New Life Homes (Lauren)

We go to New Life Homes usually once a week to spend time with the babies for a couple of hours. When we go, we usually help feed the smallest babies first and then once they are put down for their nap we sometimes go to play with the toddlers.

I love going to the orphanage…it is one of my favorite things to do while we are here. However, the first couple of times that we went I was always so excited to get there but I always felt angry when I left. I could not understand how a mother would leave her baby somewhere, whether it be at the gate of New Life Homes or in the trash somewhere. I also did not understand how God could allow these children to be left without parents. When we travelled to Amboseli for our safari, Grace and I talked about this a little bit and we just talked about how we felt like we couldn’t see God in places like this…or on the streets in the slums, etc. When we finished talking I told her that maybe since we had talked about it we would begin to see God in the places where we couldn’t see Him before.

The next time I went to New Life Homes we helped feed the babies and then they went down for their nap but we still had some time to spend there so we went up to play with the toddlers. There were a lot of people in the room so we did not stay long but while we were there the mamas got out bubbles to blow in the room for the kids. All of them laughed and giggled yelling “bubbles, bubbles.” When I left the orphanage that day I was not angry but happy…because I realized that God was there watching over those children and that they were happy where they were.

St. Boys project video...

St. boys video from Thomas Thompson on Vimeo.

Animal House and a special Fathers Day...

Maybe we will stick to either writing really long posts to catch you up on a weeks worth of ministry for little short snippets. This internet has been a major source of frustration for all of us. Skype? Out of the question. It’s just not strong enough to handle it. And I’m DYING TO see my niece and nephews b/c they are growing so fast! My first contact with my parents was finally this week. But the phone was static. I’m going to get over it though. I look at missionaries that went long before us. They left having no plans to see their families again. They left not knowing if they or their children would even survive their 3 months voyage to “the nations”. Trust me, I’ll get over it. But all that to say we haven’t posted consistently b/c we have sporadic email and we all have to share it.

Lindy! Can you just cut to the chase and tell us what’s new?

Okay, okay...

Chickens:

Good News- Grace and I are getting good at cleaning chickens. I won’t say killing, b/c neither of us has done that all by ourselves yet. (**Don’t read on if you are a lover of chickens… the living kind) The process: you karate chop it in the head (knocking it unconscious and breaking it’s neck then pull it’s neck to assure it is really broken. I have only attempted one chop and Thomas was holding it. It was scary. I think I should probably not do that any more. I truly believe it never knows what hit it. That makes me feel better any way. Plus you all know that Thomas is like the ultimate animal lover and HE IS THE ONE who does it! But he DOES NOT like doing it. He feels bad. But the $$ signs keep him from feeling too bad.

Bad News- we lost 31 baby chicks last week due to the cold temperatures. But Noah and Thomas have it worked out now. But not without a HUGE blow. It was very sad. Grace was such a trooper. She ate dinner super fast so she could go down to the chicken house with Noah and pick out the dead ones and help him bury them. She’s a good woman. Kevin and Lauren? Well, let’s just say they’re going to stick to just eating the chickens. Their gifts are in crafts and other areas. When I asked GK why she actually enjoys helping them she said this: “I think it’s gross, but knowing that it is helping Thomas and Noah become self sufficient and earn a living makes it so worth it. I have to help them.”

You know what amazes me? That we killed and cleaned 65 chickens this morning BY 7:30! We were done before anyone else was even out of the bed!! Yes, there were 6 of us and we started at 5:30, but earlier this week it took 4 of us 6.5 hours to do 40! The reason we did it so fast is b/c we had the professionals here. There are 2 brothers who charge 5ksh (6¢) per chicken to kill, pluck and clean out the chicken. It blows my mind how fast they are. But that is what they do for a living. They were nice enough to slow down and show us how today. I NEVER saw myself doing something like this… ever. But you really have such a sense of accomplishment afterwards. Not to mention the chicken taste THAT much better once you cleaned it yourself. J

Now… I think I’m going to start having milk delivered and boil it myself! It’s WAY cheaper. I’m SO serious people.

Our Sweet Boys:

This week we threw Chris a surprise Happy Fathers Day party. Any excuse to have cake, right?

The boys gave Chris a book with each of their pictures in it as well as their handprint and a letter to him. It was SO precious. I think it’s one of the best gifts he’s ever received. Dennis gave him the book and was SO excited about it. Chris didn’t even get past the first page. He put it down and walked out for a few minutes. I was so proud he came back and finished it with ALL the boys hovered around him. It was beyond priceless.

They are hilarious. They keep us in stitches. Here is some dialog for you:

“James, smile.”

Nothing.

“James, S-M-I-L-E.”

Nothing but a weird half smile.

“JAMES, SMILE! It’s a picture for Chris!”

This is what we got:

We have been working on interviewing each boy to get to know more about their history and specifics about their families and why they are on the streets. That has been so tough. We only have done a few a day b/c it is so much to take in. There are only 2 more interviews to do. Praise the Lord! I don’t think we can handle much more.

