from Kenya Dec 08 team member Rick Conniff (Dec. 12, 2008)

Here are a few journal entries from the past five days:
12/7 – It’s amazing the swing of emotions one can go through in just a few hours. Yesterday we spent six hours with Keith Ham’s staff in Pangani learning about their ministry and touring their facilities followed by a walk thru their neighboring slum where their youth live. The living conditions defy description. From the love and concern of the Mission of Hope staff to the extreme poverty and overwhelming need, our team was left noticeably touched. The silver lining was the hope we saw in their success in reaching and changing both the kids and their families lives thru education, nutrition, and spiritual growth.

12/8 – Wow… our trip to the boarding school in Joska was amazing. What struck me the most was the spiritual level and discipline of these kids. Their worship service was powerful…from spirit-filled worship to well orchestrated skits to young kids quoting 20 memory verses. And the kids ran the service! The afternoon was devoted to playing games. The kids were so attentive and excited to do anything as long as they were part of something and getting some attention. We managed to get a group together to throw a football around and before you knew it we had two teams running plays and making a game of it. Again, the emotion we felt as a team seeing God working thru this organization to change these young lives was so gratifying.

12/9- The visit to the Huruma Madoya school to participate in their kindergarten graduation was another day of blessings for our team. We got to see much of the same – kids being loved on and fed both physically and spiritually. What a joy being able to spend time with these kids…to see their hunger for learning and their respect for discipline. The Mission of Hope staff have been incredibly gracious to us; the kind of graciousness that comes only thru men and women of God being obedient to His Son.

Received this email from team leader Tom Moen late Tue PM:

Greetings from Nairobi

Our arrival here was without incident (the only way to fly)!

We hit the ground running last Saturday morning. Keith Ham (Christian Missionary Fellowship Missionary) took us through an orientation and described the situation on the ground in the Mathare Valley and in Joska (boarding school).

Around the table with us were some amazing people…

Josaphine – Head Social Worker

Edna – Community Health Evangelism Coordinator

Paul – Micro Enterprise Oversite

Fred – Health/HIV Aids control

Maggy – Admin Assistant who helps hold it all tgether

The numbers of kids in the schools continues to grow.

Here is the break down…

Pangani (the original center) 950

Kosovo 363

Bondeni 266

Mathare North 200

Huruma Madoya 144

Joska (Boarding School) 448

TOTAL 2,371

They will open 2 more centers in January of 2009!

This is amazing! Just a couple of years ago the only school (Pangani) was around 150 with 300 children on a waiting list for a spot in the school…yesterday we had a Kindergarten Graduation for 142 children combined with a Christmas celebration for the entire school and had well over 1,500 kids and parents present in an area about the size of 1 ½ basketball courts! Our Team was never so pleased to be in tight quarters.

Amongst MANY joyful encounters already one stands out for the Team…that was meeting BARAKA and asking him his name. Many of you reading this know the story of Baraka but I am including it here so you can be informed…

THE STORY OF BARAKA…

One world…6 nations…one 8 year old boy named BARAKA from the million population slum of the Mathare Valley in Nairobi, Kenya…he is deaf and he is mute…his name, “Baraka”, means “BLESSING” in English…and that’s exactly what the community in Nairobi prayed for…a blessing!

Suffering a blow to the head as an infant, damaging the cochlears in BOTH middle ears, he has not heard a sound since the age of 6 months. As an infant his Ugandan father abandoned the family and his mother, too poor to care for him, sold him to a family that lived on a farm. A couple of years later, after his mother died, Baraka’s grandmother bought him back and they moved into the Mathare Valley.

Baraka and his grandmother came to know Mary Kamau and the Hope Mission School in the Pangani section of the slum. Though unable to hear or speak the school children receive him into their class where he quickly makes many friends. Soon after the start of the school year Baraka’s grandmother died…leaving him orphaned once again. Hadija, a woman already providing a home to many orphans, accepts Baraka into her home.

The community starts to PRAY…God, help Baraka HEAR! God, life here is so hard, help Baraka HEAR! God, give him a future, help Baraka HEAR!

Meanwhile…Baraka’s story is shared in a conversation by CMF missionaries while on furlough in the US and God begins to move the nations to answer these prayers!!!

The answer follows this global trail…

A South Korean Doctor who develops a simplified procedure for a cochlear implant…

An Indian Doctor in search of ways to help the poverty stricken children of the world…

A “chance meeting” between these two doctors in Bangkok, Thailand…

A pilot program for the procedure started at a Nigerian hospital…

Funds pouring in from the US for the procedure and travel expenses…

A boy from Kenya…who’s name means “Blessing”, who is a “Blessing”…receives a “Blessing”

One world…6 nations…one 8 year old boy named BARAKA…now he can hear soon he will speak. The Mathare slum…one million people in one square mile…Baraka truly is ONE IN A MILLION!

God cares for His world…God works through His world…God so loved the world!

On Sunday we went to Joska for a 3 ½ hour worship celebration and play day…that is where we first saw Baraka. It was hard to hold back the tears when I said to him, “What is your name?” and he said, “BARAKA!”

We praised God for this answer to PRAYER!

Africa Dec 08 Mission team arrives

Joe Leturgez (husband of team member Linda Leturgez, and MCC staff member) sent his email:
"I received a text message from them approximately 5:15 pm this afternoon.
Nairobi is 8 hours later than East Coast United States. The weather forecast for Nairobi is daily highs about 80 degrees and nightly lows in the upper 50s with no rain for the next 10 days.
The team is scheduled to return to the United States on Thursday December 18 landing at BWI at 4:20 pm on British Air flight BA0229 from London Heathrow.
Please be praying for their safety and for the effectiveness of their mission."