SURELY, ONE MUST EAT!!

One of our M.P.s ....'tucks into a generous helping of chicken and chips at a Hague restaurant on October 16th 2003  -   He is among legislators who, when not attending the Trial at the I.C.C. while away the long hours talking, eating, and taking and posing for pictures in the Dutch City.     They all travelled to the Netherlands 'to show solidarity' with Deputy President William Ruto and Mr. Joshua arap Sang, wh are being Tried for post Election violence (circa 2007)

THIS PHOTO &  BLURB appeared on the front page of the Daily Nation one day this week.    Seems unfair really that one cannot eat ones food in peace, if not in privacy.   The Honourable Member will no doubt suffer some annoyance at this fiery dart, shot from a well placed 'candid camera'.   There may be room to sympathise with him; he was,after all, only passing by the Hague to add a little support and goodwill for our Deputy President at a time of need.     Surely he can be allowed a meal as he hops from plane to plane.   We should encourage his humanity...........should we not?

BUT was he RIGHT to be there in the first place?    Was it an absolute necessity for him to  be there, in the vicinity of the Hague, staying at an ultra expensive hotel, just for the purpose of encouraging the D.P. ?Could he afford it? -  or was he just there because the Government offered to pay?     It looks as if the finance was in fact funded by everyman through the Revenue Department.       I have no problem with seeing this man enjoying his chicken and chips -  my problem is that his flight, to and fro from the Hague, his accommodation, transport and appetite may have been paid for by the TAX PAYER,        This would be a waste of hard earned money.       It would be bathing in the blood and sweat of every man, woman, and child poured unnoticed and unappreciated into the National Economy.        It would be Selfish, Gluttony at its worst.      It would be just the same as looking at the mad Roman Emperor NERO, lounging in his Palace sitting room, idly playing his lute (guitar) as he watched his City, the City of Rome BURN!     Awful.      
YES we might all feel guiltless to eat when we feel the need .......but to eat a plate of food (as I also mentioned last week) so expensive that it could afford the provision of an ordinary family's food for a WEEK seems just TOO BAD.       And to eat that plate of food when you know it has been paid for by those who GO WITHOUT what they need for themselves alone!!!!    Oh my!     Is Mr. Rutto pleased with this display of WASTEFUL EXTRAVAGANCE?  - (even if only personally spent).    Can the unemployed, hungry man in the street, his wife and children, be happy about it?     Is God happy about it.       IS KENYA a nation to be built only upon the blood and hunger of its people, until nothing is left further to sustain it?    Until it is made barren, and uninhabited,  its cities and mansions left to decay and moulder away to nothing.
IN ELDORET THIS AFTERNOON  our vehicle could not move in a seething crowd of humanity that looked much poorer than it did a year ago, jostling upon the roads and pavements seemingly without joy or aim.      There is a change upon this town.    For the first time in forty years I felt there was a human despair upon the population.

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THIS RATHER GRIM representation of early Man is said to resemble Man's Common Ancestor - the man from whom ALL mankind has sprung!
This Week, in the Daily Nation,there was report of the discovery of a human skull said to be in the region of 2 million years old (??) unearthed almost completely intact.       The writer of the Article expresses GREAT SURPRISE and excitement that close study of this Skull suggests that all ancient remains of MAN now point to an assumption that he has evolved from only ONE common ancestor.
In other words there were not many different species of Man in different parts of the world as had previously been thought.....NO!  It now seems that Man sprang from Africa, and from Africa alone, and from only ONE basic primogenitor.    Science is expressing amazement that ALL Mankind sprang from ONE original source!         Are you feeling somehow confused.    I mean didn't we all know this before!      I mean doesn't the BIBLE, for example, tell us that God made MAN, and only one.     Out of that Man He produced and moulded EVE, and they were the FIRST couple on earth from which ALL the human race has sprung.       Yes of course it does say this very clearly and firmly.      It is science that has encouraged an opposite view.      I find it VERY gratifying that yet again science has been forced to consider that they made a miscalculation - a MISTAKE.    The Bible is RIGHT.   Mankind is ONE just as GOD is ONE.
No other species of a man - no other GODS.
Well of course this news has not pleased everyone, but it HAS pleased ME, since I have always intuitively felt that all MEN were created the SAME, and that all fell into rebellion against their Creator, but are all still loved equally and given opportunity to find their way back to God and into the knowledge of His Love.    GOD, our maker, loves us all, and He wants us to love each other as brothers and sisters of ONE Father.   This is the 'duty' of Man.      To know this, and to give your life to demonstrating it, could change the world - it will certainly change YOU...........

.....THAT IS IF YOU HAVE TIME.        Time is definitely running our - definitely we do not have untold millenia in which to further evolve into greater perfection.     Indeed we may only have DAYS left to us to work even a little towards such a goal.       This was again brought home to me to day reading yet another Article in the NATION.       One entitled 'Outdoor Air Pollution - a Leading Cancer Cause'.   WHO's International Agency for Research on Cancer has stated that 'The air we breath has become polluted with a mixture of cancer causing substances - We now KNOW that outdoor air pollution is not only a major risk to health in general, but also a leading environmental cause of cancer deaths.'       AGAIN I do not find this statement in the least surprising given the pollution we see everywhere.      But maybe we have taken it for granted that there is clean air enough for us all to survive on  -  Yes, survive on, but not live from.       I have mentioned some other time that in Japan there are cities so air polluted that the Authorities have had to install Oxygen Ports through out such cities, to enable citizens ENOUGH air to exist in them.      I assume people have to PAY.   It is truly terrible to have to accept that MAN who was given the task of taking care of this Planet should be the main cause of its terminal illness; the cause of it's imminent death.       SORRY, I know I do carry on a lot about these things, but every day I find myself confronted with even more proof that it IS so!.