Livingston residents:

Chris- Running around like a chicken with his head cut off. (No pun intended) The container finally got here with all the food from Feed My Starving Children. THANK YOU LORD! We only had to go a week without it! (NDI filled in the gaps)

Lindy- Cooking up a storm and teaching Zippy a few things as well. They love being in the kitchen together! LT tries to stay home once a week to spend the day in the kitchen with Zipporah in preparation for the weeks meals ahead.

Grace- As I said choppin' chickens and memorizing whole chapters of the bible!

Lauren- Crafting up a storm. That girl has some real talent in that department! Even when I doubt she can pull off a craft for 300 students the night before with few resources- she is a machine!

Kevin- living it up with those boys. They LOVE him. I feel like every time we go, I never see Kevin walking around without an extra body or 2 hanging off his neck or back. Kevin also work hard making the st. boys video. :)

Pepper (the cat) - Well, freak thing actually. A few weeks ago when the Helsby's were here Pepper started acting funny. We quickly figured out that his belly was swelling and hard. So I did nursey stuff to try and make him "go." Becky and I went and got some caster oil. I can't imagine why but he had no interest in chugging that stuff. Thomas try shoving giving it to him. Somehow I knew it was probably more than that. By midnight Pepper could hardly walk. I figured omething neurological was going on. I walked outside at 5 the next morning and Pepper was gone. I dreaded telling Thomas. Sure enough, Thomas showed up early to check on his 5 year old cat he'd had since he was a kitten. It was really sad, but the thing that got to me was not that Pepper had died, but Thomas. THAT broke my heart. He buried Pepper right next to "Thomas" the scarecrow next to the garden. That way they could hang out all the time. :)

So last week I went and did something I never thought I'd do. I purposely bought a cat. He's a black kitten and he was $8.50 at the Shaggy killer "animal shelter". He has all his vaccines. We brought him home to Thomas who was ecstatic. Thomas named him "Boss". Appropriate. Well, we had him a whole 3 days and he was sneezing and being sick. So Thomas had to take him back. Hopefully he'll get him back next week.

I know... i just spent a whole paragraph on animals in Kenya. Sorry, but Thomas really means a lot to us and we're sad when he's sad. Plus we needed another snake killer! Boss has some big shoes paws to fill. Pepper died with at least 10 snake kills that we know of!

That's it for now, but get excited b/c Kevin made a video of the street boys that is fantastic! Check back tomorrow!

James and the giant... kevin?

The interns have been teaching the boys bible stories. They thought it would be fun to do skits. The boys LOVED it. They split them into 2 groups and one group had to teach the other group their story. We all tried as hard as we could to make them biblically sound...

so don't laugh when you don't remember a certain part of that story in the bible-

Untitled from Thomas Thompson on Vimeo.

After the skits we went back into the classroom and asked the opposite group to retell the story. The boy who retold ours said that David missed Goliath 3 times! haha!

That wasn't supposed to happen.

Tomorrow we should be getting the other groups video to upload!

Hope you enjoyed and laughed as much as I did. :)

Pull up a chair... we're doing a lot!

This is a tiny recap of the last several days since we've been slack busy.

This is James AKA: "Kamau". He is 10, but looks no older than about 8. I am pretty sure James could not love Kevin any more. I think he wishes they were siamese twins. For whatever reason James loves me too. Last week we were playing soccer and i gained at least 5 lbs on the bottom of my shoes b/c of all the mud from the crazy amount of rain here. I thought about playing barefoot, but quickly reminded myself I grew up wearing shoes most of the time and my feet weren't nearly as tough as theirs. After the game I jokingly walked back to their building with a ton of mud still on my chacos acting completely oblivious to the obscene amount of mud on my shoes. This made James and Dan laugh. When James noticed I was in no hurry to clean them up he became very concerned saying in swahili "Lindy, your shoes are dirty!!" over and over again. (He talks so fast and half the time I can't understand him, but that never stops him. He just says it over and over again- as if it helps me "know" what he's saying.) He kept trying to step with his little dirty feet on the big chunks of mud and then push me over in order for me to lift up my foot so the chunks would come off. (Guess he gave up on even an attempt to tell me to move my foot to get the mud off. Soon I was standing in line to wash off my legs and feet. I slipped my shoes off and set them aside. A few minutes later I see this:

A little boy cleaning my shoes off with his bare hands... for no reason. Humbling, huh?

Wait a second... we're ministering to them???

Thursday-

We spent some time with the St. Boys having a Super Saint Boy Birthday Celebration! It was complete with cakes for the boys and even candles to blow out! I made 2 cakes with 6 names on each cake. (Please refrain from laughing at the really ugly one that is barely leagable due to the horable icing job..) It was their first ever birthday party! We had to explain to them about blowing the candles out and all that jazz. Let me tell you.... they LOVED IT! And would you believe that those 12 boys ate every bit of their cake? We are talking 3 and 4 HUGE slices of cake. My sweet little James was trying to shove it in his pocket to save for later. That was not going to be a good situation so I caught him and we found a great hiding spot. :)

After their celebration we played soccer which is per the norm with them! Those boys LOVE to play soccer.

