Among the least of these

The last 40 miles of road to Kitale, a town in northwest Kenya, is murder on your shocks. More potholes and savage crevices than paved road, one is constantly choosing which side of the road will do less damage to your vehicle. Sue and I took along our interns, Mark and Su Davies from the Vineyard in Cardiff Wales, to this Leadership Seminar. After seven plus hours of adventuresome driving we arrived in the slums of Kitale.

Pastor Edward and Nancy Khaoya planted the Vineyard in the middle of the slums in 2003. As we surveyed the neighborhood it became clear that the church was surrounded by illegal brewing dens, drug dealer hovels, and witches’ lairs. Hell may be an improvement on this neighborhood. Yet many of the people that are part of this Vineyard are those who have escaped this devastating environment.


We spent the weekend studying the leadership of Jesus as portrayed in the Gospels. Thirty leaders from six or seven Vineyards participated in the seminar. The expected format in much of Africa is that the teacher lectures and the rest sit quietly, no questions permitted. Instead we gathered the leaders in a circle and had conversations.

All of these leaders are desperately poor.

It would seen that no one cares what the poor think. Jesus did. There is a profound wisdom birthed out of suffering that we can learn from.

Serving the poor quickly alters one’s view of the world and how ministry is done. A few examples . The children you see eating in the photo are the offspring of the alcoholics and drug addicts. They ate from the scrapings and leftovers of the conference, as though they had not eaten in days. Pastor Edward told us of one woman they had been working with who had been “renting” her nine year old daughter out for three dollars a night to support her drinking binges.

During ministry time on Sunday morning, Sue was praying for another lady when suddenly she became violently ill and had to leave the room to recover. We believe the spiritual warfare was severe. During the worship time a young man, heavily intoxicated, gyrated around the room and had to be restrained from dancing around the pulpit. In all of this brokenness, Jesus showed up and touched people.

We drove back to Nairobi, bouncing down the road exhausted, awakened again to the brutal reality that the majority of Vineyards in Kenya face the scenario we had just experienced. We must stand with them for the King has said `I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.' Matthew 25.40

The Case of the Missing Spoon

‘I don’t believe it, I can’t believe it – it’s been less than an hour!!’ I was shouting to Doug as I returned from the trash bin. ..

This Sunday had been a very long day. A good day, but I was so very tired. As I was pulling up to the house, I was reflecting on what a good day it had been. God had moved and healed during church this morning and I had just finished having a half day of prayer with my Discipleship class. As is our routine, we had a potluck lunch together and once again I had brought home the plastic dishes to wash. But, today I was so tired and just couldn’t bear the thought of washing these plates one more time. For a moment, I reconsidered if throwing the plates away was being wasteful or if I was being lazy, but decided I just couldn’t wash them once again. And besides, these plates were getting a bit old and tired. Decision made, I put them in the trash bin on our compound which is next to the staff quarters, about 30 yards from our house, and went inside.

Once inside I realized my large serving spoon was in the bag with the plastic plates, so I rushed back to retrieve it from the trash. My bag was gone – in less than an hour the staff had gone to the bin and taken the bag with all the plates and my spoon. My first response was “I want my spoon back, it’s mine!” After stopping to think about it, I was reminded that I had thrown the bag in the rubbish so it was no longer mine. I was reminded that what I had considered trash, the staff had thought valuable enough to take it out of the bin for their own use, or possibly to sell for some extra cash.

These 3 men live on our compound just 30 yards from our house, yet we live in completely different worlds and realities - our dwellings are on the same property, yet we live lives that are profoundly different.

Charles is the shamba man (gardener), Stanley opens the gate during the day and Francis is the escari (night guard) as well as earning a bit of extra money (about 75 cents) washing the car for us once a week. We see one another and speak almost daily yet there is a vast difference between us. . .

So, I finally accepted the fact that my serving spoon belongs to someone else now, and each day as I get in the car or take the trash to the bin, I think of these three men and imagine them using it to cook and eating from the plates I considered rubbish. . . or maybe they were sold for a nice profit.

May God bless these men and may I never forget the life of poverty my neighbors live. May I continue to be a good steward of the abundance God has given me, and may He continue to remind me of those in need around me.

You will read in our next posting how He answered this prayer within two weeks as Doug and I traveled to Kitale for a weekend conference. . .