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AND SO TO THE CLOSE OF ANOTHER WEEK.       But not before I show you some good photos of a creature quickly in danger of becoming extinct - the RHINO.        Daryl's son, Jessie too these photos recently on a school trip to Nakuru National Park.      I have always been rather fond of the Rhino.   He is at once enormously arrogant AND humorously foolish.      Huge in armour plating, he seems to exude total indifference to all.         Now the Chinese want, as they have apparently always wanted, the great tusk on the end of the Rhino's nose.      Some talk of it being (ground down and taken in with your tea) an active aphrodisiac!    This has to be SO unbelievably RIDICULOUS that one must indeed be sorry for the defenceless Rhino.

All things bright and beautiful.

all creatures great and small.

all things wise and wonderful.

The Lord God made them ALL

Each little flower that opens

Each little bird that sings

He made their glowing colours

He made their tiny wings.

A favourite childhood song sung much by me as a child.

Strangely as I grow older, and hopefully growing into a child of God,

I find myself singing it, humming it, more than often.

Perhaps because I grieve for the Earth

and Earth's creatures.

Our Love and Prayers flow out to you. Thank your for all YOUR love and prayer, appreciated and coveted moment by moment, and THANK you for walking with us.....

John and Esther

     

A WANDERING MIND

WOW this photo goes back to circa 1983 - THIRTY years ago!!      

ALL gone into the world now, including Mum and Dad Jensen from Denmark who were then Houseparents in Jacaranda Cottage. Yes this was Jacaranda in 1983.       Children growing up all the time, some admissions some departures.  And even Mum and Dads in each Home can come and go.     Perhaps they cause the greatest sense of loss, when the leave, since they are the ones to hold the family together.      All have come to offer themselves as parents at the first, but not all discover that they are able to parent so many all at once.      Some come to devote their lives, and some endure only for a short time and leave.       They leave a family behind, forsaken and somehow orphaned all over again.        Jacaranda has seen seven sets of parents since it began as a Home for Children in 1975.      Of course Esther and I knew parents, in any Home, would have to retire at some point and new ones take over - but we expected long-stayers.     WE stayed 28 years as parents in Testimony House, and saw the benefit of it in the children that stayed with us.   Joshua and Miriam in Jacaranda stayed 19 years and found the same thing.     However,  when it comes to leaving it has been, and we think always will be a hard road to travel at the very time.    LATER the hurt heals, and even for ourselves we are seeing many children come back to seek us out with good memories of our family life together, and with adult understanding about how the time had to come when parting was such a bitter pill to swallow.    In fact, strange to say, all those who lived in a particular house seem to see the different parents as ONE as they look back and visit.      Of course they remember the individuals INDIVIDUALLY, but somehow it is as if each Mum and Dad stand as one so that on returning to the HOUSE it remains the Family that it was, and the current 'parents' composite of all that were there before them.

But Jacaranda as a Home has had the most 'Ups and Downs'.       The most changes of Houseparent, and the most troubled children and young people.    Since Joshua and Miriam left in 2003 we have seen three different couples take their place.     Currently we have Joseph and Beatrice Rop, now in their fifties, taking on the 'family'.
The have been with us since March 2009.     For the first time since Joshua and Miriam left we have begun to see the ensuing disturbance and insecurity give way to a peace-filled and happy Family once more.   We are grateful for Joe and Beatrice; grateful for their patient endurance that has sprung from a true desire to bring God's Love into the lives of children.      They are an encouragement to the rest of us.
We are praying together to see that same Strength and Devotion to God, carry all our houseparents onward, and US too, though it is true Esther and I are now tucked away as 'grandparents' to all four Families. Not always easy to face every day - but for God we can and will face anything.   We are here for HIM.

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RECENTLY one of our cows gave birth to a calf - a little girl cow.    Regretfully her mother passed away a day or two later, but the calf has survived and is doing well, strong and full of curiosity about life.   Now we have TWO heifer and one bull calf growing up with THREE surviving cows that still give us all plenty of MILK.

All the cows are on the Jacaranda Compound now in their new enclosure.      They seem very contented and happy in their new surroundings, but we are still hoping to lay a cement floor to their enclosure to avoid the danger of foot rot and other diseases that can be picked up from mud and waterlogged ground.   They spend about half their time locked up in a fairly roomy communal coral, but they also do go out to graze for some hours of the day.

We hope to see our heifers grown up into good 'milkers' - but the bull calf may be slaughtered for meat later on,      Also one of our current milkers is now old, and may herself have to be taken off to the Slaughter-house as well.      She has served us well, and many others before we got her.     I think she has had a fairly happy and rewarding time with us.  They serve us, but we try not to see them as 'possessions to be used' without kindness and thankfulness and perhaps most of all 'appreciation'.   We must remember WHO made them, and that HE loves and cares about them - and that He has entrusted us with the task of treating them accordingly for His sake.

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IT HAS STILL BEEN RAINING during this week again.       Testimony House and Jacaranda Cottage have both been troubled by their leaking roofs.     Not pleasant to have your floors and belongings suddenly saturated with water.     Both roofs have been a trouble since we moved under them!    Both built a long time ago, and not easy to repair now.    We have always been faced with the prospect of one day having to literally REMOVE them and then REPLACE them.     But this will not be easy and demands that we seek good expert advice as to how we can do this - especially where in some cases we will have to somehow join the NEW to the existing.     Not a very happy prospect.       On the other hand we have lived with them now for many years.      No one became ill, were washed away, or died.       God giveth more grace.....

