9-12 I'll be with the 3 preschool classes at Sister Freda's Hospital. Help teach, play at the breaks, serve lunch, ect.
1-2 babysit the little kids at Gilgal.
2-3 teach CRE at Gilgal sophomores
3-5 run games with the high schoolers or teach guitar to a few students at Gilgal
This is my Tuesday schedule. At Sister Freda's I also have the chance to be more in the actual hospital.. praying for patients, assisting nurses, helping with clinics, ect. The kids at Freda's are crazyyyy.. and I'm loving Gilgal more every day. Here is Wednesday:
930-10 Swahili lesson with head teacher of Purpose Driven Academy
10-11 Teach PE for class 4 at PDA
11-12 Teach CRE for class 6 at PDA
1-5 Tutor / run games / hang out at Discover to Recover, and elementary school and orphanage for 50 kids, most who have AIDS. I friggin love that place!
Thursday, June 30
Monday, June 27
Mondayyyy
This week is the beginning of having a consistent weekly schedule.. where each person on our team has a morning block (9-12) and an afternoon block (1-5) and then returns home for dinner. At each place we go to during these "blocks" we are sent out with 2 or more people. It's gonna be uber busy and crazy. Here's what mondays look like...
9-10 help in the baby class at Gilgal (a orphanage/high school)
10-12 teach CRE (christian religious education) to form 2 (sophomores) at Gilgal, and hang out with the high schoolers on their break
12:30-2 play with the baby class at Purpose Driven Academy (a elementary/high school), and eat lunch with all the students
2-3 teach CRE to class 3 and 4 (3rd and 4th graders)
3-4 teach PE to 4th-12th grade
Gilgal and PDA are both epically cool ministries, with amazing staff and administration with huge hearts. Teaching and games and all that are just venues for getting to know these kids and loving on them. Pray that I learn all their names, and don't get overwhelmed or tired. Asante sana! (thanks a lot)
9-10 help in the baby class at Gilgal (a orphanage/high school)
10-12 teach CRE (christian religious education) to form 2 (sophomores) at Gilgal, and hang out with the high schoolers on their break
12:30-2 play with the baby class at Purpose Driven Academy (a elementary/high school), and eat lunch with all the students
2-3 teach CRE to class 3 and 4 (3rd and 4th graders)
3-4 teach PE to 4th-12th grade
Gilgal and PDA are both epically cool ministries, with amazing staff and administration with huge hearts. Teaching and games and all that are just venues for getting to know these kids and loving on them. Pray that I learn all their names, and don't get overwhelmed or tired. Asante sana! (thanks a lot)
Friday, June 24
Luke 4:18-19
Here's something I read this morning that brought me encouragement in this place where there is so so much need..
"The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor"
Jesus said this when first claiming to be Lord. They were Isaiah's words years earlier. And to some extend I want to take these words on for kitale this summer. There's so much shit people have to deal with here. It's horrible and overwhelming and wrong and seemingly inescapable. In the end, I really can't do much about the poverty, or the disease, or the beatings or rape or other injustice.. but I can bring some really really good news that this physical world is not all there is. We can be set free, released from oppression!
So many people in Kenya live in really hard situations. It's not that I understand or accept these situations for them, I don't even know what Jesus would say/do about all this (if he were here,walking around). But that verse in Luke gave some perspective and hope that at least this physical life isn't all there is. People can be victorious in Jesus, no matter how horrible their situation is here on earth.
"The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor"
Jesus said this when first claiming to be Lord. They were Isaiah's words years earlier. And to some extend I want to take these words on for kitale this summer. There's so much shit people have to deal with here. It's horrible and overwhelming and wrong and seemingly inescapable. In the end, I really can't do much about the poverty, or the disease, or the beatings or rape or other injustice.. but I can bring some really really good news that this physical world is not all there is. We can be set free, released from oppression!
So many people in Kenya live in really hard situations. It's not that I understand or accept these situations for them, I don't even know what Jesus would say/do about all this (if he were here,walking around). But that verse in Luke gave some perspective and hope that at least this physical life isn't all there is. People can be victorious in Jesus, no matter how horrible their situation is here on earth.
