My Home Church

Hello,

I thought it would be nice to share with you the story of my home church in Chepkurbet, Kenya. The church was started initially by women. Now it is coming of age and men are joining in slowly by slowly.

Our home church has started about six sister churches since inception and we are really proud of that.
Our prayer is to see that we even start more churches within our community so that we can reach more for Christ. Pray with us.

Jonah

Travelling Home from South Africa to Kenya

[Caption: Road trip from Hekspoort to Joburg]

[Caption: Pulling up to our hotel in Joburg]

[Caption: Top & Bottom, some scenes around our hotel in Joburg, SA]

The hotel we stayed at before we caught our plane home was perfect!

[Caption: Vetho, our apartment hotel in Joburg]

[Caption: We had a suite with small sofa and television.]

[Caption: This room had twin beds. Quite comfortable.]

I would recommend you stay here in case you travel to South Africa. You will have fun and be comfortable as at home.

[Caption: Here we are at the SA airport]

[Caption: Ready to check in at the airport]

[Caption: Checking out the plane.]

[Caption: My friend who pastors in Uganda]

My plane ride home was great. There was no turbulence on the plane. I was sitting with my friend of 9 years. He is a pastor to university students and we went to the same bible college together. We sure missed each other a lot although I was just in Uganda at Easter with a team of young people from Kericho.

And, I must say that I enjoy the beautiful scenery of Kericho (my home)

[Caption: Whizzing by tea plantations on drive home.]

[Caption: Tea Estates of Kericho, Kenya]

... the leading world producer of tea. Actually u can drive for close to 2 hours and never get out the tea plantation grounds.

Visit to Kenya's IDP Center

Our visit to the Internally Displaced Persons IDPs Center was quite devastating. The IDPs have experienced so much loss to their lives and personal dignity.



We were without words as we visited this place. I have uploaded a lot of pictures here of all the parts of the Center that we visited so that you can see what it is really like.













I am now trying to implement what I learned at the Amahoro Gathering I attended the week before last in Hekspoort, South Africa; teachings about community building and reconciliation. We Christians are called to be peace makers.

God bless.
Jonah

Visiting the Nelson Mandela Museum

My South Africa travels would not be complete without visiting the Nelson Mandela house which has been made into a museum. There we met with so many other tourists as well and it was an eye opening experience.

Mr. Mandela was a courageous man and he did not want to just live his life. He accepted imprisonment for over 27 years so that others held under apartheid could be set free. There are not many people ready to sacrifice like him. But Mr. Mandela faithfully did just that so that others could have a better life.

In the museum you will find Mr. Mandela's various degrees. For example, honorary doctoral degrees of which I counted ten, and many more gifts presented by various people and universities.

What a great man he is. I am so glad I was able to visited his house (now museum).

Enjoy the pictures.

Jonah

Bornest Goes Home

Bornest, a young orphan woman in the community died and she had touched so many. Her life was mirrored in the talks the people made at her funeral. Many turned up. The rain was heavy but still somany people came. She loved the people and it was a touching send off.

I want to thank everyone who participated in this. You are such a great hero to the people of our village. God Bless you all.

I sincerely want to thank one sister in the Lord who sent lots of money to send Bornest to the Hospital and back and part of the funeral expenses. May God bless you, (you know who you are) and the Lord knows you very well. May he bless you and bless your entire family til it overflows.


God Bless you all
Jonah

p.s. This was a church led funeral, and the normal program is:

- removing the body from the funeral home
- taking the body home
- talks
- preaching
- final farewell.

We don't cremate here as there is still lots of land for us to bury our dead.

Amahoro Conversation

The conversation is going on down here in Hekpoort, South Africa and we are very excited. We see here at the venue what we have been discussing in the continent.

Some of these conversations will be posted online and I look forward to checking later in the week for them. (You can now find some of these conversations on line [update June 10. 2009] http://tinyurl.com/lblc3u )

It is still freezing cold but we praise God for what He is doing within us. Reconciliation is going on this afternoon. A former minister in the white rule here, Adrain Vlok, [former Minister of Law and Order in the apartheid government] washed feet with his former police officer and it touched us all.

Enjoy the pictures.

God Bless

Arrival in South Africa

Hello friends,

Just a quick note to let you know that I arrived safely in South Africa. The travel in the plane took us about four hours.

The country is beautiful and I really love it. Though it is winter now in South Africa. It is very cold as compared to our African average of about 18 Celsius, when cold. Right now, it is about 9 Celsius here.

We have people from different places of the globe arriving for the Amahoro Gathering, and I look forward to meeting some of them. Here are some pictures of the Amahoro opening.

Enjoy the pictures and have a great day.
God Bless
Jonah