Today we spent the morning worshipping at the Joska Boarding School then spending the remainder of the day touring the facilities and spending free time with the children. We ended the day following dinner sharing one word that captured the day for us. My one word was “faithfulness” because of how God so faithfully moved in this ministry since my last visit in 2011. To see the scope of growth both in the facilities and the number of children was amazing.
My highlight was seeing the children worship during the service. One could not help but be moved by their sincerity and passion for Jesus Christ. If I were to leave tomorrow, that one highlight was worth my trip.
The short hour we had to spend with the children after lunch was special as well. Their willingness to approach strangers and open up was touching. Everyone on the team seemed to have at least one child who followed them around seeking their fellowship.
Above is the Joska girls’ school. Walking into this room full of girls was pretty neat. It was so humbling to see the way that the girls loved each other and loved the Lord, as they manifested this in sincere worship and affection for Him and their peers. They sang and danced and jumped and waved their ties or sweaters; they were just overflowing with joy and it was overwhelmingly contagious! Many of the girls even offered their ties to some of the visitors to enable them to join in their worship!
After lunch, when we went to spend time with the girls, they were so interested in us and so desperate for our attention and love! They wanted to know about where we come from and who is in our family and what “our best color is”. They were eager to play with our hair and touch our skin. Their English was very good and they were incredibly well behaved- throughout a span of a few hour church service. They were attentive and engaged. I was blown away by the way the girls acted, out of respect for their school leaders, and in faith to our one God.
The speaker really struck me as well. His message was simple. He preached about how we are created for having a day-to-day relationship with the Lord. He also spoke about the body of Christ. It was not the message necessarily that stood out to me but the conviction with which he gave it. His voice had both passion and confidence but also a sort of desperation, conveying the urgency, truth, and value that he knew the message held. I noticed that, though we were all listening, he was speaking primarily to the young girls and empowering them with a message that was stern and direct, unlike I’ve seen children being charged with the word before.
We also went to the boys’ school where we were able to tour and see how the boys live and get an education, and also how the school is able to collect and purify water to consume and sell. The team from Brasil did such an amazing job connecting with these boys and having fellowship through a game of soccer. The boys loved it!
These schools are incredible and really offer a whole new life of hope to these kids. God has been doing amazing things here and it was so cool to see that today. We have plans to return to the schools on Saturday and Tom encouraged us to really think about a few faces and names of specific individuals and pray for them and seek them out when we go back. There are about a thousand kids between the two schools and we want to be sure that we don’t just see the forest behind the individual trees.
My highlight was seeing the children worship during the service. One could not help but be moved by their sincerity and passion for Jesus Christ. If I were to leave tomorrow, that one highlight was worth my trip.
The short hour we had to spend with the children after lunch was special as well. Their willingness to approach strangers and open up was touching. Everyone on the team seemed to have at least one child who followed them around seeking their fellowship.
After lunch, when we went to spend time with the girls, they were so interested in us and so desperate for our attention and love! They wanted to know about where we come from and who is in our family and what “our best color is”. They were eager to play with our hair and touch our skin. Their English was very good and they were incredibly well behaved- throughout a span of a few hour church service. They were attentive and engaged. I was blown away by the way the girls acted, out of respect for their school leaders, and in faith to our one God.
The speaker really struck me as well. His message was simple. He preached about how we are created for having a day-to-day relationship with the Lord. He also spoke about the body of Christ. It was not the message necessarily that stood out to me but the conviction with which he gave it. His voice had both passion and confidence but also a sort of desperation, conveying the urgency, truth, and value that he knew the message held. I noticed that, though we were all listening, he was speaking primarily to the young girls and empowering them with a message that was stern and direct, unlike I’ve seen children being charged with the word before.
We also went to the boys’ school where we were able to tour and see how the boys live and get an education, and also how the school is able to collect and purify water to consume and sell. The team from Brasil did such an amazing job connecting with these boys and having fellowship through a game of soccer. The boys loved it!
These schools are incredible and really offer a whole new life of hope to these kids. God has been doing amazing things here and it was so cool to see that today. We have plans to return to the schools on Saturday and Tom encouraged us to really think about a few faces and names of specific individuals and pray for them and seek them out when we go back. There are about a thousand kids between the two schools and we want to be sure that we don’t just see the forest behind the individual trees.
These children’s lives are so precious. God has really pressed upon my own heart today that these are all of his children and He knows them intimately even when we can’t. I know He is working in their lives and in the lives of the directors and staff of MOHI schools and is definitely both using us and teaching us while we are here.
-- Rick Conniff for the Kenya team
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