Email from Africa

The following email is from a friend who lives in Uganda. Over his Christmas break from school he travelled to Kenya to visit his family. When he returned to Uganda he sent this email to us.


Hello Alicia!

I feel so good to communicate to you again. Thanks for your emails and especially the prayers. I went to Nairobi immediately after my exams and amsafely back to Kampala (Uganda). We traveled under tight security but still,most roads have been blocked. Lovely greetings from my family. They are allfine.
Hope Christmas was a blessing to you. We had fun celebrating the birth ofour savior. Indeed, Jesus is our savior.

My first few days in Nairobi were okay until elections. The electoralcommission delayed to announce the results, so every one was concerned.People suspected something wrong to be going on within the commission.Unfortunately, some of the results presented by the commission weredifferent from those obtained at the polling stations. In fact thecommission failed to justify its errors.

Many people have lost their lives and property. We had to keep indoors allthe time. Refugees in their own country. Others fled to the neighboringcountries. Play grounds are the new homes to many Kenyans. I was touched tosee many of them struggle for a meal at a play ground in my home town(Busia). Due to the limited resources, parents have sold their own daughtersto men, just for survival. Others are working as prostitutes. The situation might be worsening.

We are praying for Kenya. I was encouraged by Psalms 69:32-33, the humblewill see dear God at work and be glad. Let all who seek God's help leave injoy for the lord hears the cries of his needy ones. He doesn't despise hispeople who are oppressed.

I was not able to access the internet during that period. Please send mygreetings to Tim and everyone else. May God give you a rainbow for everystorm, a smile for every tear, a blessing for every trial, a sweet song forevery silence and an answer to every prayer in this New Year.

In Christ,
Phillip.

Blessings and Prayers......

We just wanted to share a few of the exciting things God is doing as we prepare for Africa.


As you can imagine going to Africa for an entire summer requires a large amount of money. We have not really begun raising support yet but God has already blessed us with some funds toward the trip.


I (alicia) have been at my job for over 7 years and have saved up a great deal of vacation time. I am planning to use all my time for the internship this summer but this does require agency approval. Originally the necessary approval was given and then about one month ago this approval was in jeopardy which raised the question if we had to choose between my job or Africa what would we choose? Without much thought we knew we were going to spend our summer serving in Africa no matter what the cost.


The next Sunday my mom felt like she should say something at church about our trip. After church someone came to my dad and gave him and envelope containing $450. He had been saving this money to buy a new 4-wheeler. He said after he heard what my mom had to say he knew God wanted him to give that money to us as he felt like we needed to go to Africa more than he needed a 4-wheeler. Needless to say when my mom called to tell us the news I was overwhelmed by God's goodness. It was really something that assured us we were where God wanted us to be. A week or so after that my job approved my vacation request.


We would like to ask all of you to join us in praying for Kenya. As many of you know since the December 27 election results were announced there has been a great deal of violence and unrest. Please pray for peace. Please pray that through this difficult time the love of God can be shown to all of those who are hurting in Kenya. Please pray for us as we prepare to go to an area that has been affected by so much violence.

If you want to check out the area we are going to please go to adifferentkindofnovember.wordpress.com

Let the fun begin....

As some of you know, I (alicia) travelled to Uganda last summer with Libraries of Love. I have always had a heart for Africa and needless to say I was thrilled to be given this opportunity. I had an amazing time while I was there and this trip only increased my passion to be a part of what God was doing in Africa.

Needless to say when I arrived home it was impossible to contain my passion and desire to return. Over the summer, our church, Westside Christian Church, began a campaign to adopt a community in the slums of Nairobi,Kenya through Christian Missionary Fellowship. The combination of my recent experience and West Side's new commmitment to the people in Africa sparked an interest in us.

We could not shake the feeling that God was somehow calling us to be a part of what our church was doing. Through many conversations and a lot of prayers we were sure God was calling us to go to Nairobi and directly serve the community we had adopted.

In November, we were able to go to the National Missionary Convention and talk with CMF about how we could be used in our adopted community. They suggested we participate in their REACH internship program which would allow us to spend 8 weeks in Nairobi. We quickly filled out our applications and eagerly awaited their response. About 6 weeks later we got the call that we were accepted into the program....

WE ARE SPENDING THE SUMMER IN AFRICA!!!