Kenyan worship, a herd of goats, and a street fight

Last Sunday Matt was invited to preach at a church in Eldoret (Halleluya Church). The service started at about 10:30 and the church began to sing and dance and celebrate with the worship that is typical for many if not most African churches. The length of the service was also typical of most African churches. After numerous worship songs and about 30 testimonies, Matt was offered the platform at about 12:30. He spoke for about 45 minutes (probably a little brief for an African sermon), but afterwards, as the service continued, the Bishop, his wife, Matt, Cheryl, and two elders exited early to have lunch as the service continued until about 2PM.

They had a wonderful homemade stew with rice, (no goat intestines this time), and some typical Kenyan chai tea. Afterwards, Matt and Cheryl went to the Bishop's house and watched some Kenyan Sunday afternoon television with the family which mostly consisted of various preachers speaking in Swahili, although one show was broadcast in English with an American evangelist. The Bishop invited us to stay for a nearby outdoor evangelistic service they have in a neighborhood every week. As we got out of his car, we saw several singers on a stage singing and several dozen people in front of them dancing and singing. As we continued singing dozens of onlookers watched, dozens more walked by, and a large herd of goats walked right through the middle of the worshippers. Cheryl and Matt smelled the aroma of raw sewage directly behind them in a ditch, and a street fight began to erupt less than twenty feet from the crowd of worshippers. The street fight subsided, the goats managed to find greener pastures, and the congregation of worshippers continued to grow as the night went on.

Speaking of Kenyan worship, every weekday morning, the staff at Open Arms International enjoys a brief time of worship and prayer to begin every work day. Matt took the liberty to videotape one session so I hope you enjoy these Kenyan worship songs as much as we do (at least I hope I'll be able to download the video - we'll see - it's about ten minutes long) (sorry couldn't download it. I will try later).

We are enjoying a nice three day weekend as we are writing this blog. In fact we get two of them in a row thanks to what is called Moi day this weekend, and Kenyatta day next weekend courtesy of the first two presidents of Kenya (this is the equivalent of President's Day in the U.S.). Next weekend we might go out of town for the weekend and go see some wild hippos and crocodiles (we will certainly send photos in our next blog if that is the case). For now we are just busy putting formula into bottles and changing diapers.

At the village, things are progressing at a good pace. It is probable that the first orphanage home will be completed sometime in the next week. However, we still need to hook up water, sewer, and electricity. It looks likely that we might finally get this situation resolved with the well, and get good water supplied to the village so that we can hook up the homes to water in the next week. The sewer might be done in two weeks. We don't know when electricity will be supplied to the village, but we can likely move the children into the first two homes before the end of this month (even without electricity - they certainly don't have any right now, and the homes they will be moving into are much nicer than what they are living in now). We'll keep you updated on our progress and blog again soon.

Blessings,
Matt and Cheryl