Crazy Kenya Ish
1. There's a myth here that having sex with a virgin cures HIV/AIDS. This is one of the reasons infant rape exists.
2. Rape is ridiculously common here. It's not unusual for girls to be sexually active by age 12. Girls that are 10 years old--that's third grade--have often been raped and sexually abused.
3. Women are responsible for cultivating food (or brewing changaa, the local brew made/sold in slums nearby), house chores, raising the kids, and feeding the family. If there is no food, she may give her kids changaa, because there is nothing else. When a woman sells changaa, her daughters often come with the purchase for that night. Men are free to sit around with other men, talk politics, beat their wives and sleep around.
4. It's technically illegal to live on the street. This week 7 or so street kids got rounded up by police and taken, where they were probably beat. Some team members went to the prison to buy them out. You can buy your way out of most anything here.
5. Street kids are anywhere from 8-16 years old. They often run away from single parent families where they are overworked or beaten, without much food or love in return. So the streets is just the better option.. where they arent wanted anywhere, have to beg for food or dig through trash, sleep under store awnings with maybe a tarp or bag as a blanket, and wake up to beatings by angry store owners or drunken nightlife. These are 3rd graders.. and it's cold in kitale at night. To see a bunch of 8, 9, 10 years olds cuddled up together on the sidewalk is heartbreaking. It's horrible.
6. Jiggers are flesh eating maggots that come from walking without shoes in the dirt. At medical clinics we help at we spend all day removing jiggers from kids hands and feet, mothers hands and feet. They're painful and eventually make you walk only on your heals. The sad part is once we remove them, kids will get them again in a few months because they don't have shoes, they need to walk, the mothers need to work, and the cycle repeats.
As sad as some of these things are, there are some really great things going on in kitale as well. Oasis of Hope is this center for children that welcomes street kids and orphans and the poor. They educate for free, provide 2 meals a day, teach trades to older kids, house students, counsel kids, provide medical care, and have organized games. All for free. It's literally an oasis of hope for a few hundred kids in kitale. I was there all afternoon, learning kids names, playing with them, eating lunch, and walking home together. Love it!!
2. Rape is ridiculously common here. It's not unusual for girls to be sexually active by age 12. Girls that are 10 years old--that's third grade--have often been raped and sexually abused.
3. Women are responsible for cultivating food (or brewing changaa, the local brew made/sold in slums nearby), house chores, raising the kids, and feeding the family. If there is no food, she may give her kids changaa, because there is nothing else. When a woman sells changaa, her daughters often come with the purchase for that night. Men are free to sit around with other men, talk politics, beat their wives and sleep around.
4. It's technically illegal to live on the street. This week 7 or so street kids got rounded up by police and taken, where they were probably beat. Some team members went to the prison to buy them out. You can buy your way out of most anything here.
5. Street kids are anywhere from 8-16 years old. They often run away from single parent families where they are overworked or beaten, without much food or love in return. So the streets is just the better option.. where they arent wanted anywhere, have to beg for food or dig through trash, sleep under store awnings with maybe a tarp or bag as a blanket, and wake up to beatings by angry store owners or drunken nightlife. These are 3rd graders.. and it's cold in kitale at night. To see a bunch of 8, 9, 10 years olds cuddled up together on the sidewalk is heartbreaking. It's horrible.
6. Jiggers are flesh eating maggots that come from walking without shoes in the dirt. At medical clinics we help at we spend all day removing jiggers from kids hands and feet, mothers hands and feet. They're painful and eventually make you walk only on your heals. The sad part is once we remove them, kids will get them again in a few months because they don't have shoes, they need to walk, the mothers need to work, and the cycle repeats.
As sad as some of these things are, there are some really great things going on in kitale as well. Oasis of Hope is this center for children that welcomes street kids and orphans and the poor. They educate for free, provide 2 meals a day, teach trades to older kids, house students, counsel kids, provide medical care, and have organized games. All for free. It's literally an oasis of hope for a few hundred kids in kitale. I was there all afternoon, learning kids names, playing with them, eating lunch, and walking home together. Love it!!