TODAY our WATER Department has apologised for reduced Water supply in our area!    Rather surprising when it is understood that this has been the wettest year in forty years for our Country, and that the rivers are full.     WHERE IS the water going?     The pressure is certainly low, and some days water cannot find its way into our roof storage tanks.    Sometimes SO low it will not service the flush the toilet systems either in the Homes or the School.     Not easy to endure.           WELL, say the authorities, it is not that the supply is low, but that we do not have a big enough Holding Tank to be able to enable efficient CLEANSING of all the water that we need - we need MORE holding tanks - AND bigger dams!     Sad that they can make such statements AFTER the water has GONE, rather than before.       It is galling when those who should know better and are in fact PAID to know better, declare their own inability to look ahead, plan and provide for the future.     

Nevertheless we still should not grumble since there is still water in the tap.     MANY in other areas have no tap let alone water!    Life may begin to also cause US discomfort, but this alone will not kill us.

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BLUEBELLS may be a thing of the past - or so I read recently.   Their habitats are all being eaten up by human development.      The shady woodlands and copses of our countryside (in England) disappearing to make way for more housing estates.     Everything is disappearing - even here in Kenya.    OUR Wild-life is vanishing - with only a relative 'handful' of elephants, lions, rhinoceros (to name but a few) still existing compared to the huge numbers of the recent past.     Even these remnants are being constantly whittled away by poachers.   Nothing and no one seems able to stop this.    Eventually all we shall have left are photos, and other pictorial images to show to our children and grandchildren.     An Earth slowly being impoverished and plundered by its appointed Protector - MAN.     Man was appointed to CARE for Creation not destroy it, and selfishly use it up for his own base and carnal lusts.       But Man can 'rob his own grandmother for a shilling' so how much more will he rob for MORE than a shilling.        Governments accuse other nations of plundering their wealth - we hear this accusation all the time in relation to the ill use of the Colonialists in merely taking advantage of the Colonies rather than developing them.     Whether this is true or not, it is certainly true that Man continues to take advantage of himself, his kind.... and that without any conscience or compunction.    Just this week we have been told in Kenya that our Governments Audit has revealed yet another deficit - this time of more than 200 billion Kenya Shillings all gone astray - somewhere.    Yes, Man is a Robber, a Pillager of everything and everyone, and ANYTHING he can turn to his own profit  -  he is indeed his own worst enemy whilst at the same time being the Enemy of all Creation AS LONG AS HE REMAINS IN THE GRIP OF SATAN, AND DOES NOT TURN BACK TO GOD. Let Mankind be WARNED - Judgement is COMING!    Judgement more fearsome than any human kind, and one quite unable to be bought off with anything we have!

Tomorrow I shall be in the pulpit again in our Sunday Morning Fellowship.     I shall be sharing about the 5th Commandment ' Honour your Father and Mother....'      I tend to go through the TEN Commandants about every three or four years, and we have them posted up everywhere.    Forget them, forget GOD, and in the end NOTHING will be left in or upon the Earth.........BECAUSE they (the inhabitants of the Earth) have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinances, broken the everlasting covenant....(Isaiah 24v1-6  the whole chapter is worth careful prayerful thought!)

Our affectionate love to you all, each one.    You are Precious in His Sight.

Lovingly     John and Esther.

DO NOT CONFORM TO THE WORLD

THIS PHOTO IS OF A COTTAGE IN A TINY VILLAGE CALLED 'ALFRISTON' IN SUSSEX ENGLAND.
I have put it in here because it speaks of a bygone age!     And recently I have been considering how that time not only passes by, but at certain times seems to come to the end of a chapter, an age, an era.      THIS COTTAGE has stood for 800 years and seen time go by whilst remaining almost the SAME in its snug garden.    But different ERAS have seen changes in the world around it.   In its social life.   Things have gone on.     They have certainly gone on since I was born in May 1940.
I read just recently a comment from someone writing about those days and remembering what did not even EXIST then - ' No personal computers, no Internet, no cell phones, no calculators, no FM radio, no ATMs, no satellites - (until Sputnik), no Debit cards no cable TV, no MTV..........'      How DID people manage to live in those days without all this electronic and technical advance?    We lived very well indeed with less stress and perhaps less fear.     Just a hundred years and the whole world society has CHANGED even more radically and quickly than in the Industrial Revolution.     And by 1960 the introduction of Television began to shrink the world until now with mobile phones, the Internet, and Cable TV we can have the world IN our homes.      More than that we have speeded up the process of learning and 'knowing' EVERYTHING.          Reading in the PRESS we are confronted with what the Owners think will SELL the Paper -  Sensational news - mainly violent, corrupt, disappointing and tragic, and SEX.      Sex is probably number one - a close runner with Corruption.  
When I look at the photo above, and even remember my own childhood in the North and West of England between 1940 and 1960 I see little of what we endure in society today.      Of course crime and immorality and injustices existed.....but today it seems NOTHING ELSE EXISTS.      In this last few years we have seen civil unrest and political and religious terrorism destabilise the peace of the world.      The London Riots, still seem unbelievable.    But we have lived progressively with Famine, Disease, and Insurrection all over the globe.      And SINCE the 1960s it seems as if man cannot live apart from SEX.     Indeed Violence and SEX dominate our world scene.     And from sexual permissiveness and liberal manners awful statistics are available.      For example statistics show that adulterous behaviour is out of control.    The Kinsey Institute estimates that during their married lives 37% of American males will prove sexually unfaithful to their wives and 29% of their wives will commit adultery.
Adultery is family-obliterating behaviour that destroys the very heart of society, with devastating consequences for children.    According to social critic William Kirkpatric, divorce is "up 700% in this century, with most of the rise occurring in recent decades"   He also notes that "the pain of parental divorce is more difficult for a child to overcome than the death of a parent."        Teenage pregnancies are up worldwide, and with the the incidence of single parent 'families' rising.     AND more and more of those cases relating to people going on the rampage, killing without apparent reason, are found to be from 'one parent families.
THE WORLD has radically changed and LEFT BEHIND its old moral values and concepts.     This began I believe in the 40s, and began to be clearly SEEN in the 60s since when a NEW WORLD ORDER has come into being both in Political Science, and in MORAL and SPIRITUAL perception.     A BRAVE new world indeed.     Where is BEAUTY?    Where where is FAITHFULNESS?   Where is SPIRITUAL worth? As I have often felt in my heart - the evolutionary teaching that 'Men came from Apes and the Jungle' seems much less likely than that Men are turning to become APES, and are returning to the law of the Jungle.
Perhaps we should wake up with a start and realise what is happening to humanity - the Cartoon was drawn in 1922!

