October 19th

Sunday, October 19, 2008

Today is our last day in Mombasa. We got up this morning and packed up our things getting ready to leave Kigotho’s Hotel and Apartment. Charles arrived at about 8:30 am and we loaded up and got on our way. We were scheduled to visit one of the Mombasa stations for the church services on our way back to Nairobi. We drove back through Mombasa, across the bay that separates Mombasa from the mainland, and back to the west toward Nairobi. We passed the station we visited yesterday at Mariakana, and continued another 15 minutes or so to Samburu. This station was not as big as the one in Mariakana, and had recently moved from one building in the village to another. When we arrived the members of the congregation were inside praying in preparation for the service. They invited us in and had us sit in chairs at the front of the church as is the custom here. There were around 35 people there and most of them were women.

Picture of me by a "gator" near our Mombasa hotel.

There were a few children, but not as many as in other stations that we have visited. There were even fewer men, and those who were there were the leaders of the church. The members were very well dressed. The women wore dresses of bright colors, and the men all wore dress pants and button up dress shirts. Even the young children wear very nice clothes. It is easy to see that this is an important day, and that they want to wear their best attire as they come to worship their Savior. The service started with a beautiful hymn by the congregation, after which we all stood up for prayer. Pastor Simon asked that I give the opening prayer. Introductions were made so that everyone would know who we were and where we were from. Then Simon offered us a word of welcome and addressed the congregation and asked them to be attentive.
Russ began with his presentation of the Armor of God. He again asked for a young volunteer to use as his “Soldier of God” as he put on the armor, piece by piece. The people listen very attentively and many of them even had notebooks in which they were taking notes.

After Russ was finished the congregation sang another hymn. It is amazing to hear these congregations sing without any instruments or notes to follow in a book. They sing in harmony and even sing in a kind of round in which there are multiple layers being sung at once. It is very beautiful, and the more I become familiar with Swahili, the more I catch and understand in their hymns. Parts of the hymns they sang this morning were also in English, which was easier to understand.

When the hymn was over it was my turn to speak. I used the parable of the wedding feast in Matthew as my text. I focused on the fact that we cannot get into heaven through our own works. God in His love and mercy not only invites us to His wedding feast, but He provides the perfect wedding garment of Christ’s perfect righteousness for us, freely! How dare we ever try to get into the wedding feast by our own righteousness!

Then Bruce asked if we could sing a hymn for them. Bruce summarized the thought of “God’s Word is our great heritage” so that the people would know what we were singing, and then we sang it in parts. Russ and I sang the melody and Bruce the tenor.

Although we would have liked to have stayed for the whole service, we were not able to because of the length of our trip back to Nairobi. So we prayed for the Lord’s blessing upon the congregation, and were back in the car again.

On our way back we stopped at a restaurant different from the one we visited on the way down. The food was much better here. While we were there we took a look at a curio booth which was selling all kinds of carved animals and African trinkets. It was amazing to see the detail on the hand carving.

We arrived back in Nairobi at about 6:30, just as it was getting dark. We looked desperately for a n open cyber café, but couldn’t find any. We decided to eat supper at a hotel we stayed at last year, which had wireless internet, but that wasn’t working either! So much for getting e-mails out tonight! So after finishing supper we journeyed back to Hotel Southern Blue and checked in. After getting settled in I had to make a few calls to Paul and Charles in order to make sure that everything was arranged for our meeting in Muranga tomorrow.

We pray for the Lord’s continued blessings upon our work here!

In Christ,


Nathanael