ever been astounded by God’s guidance in your life and how He led you to do the RIGHT thing when you had no idea at the time of why this was exactly what you should do?

Last Monday, as I began to post the already prepared day’s photo/comment to the 2011 PRAYER NUDGES FROM EAST AFRICA (1) - a great photo of a kid, which is always loved - I felt compelled to delay the planned Prayer Nudge and create a new one with a photo taken the day before of an “ oft' seen Eastern African scene … that always brings heartbreak to missionaries and a reminder of those in our world with daily burdens such as a shortage of water and back-breaking work – people who often have not heard our Savior’s promise: ‘If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me ... streams of living water will flow from within him’” (John 7:37,38).

At the time, I questioned if I was simply making more work for myself and seeking to delay another job that I didn’t want to do! The next morning as I read a local newspaper, I realized that I had done neither of these things, but had definitely sensed God’s guidance as yesterday was the annual International Water Day – a day to focus on the water issues faced in our world by many people without adequate and clean water. So, I delayed the Prayer Nudge with the child’s photo yet another day (possibly tomorrow) and created a new Prayer Nudge for March 22^nd (1) to emphasize a Daily Nation (2) article about "flying toilets" and people praising God for broken pipes, an article you shouldn’t read if you “don't want bad news… but if you want to pray knowledgeably for hurting people in our world, you MUST read.”

Jack share’s this experience of God taking him an unplanned way this last week: “Saturday, I was invited to teach ‘leadership’ to the leaders of Community Baptist Church. I considered sharing all kinds of tools and practical suggestions and bits from my Church Planting Methodology training. Earlier this month, I was trained in a new form of Muslim Evangelism and I was eager to share it! As the leaders assembled that morning, I knew God was leading me a different way – to teach Baptist Beliefs, which I usually teach to seminary students. Of the 40 listed leaders of this barely one year old church , 25 attended the day-long meeting (most of the others work on Saturday). The oldest leader at the training was no more than 35 and amazingly the youngest, the children’s leader, was only 12, but this girl turned out to be the most avid and astute listener. Her questions were penetrating and seeking, as were the questions of the others. At the end of the day, I felt blessed to be asked to teach this group of leaders. I was also certain that though Baptist Beliefs is not the most entertaining subject, God had led me to start training these leaders at this point!”

We know that these events in our lives were the result of prayers – especially your prayers! THANK YOU! Thank you for allowing us to be a part of God’s Work in East Africa and for your joining in His work as you support us in prayer, personnel and finances! BERT

(1) 2011 PRAYER NUDGES FROM EAST AFRICA: http://easternafrica2011prayernudges.blogspot.com/

(2) "Families smile when water pipes burst" – Daily Nation, 11-03-22/p.3 - http://www.nation.co.ke/News/Families+smile+when+water+pipes+burst+/-/1056/1130430/-/x9umv2z/-/index.html

March 16, 2011

Since early January, I have searched for a new Lottie Story to share as our thanks for your gifts last year to the Lottie Moon Offering and Cooperative Program, gifts which allow us and IMB coworkers to do what God is calling us to do! This last Friday, I received another precious gift, the opportunity to share a tribute to Joy Mwangi, the wife of our Associate Pastor at Parklands Baptist Church, who died on March 6th after a battle with oral cancer. Joy and Simon were baptized and discipled at Parklands and through Baptist Student Ministries while in college – this is also where they met! As I returned to my seat after representing the mission family and those no longer living in Kenya at Joy’s Memorial Service, I realized that I had just shared the perfect Lottie Story!

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When we arrived in Kenya in 1978, I was blessed to work with one of the first couples to come with the International Mission Board to East Africa. On our first Sunday, James and Gena Hampton invited us to the small English speaking church that they helped start a few years before, Parklands Baptist Church. There were many lessons that the Hamptons worked at teaching us – One lesson they taught us by example and instruction was that we as we served our Father and shared our Faith, we were to always be preparing a Kenyan Christian to replace us. One of my greatest praises and joys today is how we have seen this transformation take place among Baptists and the Kenyan Christian family during the last 32 years.>In my current job as an Internet Missions/Prayer Advocate for East Africa, I must often define the word “missionary” to my mostly American audience – For as I seek to help them understand and pray for God’s work in our part of the world, the stories I’m sharing about gifted missionaries are not stories about those who arrived from another country or continent to be about our Father’s work in East Africa, the missionaries in our Father’s Harvest Field are Kenyans!

Joy Mwangi is a great example of East Africans on mission with God. She did what I was taught to do as a young missionary – Joy did what God called her to do and she taught others to do the same, she reproduced herself! We are currently members of Parklands new site on Mombasa Road, and it has astounded me how Joy did not visit us there even once, yet the Children’s Sunday School ministry began strong at our young church – thanks to Joy’s teaching, training, preparation, dreaming, and past hard work! Joy’s work in developing the current children’s ministry at Parklands is far beyond the dreams of those of us who taught Parklands Children’s Sunday School class in the 1970’s! (Added note: This includes one of Joy’s dreams – the huge building at Parklands just for kids!)

Joy also had an amazing ministry at the Nairobi Baptist Centre at Shauri Moyo. She capably did jobs which in the early days were done by missionaries, not only capably, but better as she more fully understood the needs of the students and the community! A retired co-worker who worked with Joy at Shauri Moyo shared: “While teaching at the centre, Joy was always a light, always smiling, wanting the best for her students. It was a Joy to be with her and know her.”

Joy is an awesome example of one who responded to God’s call for workers in His Harvest Field. Joy did “go and make disciples of all nations” – she taught new generations of children and youth all she knew about our Father’s teachings and how to obey and serve Him. She knew that God was with her always and she wanted others to have this precious gift. (Matthew 28-19-20) It was Joy who masterminded the children of Parklands Baptist Church leading our church family into going to an Unreached People group, the Endo, and taking our Good News to them! Joy was a gentle person, but when she knew God wanted her to do something, you knew to join her as she would not give up until she knew she had obeyed her Father.

I’m praising God today for the fact that I and many of my friends and former colleagues could call Joy our friend and that she impacted our lives with her joy and strength and her example of what it meant to be on mission with our Father! And when the day comes that the eternal gospel has been proclaimed to every nation, tribe, language and people (Revelations 14:6), I know that many of those worshipping at our Father’s throne will be there because of Joy’s testimony and work – AND the testimony and work of those that Joy befriended, trained and impacted!

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THANK YOU for taking time to read this Lottie Story. Thank you also for being our co-workers in our Father’s Harvest Field as you offer financial, personnel, and prayer support for us and our IMB colleagues! BERT YATES

2011 PRAYER NUDGES FROM EASTERN AFRICA: To receive these Prayer Updates via e-mail, you can subscribe at: http://easternafrica2011prayernudges.blogspot.com/ OR Photo Prayer Nudges can also be viewed at http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=351345&id=685050129&l=47f55a92ab – You DO NOT need to be a Facebook member to view these Prayer Nudges, BUT if you are a member, please send me a friend request!