Thursday, June 23
Post #3
Today was a super discouraging day. People's situations here just seem so hopeless. Poverty feels like this unbreakable circle, that no matter what we do people will still be in the same horrible sad discouraging situation. The phrase/song/prayer "break my heart for what breaks yours" sucks. It's not fun or awesome or something that makes me feel closer to God. It's just heartbreak.
At the same time, today I saw two of my favorite favorite kids. A 3rd grader, Emmanuel, from purpose driven academy and Sammy, a 4th grader from discover to recover. I hugged them, kissed them, hugged them some more. As sad as kenya can be, thinking of reuniting with these two boys makes me SO HAPPY.
At the same time, today I saw two of my favorite favorite kids. A 3rd grader, Emmanuel, from purpose driven academy and Sammy, a 4th grader from discover to recover. I hugged them, kissed them, hugged them some more. As sad as kenya can be, thinking of reuniting with these two boys makes me SO HAPPY.
Wednesday, June 22
Random Thoughts
1. Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil. Cling to what is good. -Romans 12:9. In some simple way I guess that's an answer for how we should respond to evil in Kenya.. and distractions in America.
2. We're supposed to represent Jesus Christ.. what a high calling. Jesus was epic, perfect, he was love itself! As we walked through a hospital today I struggled with that calling. We stopped and prayed for a mom who had malaria and pneumonia. I knelt by her bed and stared at her while we prayed. Her face was scared and alone and it's something I remember when I think of my comfort and security at home.
3. There are no great acts, only small acts with great love. -Mother Teresa.
4. Phrases like "God's love" and "joy in Christ" lose their meaning cuz of how often we hear them in church or in bible studies or wherever. I LOVE the moments where I somewhat realize how powerful those ideas are.. "God loved us before we were born; He will love us after we die. Not one thing can separate us from the love of God. His heart is an inexhaustible ad irrepressible fountain of love" -Oswald Chambers
5. "My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness." Maybe it can be that simple.. Our hope is build on nothing less than the fact that Jesus lived--a perfect life--and then died.. for us.
2. We're supposed to represent Jesus Christ.. what a high calling. Jesus was epic, perfect, he was love itself! As we walked through a hospital today I struggled with that calling. We stopped and prayed for a mom who had malaria and pneumonia. I knelt by her bed and stared at her while we prayed. Her face was scared and alone and it's something I remember when I think of my comfort and security at home.
3. There are no great acts, only small acts with great love. -Mother Teresa.
4. Phrases like "God's love" and "joy in Christ" lose their meaning cuz of how often we hear them in church or in bible studies or wherever. I LOVE the moments where I somewhat realize how powerful those ideas are.. "God loved us before we were born; He will love us after we die. Not one thing can separate us from the love of God. His heart is an inexhaustible ad irrepressible fountain of love" -Oswald Chambers
5. "My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness." Maybe it can be that simple.. Our hope is build on nothing less than the fact that Jesus lived--a perfect life--and then died.. for us.
Monday, June 20
Post #1
Hey guyssss, made it to kitale. It was a solid 2 plus days of traveling but we made it. Being back a 2nd time is totally different. Man it's crazy. You're just brought to the forefront of like life and what matters. Poverty, the gospel, evil, becoming less so he can become greater. I'm learning a lot, being challenged consistently throughout the day and night. Like, it's crazy trying to wrap this experience cuz theres soooo much that happens each day... New mind-wrenching evils that exist in kenyan culture, new dynamics of living in a world that's spiritual not just physical, new perspectives on god/christians/truth, learning about myself as a member of close christian community. In the end, I still have NO idea how to reconcile kenya with america.
Thanks for your thoughts and prayers, I miss you guys a lot :) I guess just pray that God would stay close by, help me process, help me hear and do what he wants me to hear and do. Thanks guys
Love, Brea
Thanks for your thoughts and prayers, I miss you guys a lot :) I guess just pray that God would stay close by, help me process, help me hear and do what he wants me to hear and do. Thanks guys
Love, Brea
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