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THIS WEEK our weather has taken a turn for the better with deliciously warm and sunbathed days.

Also the Nation is quiet and slowly getting over the enormous shock of the West Gate Massacre.  BUT perhaps not feel quite as secure as before.       One of our old girls from Testimony House who is now a teacher away from here, lost her fiancee at West Gate.    He was there shopping and was one of those shot down.

ON WEDNESDAY OF THIS WEEK we received the three girls I mentioned Last Week.    They all arrived together with their Uncle and also their Pastor.       We officially Admitted them to the Homes, trusting that eventually the Children's Department will have them duly Committed to us via the Court.
PERIS, aged 16 is standing at the back of this photo, and to her left is Susan aged 13 and lastly Mary aged 8.     ALL three are suffering from severe Malnutrition, and Mary had been diagnosed as having HIV when she was born.     She had not been checked in all the years till now, but yesterday at our HIV/AIDS Ampath Clinic she was discovered to now be NEGATIVE.   Much Praise and Thanksgiving indeed.
Peris is staying now in Testimony House as part of their family, Susan in Tyndale Cottage and their family, and Mary in Drakeley Cottage and their family.    All three VERY happy and already settled in.     They have yet to be tested as to their academic ability and placed in their appropriate Class.    Not many weeks left of this last term - School closes on the 8th November.
We feel we have guided very much by the Holy Spirit in granting places for these sisters.    AMEN.!!

We also received a NEW cow calf last week.   Her poor mother unfortunately died giving birth to her, but the calf is strong and bright, and already the darling of all the children.     We still have THREE cows and three calves - one a bull calf.    All are doing well, and enjoying their new quarters in the boma near to Tyndale Cottage.     

LIFE HERE CONTINUES by His Grace, and His Love in and through you all.     The sun is shining, a light breeze like a breath of blessing moving about the compound, full of colour, freshness and peace.      It is as if 'time' stands still at times here.     His Word continues to order our lives and implant faith and confidence into all our hearts - no matter what is happening around us, or how adrift and alien the world might become.    The is something here in Testimony like the Cottage in the photo.   The World does batter upon our doors and fences at times, but we are KEPT by His Power, and so far we remain a WITNESS to the everlasting Commandments of God.

God Bless and be with each one of your, our dear friends, and co labourers with us.  

John and Esther

What IS Going ON?

TODAY children, ALONE, can be seen everywhere in Kenya.   Having commenced clearing our Eldoret streets we see MORE returning every day.     In 2012 the OFFICIAL number of children considered homeless orphans was put at more than 1.5 million.     The number has not gone down.  
No so long ago the Director of Children's Services Minister - Esther Murugi was quoted as saying - 'The Government is supporting over 2.5 million orphans, and its limited resources are overwhelmed!'   She then appealed for assistance from religious and charitable organisations.
BUT TODAY it seems that this scenario has changed - or if not changed then is seriously misrepresented and seemingly unreliable.
This week Testimony was approached by a local Church pastor well known to us.    A family attending his church had suddenly been thrust into poverty and loss.     Never rich, neither husband or wife having more than casual employment to provide for themselves and their five children, income has now ceased altogether. The husband died of AIDS in 2006 and his wife passed away with AIDS just two weeks ago.   The home was grabbed by another poor relative as soon as this woman passed away, and although the boys in the family (17 and 20) were offered shelter by the mother's uncle, no one came forward to help the three girls.
16, 13, and 8, the youngest also with HIV.      The pastor asked for our help.     However we are not allowed by law to Admit children into the Homes without the consent and knowledge of the Children's Department - so I sent him off to the appropriate office saying we had vacancies and could take the children provided the Department agreed.
THEY told the pastor that they no longer favoured or sought for children to be placed long term in the Children's Homes,     They current policy was to have such children fostered - this could take some time - and in the meantime they could not help.    AMAZING!!           I have written back to the Children's Officer for the area and informed her that we shall ADMIT the three girls next Wednesday and expect her department to provide the necessary Court Orders - failing which I will attend Court myself on  their behalf.
For some years now the Government has been intimating that it would have no need of Children's Homes by the year 2020, declaring that by that time ALL children currently homeless would have been FOSTERED.
The United States and the United Kingdom have both followed this kind of policy from time to time, and both have encountered problems relating basically to lock of personnel to monitor and secure children fostered or finance handed out as part of the bargain.
TODAY Kenya has upwards of four hundred thousand families who have - with financial inducement - taken a child into their care.      Within a short period after placement approximately 30% of these children have run away to the street again!      The government IS aware of this but continues to pursue this policy (which though good in part, is difficult to implement.).      
THIS determination to flog what looks already like a partly dead horse, has meant that officially they have had to discourage children being committed to Children's Homes.       With a rising figure of more than 2.5 million children nationwide un-sheltered or cared for, it seems quite amazing.

