Kenya Still Surprises Me

Now that we've lived in Kenya for close to a year, it's very easy to forget how different Kenya is from the US.  When we first moved to Kisumu last summer, we were overwhelmed by the differences between the two nations.  But sadly Kenya stops surprising us because, well, we live here and we have gotten used to life on the other side of the world.  But, every once in a while something happens that makes you smile because you realize:  Wow, we live in Kenya!

I had one of those moments on Friday during my staff's morning Bible Study.  We had a power outage the night prior (we've had them every night for the past week or so; wait, another difference to the US!), which resulted in my alarm clock not going off as scheduled.  So instead of my normally scheduled study of Romans, I instead decided to have a prayer time with my staff.  

We all sat down in the dining hall and began sharing different prayer requests, ranging from prayer for family members, to the Agape boys, to prayers for peace in Kenya.  I scribbled each request down in my notebook, and once we had completed our list, I went around the table and assigned a prayer request to each staff member.  Some looked confident; some looked nervous, but everyone agreed to pray out loud for their assigned prayer request.

Leading the prayer time, I told my staff that I would open in prayer, and then we could go around the table so that each person could pray about their assigned prayer request.  So I began the prayer, "Dear Heavenly Father . . . "  

. . . and then all 20 or so staff members that were present at the time began praying out loud at the same time!  We all prayed together to the Lord in a loud chorus of voices for our assigned prayer request!  After about one or two minutes of "joint" prayer, we all said "Amen."  I finished the prayer with a big smile on my face realizing, "Hey, I'm in Kenya!"  I never would've designed our prayer time in this manner, but sometimes the Lord has a different plan than we expect . . . especially when living in Kenya.