Untitled from Thomas Thompson on Vimeo.

Friday- Sunday

Last night we got back from spending 3 days in the bush- out in Kibwezi. It is about a 4 hour drive east of NBO. Our group of 13 (5 of us, Graig's group of 4 from Michigan, and a group of 4 from Kenya) followed our partner, Meshack and his pastor friend Dan to Kibwezi for a "Voice of One" outreach to youth. Dan did the setting up and coordinating with the boarding schools we visited. We spent our 3 days in and around kibwezi speaking to a total of about 2,000 14-18 year olds. God was truly glorified this weekend and we were all so blessed to be a part of Meshack's team. He is an incredible leader and so passionate for the lost youth of his country. I have just a VERY few pictures of the past 4 days.

This is the team in front of a boabab tree. These trees are beautiful and Dan told us that these trees were used by his ancestors who would use them as they traveled. At night they would find a tree, cut a hole out of it and make a door of thorns and sleep in it at night. I tried to talk everyone into doing this, but to my dismay- no one was interested.

I'm sure you were expecting "serving pictures" to be posted but surely you know me better than that. You know I had to post something funny. While Meshack was preaching a locust flew up on his back. Please click to enlarge. It was almost big enough to eat him!

St. Mary's school- Kibwezi

I'm not too sure if these boys like the interns much....

Sunday Snapshots...

The Saint Boys (Huff)

The thing that I have always felt as the biggest pull in Kenya has been the street boys, newly renamed by themselves as the Saint Boys. The Saint Boys Project is a part of Only Servants Ministry. It takes boys who live on the street off and helps educate them, teach them about Christ, and show them the unconditional love that Christ shows us. These boys, before they come into the program, have no one to take care of them or watch over them, live in the streets, are normally addicted to sniffing glue to get them high, as well as sometimes addicted to other drugs and alcohol. They are looked down upon in the community, sometimes considered criminals, and also looked upon as untouchables. This program gives them a place to come, learn, have fun, learn about Christ, and see that there is much more to life than the lifestyle they are currently living. A place that they can come and be accepted as they are, and not looked down upon. The purpose is to help make independent people that can be successful, and make healthy disciples of Christ. To help show them that they do not have to be a part of the street for their whole life, that they can be much greater than that.

These are some amazing boys. I love spending time with them. I look forward to the things we are able to do with them. They are very open and love to be around you. They are very excited to see us every time we come. I love just being able to be in their presence. I feel very blessed that I have had the opportunity to work with them as much as I have.



We have been able to do a lot of different things with them so far. We have done arts & crafts with them (mainly a salvation bracelet). This bracelet has different beads meaning different things including, black for sin, white for purity, red for Jesus’ blood, and green for growth in our relationship with Christ. They really enjoyed making these. We have also played different random small games just to get comfortable with each other. We also made up a scavenger hunt to do with them, where they had to work in teams against each other. Of course we had to play futbol (soccer) with them. They are really really good. It just amazes me how they are able to have such joy and fun in whatever they do with us. It also makes me think how selfish and ungrateful we are, as Americans, because we complain about doing some small thing that we don’t like as much.

This has really made me think a lot and made me somewhat disgusted with myself. When I think of their situations, and how they act, compared to how we as Americans, with myself included, act. It sickens me. It is unimaginable for me to think of how I would react if I was in their situation. I can NOT imagine not having parents or family to take care of me. I can NOT imagine not having shelter or a place to live. I can NOT imagine not knowing where my next meal would come from, or if I was going to eat again today. I can NOT imagine being an outcast and looked down upon in my community.

Thinking about this has really made me sick. To think about when we do have SO much and yet we are so picky, greedy, ignorant, and ungrateful. We get upset or frustrated when we don’t get to eat exactly what we want to eat, when they just want something! We don’t eat everything we have, when they just want to eat! We get angry and upset with our parents, when they just want parents or someone to take care of them! We say our house isn’t big enough or nice enough, when they just want some shelter. We want new and extra clothes, when they have just 1, maybe 2 pairs of clothes. We have numerous pairs of shoes, when they have 1 pair, mostly old and torn.

We are so ungrateful! They have so little but can have so much joy when they are doing things, even if it is just the little things.

This really breaks my heart. I can’t imagine being in their situation.

I think the thing that pulls me towards this program above all else is that I think this is the exact thing we are supposed to do as Christians. This is exactly what God wants us to do. He wants us to go and meet the unbelievers where they are, and accept them. He wants us to go and show them the Love of Christ. He wants us to love them where they are, not where we want them to be. He wants us to show people that there is more to this life than the things of this world. He wants us to show people the joy he has given us. He wants us to do the dirty work, to get uncomfortable. He wants us to do the uncomfortable things, that no one wants to do. He wants us to go touch the untouchables. That is exactly what we do as a part of the Saint Boys Project.