THE RED CROSS has just recently opened a new 5 star Hotel in Eldoret just a short walk away from us.  Daryl and I went to view it yesterday.     It is well appointed but expensive.      A plate of food costs up to Ksh, 1500/-   more than a weeks housekeeping for a normal labouring family!    The actual difference in price for a plate of similar food is about 1000 Kenya shillings.  It seems again quite incongruous and without reason for a CHARITY (as I understood the Red Cross to be) to plant such a high class establishment in the midst of poverty and beyond the reach of the average Kenyan.      I found the same problem in India where the multi-floor modern malls and apartments are lapped to the doors by the very grime of poverty and even filth. Just to walk through this hotel, so foreign to our surroundings, made us both feel out of place and uncomfortable - no doubt fortunate their prices are SO inflated that we can never be tempted to visit then socially.   Who will it profit I wonder?     Not the Kenyan - perhaps the tourist, though few come this way.........

WITH  the sudden increase in VAT on basic foodstuffs AND an 11/- increase per litre on petrol, the cost of living has shot up and will continue to do so.     The school has not increased Fees for those attending from outside of the Homes for three years, but this year they have notice an increasing termly deficit.  They have therefore publicly proclaimed a rise in Basic Tuition Fees from Nursery to Secondary - generally a hike of between 6.5 and 13.5 pounds at the current rate of exchange.    This not likely to be popular but if we can get it the School may have to close soon.      We would ask you to pray about this.    The hike though heavy enough is in every way fair, and will not gender more than enough to service basic cost of running.     Our Board of Management agreed the matter last night, and today they parents are being told.

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THIS WEEK, we sent representative junior swimming team to Nairobi with our Instructress & Coach.   A Team of SIX including two from our School, who will compete in a national competition.    Quite exciting, and a very quick commencement in participation in such events.       If they do well they may proceed on later in October to the next level of Competition to be held in Mombasa.

We are celebrating Daryl's 41st Birthday this even, and we shall be together for a Birthday Cake!!     We expect him to arrive with Carol and Jesse and Becky by 7.15 or so with his brother Edward too.   But Jeremy and Manu are both away so they will have to miss the cake this time.

BEAUTIFUL weather today.      The first real WARMTH for many months!    Perhaps OUR summer is dawning - or perhaps the weather is as MIXED and unstable as everything else in Kenya just now.

Love you all, and our prayers always going up to heaven for you.

Lovingly

John and Esther

COUNT YOUR BLESSINGS - NAME THEM, ONE BY ONE!!!

THERE ARE MANY SCENES OF THIS KIND IN KENYA - EVEN CLOSE TO TESTIMONY FAITH HOMES, here in Eldoret.      On fringes of the Town Centre hundreds of thousands of people tend to exist in mud and squalor most of the year around - especially 2013 has been WET, and the almost continuous intermittent rain storms have things running with water - and even sewerage!   Not a lot of comfort to be found in a mud and wattle hut of some fifteen feet in diameter.    The grass roof may often leak, rotten with age, and floor of cow dung and mud, dried and hardened, can become damp and uncomfortable.     A husband and wife and MANY children will share the space.     All the usual fasilities of indoor sanitation, electric light,  seperate kitchen and so on just not there.   The toilet just a hole in the ground some distance from the house.    VERY DIFFERENT living to that of those of us who have grown up in First World Countries - even those of us who WERE in fact poor!
My own beginnings were lived inside a crumbling terrace house in a small town called STARBECK in the north east of England.      It was rented house costing about eight pounds (U,K,) a month; a house quite neglected by the owner, and infested with rats, cock-roaches and other vermin.     It had one room and a small kitchen downstairs and two small bedrooms above.     The toilet was in a shack at the bottom end of a small narrow yard where we also kept a few chicken and a rabbit or two.    We had no money in those days, and dreaded the knock of the Rent Collectors hand on the door at the end of the month.     It was in the early 1940s and the second world war was still continuing.   Food was very scarce, and very expensive. We had a small radio which crackled and hummed with bad reception.    NO T.V. or other electronic aids such as a phone or even lighting at times.      VERY different from today.
YET happiness was to be found there in the midst of the LITTLE that we had.     One of the factors that helped us was that we lived quite unaware how other, richer, people were living.     Everyone around us were also poor, and even those I went to school with were poor.      We found it difficult to covet what we could not see!     We may at times have 'wished' for more, but on the whole we learnt to make the most of what was there - and made merry with it.      There was love in the house!    There was food, however little and meagre, in the house, and there was laughter and fun in the house!       I am glad to have BEGUN my journey here on Earth in such a situation............       I guess JESUS may have felt the same.
Perhaps I might not DESIRE poverty, but I tend to think that to be rich or essentially well off, without having known poverty and learned to live with it, and to value those around you at the same time, is a great disadvantage.

When Testimony began it existed in poverty, without 'Western' essentials and necessities.     Our first home together with the children - almost twenty of them - was of mud and wattle, giving way to sun baked clay brick - even when we moved to the Town of Eldoret in 1972 we still found ourselves in a house made of mud - mud baked brick and wattle......Our first home was without electricity, running water, or sanitation. The ceilings were not there, and the windows had no glass     It was a warm, open plan, happy house. There was laughter in it - it exuded 'family' and provided security, and a place to find safety in.

