Understand The Times, International

The days have been very long on this trip to Kenya. I have had many eye-opening moments based on visual observations. I have heard people share their hearts, which has touched my own. I am shocked when I hear the responses I am getting when I ask widows questions. Rather than presenting a day by day, moment by moment accounts in a chronological order of this trip, I have decided to simply write about the incidents and circumstances that have had an impact.

I can honestly say there are many times I have found myself using the word �unbelievable.� This entire trip has been unbelievable, especially for someone like myself, even though I have been to Kenya five times previously.

I am also asking myself another question: why such a revelation now regarding the scope of the problems we have been dealing with in the past? I think I know the answer: if God had shown me the things He is showing me now, we would not know where or how to come up with a ministry to address these horrible situations by applying God�s Word and the gospel.

Another word I keep using over and over in conversation is �overwhelming.� If you have been on a missions trip to a third world nation, you will have some understanding to what I am trying to convey. However, for me, someone who has traveled the world and seen what I thought was everything there was to see with regard to poverty, I had really never let it all sink in. By that I mean, I had never attempted to spend much time thinking about what the people we are attempting to serve are thinking.

When it comes right down to it, through my life I have not considered myself to be an emotional person. Oh yes, there have been moments when I have been overcome with grief when I have lost a family member or a close friend. Here in Kenya, my emotions have been on the edge throughout the entire trip. And it never ends. Around every corner, there is another event, and something so significant that you just cannot walk away and ignore what you just saw, or what someone just said when you asked them a question via an interpreter.

I have learned an important lesson that has opened the window to an understanding I never had before. Spending a little time with widows who are in obvious pain (depression) and showing them you care for them reveals another dimension I have never discovered before. These are Christian women who have been beat up, abandoned, and then despised by their own families. They are despised because they are poverty-stricken widows. Many have found their way into churches because of genuine pastors here who care and who have a vision, who have nothing and give everything, even to the detriment of their own families.

In another report, I will focus on this topic; but for now let me say that these men, who receive as little as one or two dollars a week from the offering on Sunday morning, give all their time and energy to reach out to the poor. Why? They are compelled to do this. Being a shepherd to them has nothing to do with money.

Children are often dropped off at their doorsteps and abandoned. And if you are thinking that these men have mansions to live in and churches with steeples, sound, light and smoke entertainment, think again. Their wives have small gardens in order to sell produce at the local market in order to make a few shillings (cents) a day to feed their families.

It is through the nurturing of widows through the Bryce Homes Program that many have come to the knowledge of the gospel and have responded. The pastors want to do more, but they cannot. How could they? How can you squeeze more and more juice out of an orange that has already been squeezed to the point there is nothing left but the peel?

And there are only a few oranges left on the trees that remain in the orchard. While the presence of what is called �Christianity� is certainly observable in Kenya, the quality of Christianity is debatable. It is sort of like it is elsewhere in the world. There may be a lot of smoke but trying to find those who care about biblical Christianity and the gospel according to the Scriptures is like trying to find the car keys you lost somewhere when they are nowhere to be found.

Added to that, these brothers, while they study the Bible and can present the gospel, are not aware of the wolves from the west who spread their deluded form of Christianity to them via books, the Internet and other means. Most of them are too poor to go to an Internet caf�; and if they do, it is for a few minutes to check their e-mail. But somehow, Christianity in many locations in Kenya is nothing more than a cult led by men and women who appeal to the rich and successful. A lot like it is in America.

While you may be saying, but what about all those e-mails I get from �pastors� in Africa that say they are in desperate need and invite you to meet their desperate need via you sending them funds via your credit card or by bank transfer? You would not get such a plea from the men we are associated with in Kenya. Their motives are pure. They love the Lord, not mammon. They see themselves as the hand of God extended.

Nor do they negotiate with boards for salary increases or housing allowances. The widows in their congregations cannot afford to support them with anything. They don�t have cars or paid holidays. They don�t have pension plans. They have nothing but give everything they can. They are servants of God that give rather than take. They will receive their reward in heaven, not here on this fallen planet like many are doing.

Maybe this is enough for today. If you think I have gone overboard, please think again. I am aware of cultural differences. I am aware that pastors in the western world have bills and need to be supported. A workman is worthy of his hire, the Bible states. But let�s be serious. The funds that are bilked out of enamored �Christians� who have sold out to church-growth marketers who have destroyed the Bible and the gospel, is staggering. If you took one percent of the funds spent on the budget for many megachurches and sent these funds to Kenya, you would be able to support a myriad of pastors who are really ambassadors for Christ.

Now concluding this on a more positive note. My critics, who label me as �one of the haters,� will be quite upset with what I have written, should they read this report. I am not really the �grumpy old man� they say that I am. When I am in Kenya, my heart is always full of joy. Observing the fruit and seeing what God has done in the past five years is amazing. But based on my understanding and the way God speaks to me through his Word, I believe what we are seeing is only the beginning. I am not writing with grandiose thoughts in my head. I am suggesting that based on the model of the Bryce Homes Program (that was never planned by man), this is a plan from God.

God loves the widows and orphans. If you want to know where God�s heart is, you won�t find God�s heart in the church-growth movement. You will not find God�s blessing on any religious system that ignores the gospel and promotes the flesh. We are only passing through as we live this life here on earth. There is an eternity with Christ ahead for those who have accepted the true gospel.

Out of the miry clay, souls are being saved. Joy fills their hearts. Their misfortunes turn into blessings because the Creator of the universe has introduced Himself to them. Sometimes it takes a deep hole or a pit or a very hopeless situation to get one to the point that they realize there is no other hope.

Jesus Christ is the only hope. He is not a crutch as many skeptics like to say. Jesus Christ is the Creator of the universe, and He knows the hearts of everyone on the planet. And as the Bible states: �The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance� (2 Peter 3:9).