UPDATE

LAST WEEK I wrote at length of how the Lord had provided for us up to date.
I thought you might like to know that He also uses those that hear His Voice in Kenya as well, as this photo portrays! On this particular occassion we had woken up to a 'cent less day' and had as usual come together to pray for our daily bread.
We had just about enough food on hand to provide against lunch for everyone, but no more. Lunch came and went - then a little later two mini buses drove up to the Testimony House front door. Out of them spilled a whole crowd of young adults from Nakuru, two driving hours distance. Leading them was one of our Old Boys, Anthony Kiprotich - then Assistant pastor at Lake View Africa Gospel Church in Nakuru. He was also leader of this group of Christian Young Adults from various churches in the same town. He had shared his testimony with them, and they had been anxious to visit us and actually SEE for themselves where he had grown up AND to bring gifts of food to us!! They brought enough for a WEEK's housekeeping - some of it you can see in the photo. Yet again we were delivered! We still had no cash, but we didn't need it for a week!

TO THE RIGHT is a photo of the very FIRST Testimony House.This was taken in August 1969. It was a fairly small mud and wattle cottage some 20x40 ft with an outside kitchen and bathroom. Three very small bedrooms and a sitting/dining room. No ceiling - just open rafters to the iron sheeting, no internal doors, no glass windows. It had been home to goats before I gook it over; then we cleaned it out, repainted it, put in a rush mat ceiling, and hung curtains in the inside doorways. No electricity! Oil lamps. The Toilet was a 'long drop' a small hut built over a twenty foot hole in the ground covered with a box with a hole in it. The roof of that toilet was grass, and the first time I used it a snake felt from it onto my head. I ran yelling SNAKE!, SNAKE! - to the great amusement of passers by!! The first boy that I helped WILSON, then about 14 (now married with two children and 53 years old!) brought me a photo he had taken of it last week - still being used as a dwelling, but totally run down and ruinous. The roof broken and rusted, and the walls crumbling and unpainted. Worse than when the goats lived in it!! I was sad to see it so - many happy memories crowd upon me of my time there whenever I see this black and white photo. From such a very small beginning has come so much - much more than I then would have imagined.

TODAY is Daryl's 36th Birthday! In the photo he is only 9; just a year after he first came to stay with us, together with his brother Edward. It is a working day for him as well, and he is busy supervising some maintenance work with the School Bus and other matters relating to the School boarding section. He has a busy life these days, but revels in activity and keeping things in good repair and order. Much happier doing this than sitting at a desk. Now I have just received a message from his son JESSE who is now 10 and just joined FACE BOOK! How time passes, and the Grace of God continues to walk alongside of each one of us in patience, mercy and love. We do not deserve such deep consideration. But how wonderful that it is there for us in any case, and that He never tires of looking for our acceptance of it, or for our rejection of all that which at one time or another sought to exclude Him from our life! A loving God? Yes, Patient and Kind also! But His NAME is JEALOUS! He yearns and seeks for our undivided affection and service..........jealously!
Have a wonderful week!

John and Esther


NB - You may receive this BLOG via a friend - if you would like to be in touch direct please let us know your E-mail address.
If you would rather not have this BLOG sent to you via E-mail as it is now, please let us know so that we can remove you from the weekly list.