HOW are we all here today?       The Town is now encroaching in upon us with all its urben temptations and attractions.     We are no longer secluded from the developing material and technocratic society  all around us.     We can no longer (the children that is) be CONTENT with what we might have - the NEW assets and baubles of the the new age being constantly thrust upon us by those with more money to wast on pleasure and luxury.       THIS is perhaps the greatest problem facing us.       The Lust of the World - its wealth, its power, and its idolatries.      
The House Esther and I moved into in 1972 is still here, forty years or so later.We lived in it with a family of 40 or so for twenty eight years    A MUD house showing wear and tear even in 1972 - it was well
over forty years old THEN!!       Successive owners have plastered the outside with a veneer of plaster but it remains a MUD house.     Everything in it second hand and subject to wear and need for updating and repair continually.         Across the road is Jacaranda Cottage, also a MUD house behind the plaster, though not as old as the other.      Then the two NEWER houses built in 2007, this time of solid stone with good foundation - well their furniture and contents are newer - but still experiencing daily wear.   Each home and family though not always having enough, are never as poor as they might have been.    For the first twenty years of our existence we were blessed with enough without craving for more.   BUT slowly, as the Town grew, and as our SCHOOL grew, and the lifestyles of those richer and with MORE began to affect us, things are changing...........Now we are being absorbed by the Town.     Infiltrated by not only the t.v, but now by the INTERNET via computors, laptops and even perhaps the most devious tool of them all, the mobile phone.  
There is still, for the most part, laughter and fun to be found in our four Homes, but also more temptation to aspire for MORE.        SO these days we are having to concentrate on showing the values that come from just being 'family' and from realising that true contentedness is not dependant on material wellbeing or excess.
Not easy.  

STOP PRESS!!!!!

WELL, today Daryl journied up to our Capital, Nairobi for some business.     At about 2p.m. our time he entered a Shopping Mall at Westlands, on the outskirts of the City and a well known tourist area and shopping centre.        Once inside there was the sound of GUNFIRE, and it became apparent that the MALL was being attacked / robbed / what-have-you, by thugs.         Alarms were ringing everywhere and finally the Police surrounded the entire area in efforts to contain the thugs.       The main problem was on the 2nd floor, which Daryl fortunately  failed to reach, valiantly deciding to leave the building whilst still on the ground floor.  VERY scary that  such a thing could happen - first time in our history.      Carol heard about it from Daryl himself as he was running out of the complex and she immediately phoned us.     Many were injured and some have died.   BUT for the Grace of God.      This is almost NEWS as I am typing.
AS I AM TYPING the Police are still surrounding the
Mall whilst the gang is holed up in the 2nd floor with hostages.     So far it is being said by Red Cross observers that at least 20 are dead and perhaps 50 wounded.     These figures cannot yet be confirmed,  but there is no doubt this was a major confrontation by the Police and will be a set back to the Tourist Trade - we wait to see from where this attack originates, but it would seem to be internal crime, and this will reflect badly once again on our internal security.      We Thank God that He got Daryl safely out before the worst happened AND
before he got to the 2nd Floor where the worst is still happening.      Truly he watches over us, and I am sure many are giving Thanks to night for His Care of them. But our prayers continue for those who may still be being held, and our cry goes up that no others will have to innocently give up their lives to the Greed of Men.
STRANGE that I should be touching on this in the Blog today -    It is truly covetousness that moves men and women to greed and discontent and to CRIME.    It can never be the way to true happiness.

This must  be all for today.      We are ourselves looking heavenward at this time for God's help and notice. Blessed be the Name of the Lord.



John and Esther

THERE REMAINETH A REST TO THE PEOPLE OF GOD

JUST TO REMIND you where we all are in relation to the East African Countries around Kenya, and indeed also ourselves IN Kenya.   ELDORET!!
Approximately 6,300ft above sea level, with a reasonably pleasant climate - though changeable. This year there has not been a LOT of sunshine or even HEAT!   Rather more RAIN than usual and some very cold spells - but right now not too bad.     We have an increasing population in excess of 600,000, -  sixty percent under 20, and unemployed.    There is a sense of overcrowding with so many on the streets, and cars the roads and pavements!   The Town itself is noisy, dirty, and throbbing with activity.   Dozens of Banks, Hotels, Supermarkets, chemists all mixed in with old and shabby shops and kiosks, and crumbling side walks.........Not an attractive town but in the 40 years we have lived here we have felt at peace in it, and happy in it - even having also gone through the 'Troubles' of December 2007.   But apart from high rise buildings going up from time to time there has not been much upward progress in the prosperity or general services in the town.     YESTERDAY, Saturday, I could not write up the Blog due to failure nation wide of Electric Power.       This interfered with access to the Internet.     Also the WATER was cut off Town wide all day...     Not so unusual, and in a week Power and Water can go off a dozen or more times interrupting daily life at home, at school, and in business.     Not too inspiring, or even hopeful for the future....BUT then there are many much worse places to be.    One should not grumble..even though there ARE times!!
No doubt everyone, wherever they are, will find something to grumble and be discontented about.    The child growing up in SYRIA right now, or in many even poorer Countries around us here in Africa, will each one face problems - even despair.
DAVID, one of our young men who is now employed here in our Bakery was asking me only on Friday if I had ever wondered what life is all about, and whether it had any real purpose - and if it was really bearable!
He is 25, still unmarried, earning about a hundred pounds sterling a month, and living alone in one room in Eldoret Town, fending for himself.    Quite a big change from living within a family group of 40 with everything taken care of.         He believes in Jesus, is normally of an optimistic and happy nature, and usually content with what he has.    He wants to trust fully in Jesus, but at times he is faced with a life that seems to be leading and going nowhere.   He is feeling real happiness and well-being are getting further away from him.      BUT he has a job - he is NOT one of the 60% unemployed.    He gets up at 4am to arrive early at his job to bake enough bread for 800 souls for the day.      Hard work!     He will leave at 4.30p.m. and spend an hour getting home to his empty uncomfortable room (it WILL slowly change for the better).   Once home he will cook a simple supper for himself, watch a little TV and go to bed early.   He has little time for friends or entertainment outside of his TV.    This is how his daily life is now - without a wife and children - it is a kind of drudgery, and it seems it can only get worse when he finds his own family, children to feed and educate.      There is a real hopelessness, and even discontent in the hearts of the masses.....and yes I know this is something experienced all over the planet - not just in Kenya.
YET DAVID does himself have hope and generally he tackles his daily life and duties happily.  But I think when he leaves work and arrives at his shabby comfortless room he MUST suddenly feel ALONE.    And within Kenya, and all around in the world outside, anxieties about the future increase...........To live on planet earth seems to be a very depressing concept.

The Syrians have one week to list all their Chemical Weapons - as if they do not already KNOW what they have, and already HAVE a list!!    No doubt they will use the time (whilst they continue to kill each other) to devise a way to deceive those that need to KNOW what they are hiding.    Did not the President of Iraq do the same quite successfully?   And then - nothing immediate will happen.....but later the gloom and shadow of War and Violence - the very stalking-horse of fear of the future - will descend upon the people.
THE WORLD KEEPS AN UNEASY PEACE - and its people have no confidence in it - and thus they try to blot out their fear and apprehension with drugs, with excessive sex, alcohol, and a multitude of questionable and inconvenience pleasures and pastimes.    And their Leaders, the Men of Power RULE recklessly without any real CARE for the people.    Yes indeed, look around you - are we not all jostling precariously upon a slippery slope?    Oh that Jesus would come NOW, and whisk us all away - yet we know that He will not grasp everyone's hand, to SAVE them, and that SO MANY will slide inevitably DOWNWARDS to even worse than what they now fear and flee from in their minds.
WELL, I DO remember feeling like David when I was sixteen in the UK, living under the cloud of Russian Missiles.....but I went on living, and came through to know the reason why.    MANY of our boys and girls, as they grew up with me and Esther in Testimony House, came to such moments in their thoughts. It was interesting to notice the difference in them - in those who had found PEACE from their FAITH in CHRIST, and those who had no faith at all in anything.     The latter would suddenly be found sitting disconsolately staring into space, hearing and seeing nothing - as if the bottom had dropped out of their world.     But the others, who walked with JESUS entered into a REST - a Sabbath - and a respite from all the worries of this world; looking away to JESUS, and trusting in His Promises -  They found purpose to LIVE for God, and in living they found HOPE.......       YES we ALL need to shake of 'dull sloth' and to LOOK up from the daily disappoints and boredom's and get NEW VISION about what REAL life is all about.     We need not to fear, but rather gather great encouragement as we focus on the Coming of the KING of ALL the WORLD.

AND IT IS GOOD TO KEEP IN MIND and understanding the FACT that all that we go through and come to know, as we live upon the earth, is meant to prepare us, and even nudge us on, to be involved in the Great Task that still awaits to be unfolded to us - a TASK that will take us into Eternity, and even Beyond.

Steve & George

HERE IN THE HOMES we look back with thanksgiving as we see the children who have come and gone now entering into the challenge of LIFE with CHRIST.        And we even rejoice when we see those who left us UNBELIEVING come to discover the TRUTH - that is, that if GOD is with you then you WILL find PURPOSE for your life, and it WILL prosper.       The hurts, disappointments and sorrows of this world confront us all - but we do not have to be overwhelmed by them, or brought to despair by them.     We CAN go through - we CAN WIN through, and make our BEING ALIVE count.
Many of our children are now grown up; they are married with children of their own that call us Grandpa and Grandma!    Life is not all roses for them, BUT they have had, and continue to have, times of JOY and HAPPINESS as they progressively discover that they do now walk (live) alone - GOD is WITH THEM, and will rescue and deliver them from AL their troubles.      The KNOW why they were BORN.

To conclude a few photos of children now grown up to be husbands, wives and parents.    FIRST is George, who came to us when he was eight. He is now 37.  He is now happily married with a family.   He is now a small Business man in a nearby town not too far from us.   He is seen here with STEVEN GREEN,  and his first born son.    Steven of course also grew up in Testimony House, now married with two kids of his own.  He and his all are trusting in Jesus - HE is just turned 40

THEN there is Francis posing here with his wife and firstborn son.     Francis did not do too well at school but started out as a Shoe-maker.     Now he is a Security Guard working with a Christian Mission.   Life was a great struggle in the beginning but now JESUS walks with him and his family, and they are confident and sure that they are SAFE in his hands.      Francis grew up in Jacaranda Cottage from when he was 11.      Now he is 40

AND LASTLY here is Wycliffe, our Pastor and Chaplain, with Miriam and his wife (centre) and thier daughter Lydia.     He is now back in service with us all having recovered well from a recent operation and also, just last week, from the sorrow of losing his young sister.    He has two children in High School.       He and his wife trust in Jesus and no matter what confronts them they know HE will be with them as they face the problems.     Wycliffe is now 52, a seasoned School Teacher by profession but with a life laid out for GOD.       NO, these are not just a small handful but a sample of the many, many  others who came - grew up - left us - and continued to GROW with God by their side.     They came destitute, came to know their poverty of spirit, trusted in Christ, and are now waiting in confidence for His RETURN, and for the Establishment of a Kingdom ruled by and with RIGHTEOUSNESS.     A Kingdom that will endure for EVER - no more tears there, no pain or hurt, no fear of the unknown  -  the restoration of that SEVENTH DAY when God opened the door and welcomed humanity to REST with Him........and to those that BELIEVE it will never more be interrupted.  HALLELUJAH!

God Bless you all


John and Esther

ROBBERY WITH EXTORTION

THIS IS A RENDITION OF THE NOTORIOUS 'DICK TURPIN' a Highwayman of the 19th Century who used to hold up at gunpoint those travelling at night on the roads.      He was not the only one of his day, and indeed we have 'Highwaymen' even today.     Those who will stop you, and give you a choice - Your Money or your Life - which will it be.     It can be a HARD choice to ,make at times, since either way your LIFE may be at stake.

THIS WEEK, in Kenya, the Government has passed a Bill raising the VAT on essential items, and even on basic commodities never before taxed, by 16%, thus in a moment raising the basic cost of living at a time of chronic economic depression.     For the MAJORITY already living below the .Bread-line' this is as good as a modern 'Hold-up' by a modern day Highwayman.      The leader of the Opposition Party CORD, Mr. Raila Odinga, has expressed considerable concern about this action.  He is recorded in Thursday's DAILY NATION as saying -   'This tax would lead to a chain reaction in price increases.   "There is no doubt that the cost of transport will go up, farm inputs will increase and those who offer services to make the economy run will put up their costs as well.   Soon Schools will raise their fees because of the growing cost of food and other consumables, students in collages"

Mr. Oginga also critisized the move by Banis to charge Kenyans a 10% tax each time they withdraw money from their bank accounts.   This, he said had also pushed up the cost of withdrawals up.   KENYANS MAY HAVE TO KEEP THEIR MONEY UNDER THEIR MATTRESSES!!

WE certainly feel doing exactly that!   Times are TIGHT and as long as the Government pursues this kind of action then times will have get TIGHTER.      A loaf of bread is already selling in town at 85/= per loaf.  It costs US currently 55/- but FLOUR will now cost more and the spiral upwards will continue upwards and upwards until the 60% unemployable mass will be able to eat less, drink less, and clothe themselves with less.     PAY or DIE seems to be the order of the day.

BUT in reality it may well be people will DIE even if they PAY.   

This is not a policy confined to Kenya.    Governments around the world are more and more holding financial guns to the heads of their citizens in a demand for more and more money to provide less and less service.   AND as I have had to say before even CHARITIES are feeling the pinch since none of us are permitted to BE here, or provide SERVICES here unless WE pay TAXES - for everything, AND are also CHARGED for every thing as well in an effort to diminish what WE have for the poor.       More and more missionaries and other charitable bodies are leaving Kenya in order to reduce overheads paid out to the Government which could be used more effectively, and directly given, straight to the ministries the funds were originally given for.

Kenya is poorer materially than ever - and perhaps morally and spiritually as well.     BUT PRAY for the WORLD.

======================================= 

TODAY THE SUN IS SHINING,   All the windows are open, and I can hear one of the gardeners clipping away at the hedges below the window near my desk, just out of my line of vision.    The air is warm and light is everywhere of a fresh golden quality. 

A welcome change to the continuing heavy rains and lowering skies.

 

ON THURSDAY, the Area Advisory Council for Children's Inspection Team arrived to look around the Homes to see if they would recommend our Re-registration for a further three years.    There were only four of them; one from the Probation Service, one from Public Health, one from the Registry of Births and Deaths, and also the District Children's Officer for our particularly area.      It took us almost three hours to go round each of the houses and compounds.     They were all very pleasant and very appreciative of what they saw, and assured us that we would have their approval.    This, in addition to the bound 140 page Application which cost us more than forty thousand Kenya Shillings to put together and print, will be sent to Nairobi for a final decision.    Probably another month or so before we get the final Answer to say whether or not we can continue operating for a further three years.       In its own way this just another stone put in our way since it prevents us from feeling secure, and this insecurity is also passed on to the children in our care who also know that we must be reviewed every three years.     Such a procedure has only been going on for the last six years - before that we had lived in the belief that our Original Registration obtained in 1969 was a once and for all matter that could be upset only by us not keeping the laid down Regulations.

WE QUIETLY continue our daily task.    We are grateful for the PEACE of our days, and for sense of security we DO enjoy.     GOD is with us.

AND THE SYRIAN AFFAIR, hovers in the background of our thoughts.     Is THIS going to be the beginning of a wider war, a world war, THE prelude to the END?   Whilst 'prophets' worldwide are as usual predicting 'almost' certainties, we wait on God.      It seems now that the American Congress will be the factor to decide an 'attack' or not.       BUT, consider the time gone by, the lives expended, tormented, dispossessed and even KILLED.     And the more one reads the more one wonders - in all the world IS there ONE righteous man, a righteous Judge who will rule in Righteousness.      NO ONE SHINES OUT in the surrounding darkness of violence, famine, disease and other ecological disaster.     Perhaps that is because SOON the blinding LIGHT of TRUTH shall come in the Person of the ONE MAN who has all the Answers and Who alone is FIT to Govern ALL the Earth,  The One who MADE it, even Jesus.  

Be calm and be assured, He Who IS to come, WILL Come, and we who know and love Him will be found standing with him.    WHAT a DAY that will be!!

Love you all

John and Esther.