Forest creatures

Recently Jon P has been fasting and praying about the spiritual side of Turning Point's work in Kibera. It has been quite challenging to watch, not in a watching takeshi's castle sort of way but in a feeling a bit inspired and uncomfortable sort of way. You can read more in depth about this at healingonthestreetsofkibera.blogspot.com yes, you thought my blog name was long.

To top it off our Pastor spoke about fasting this weekend and what its all about, I don't know that I have understood correctly the full dynamics of fasting but to me it seems fasting is about doing something costly to show God you really want Him, you really want what He wants and in the process you find out a little more what that might actually be.

Anyway this week all this seeking God has led to a group of Pastors from Kibera meeting to talk about praying for people around Mashimoni, praying for healing basically. I sat in on this meeting and just felt super humbled. They all talked of how we should go about preparing ourselves, one suggesting we fast and live in the woods for a full week like hungry squirrels. In Kenya people are very used to fasting, they do it a lot, its an important part of the church tradition I guess. In the end it was decided we had work that still needed to be done so the squirrel idea was dropped but it was very challenging to hear how much these guys sacrifice to seek God. We prayed for each other and it was amazing to be prayed for by this Pastor from Kibera, I don't know why, it just was.

During the meeting I remembered something very cheesy that Pastor Martin in India once said to us, that if you want to be a winner for Christ you need to surround yourself with winners. That's ridiculously cheesy and sounds like something a motivational speaker would say but it stuck with me. When you recognise that someone has a true passion for God, someone who is earnestly seeking Him and desperately wanting to see His will done. That's good people. You want to stick with them, learn from them.

I think that is what I saw in those that gathered today, I felt like a grade 1 drummer sitting in a room with Chad Smith, Mitch Mitchell and John Bonham, like I could learn a lot here.

Shoot the Rabbit

The latest news from E3 (that's our apartment) is we've got a baby rabbit, her name is shoot. She fits in the palm of your hand. When she cleans her face, you want to cry. We have made her a little hutch out on the balcony and when we work at home she snuggles up against Jo's laptop where is gets all warm on the side.

Jo Bayley is the new volunteer for Turning Point, she is focussing on fundraising and doing a splendid job! The original housemate Cara is still around but preparing to get married next April. Lee, the Kiwi who lived here for a few months also moved out to get married to Bruce. The Bruce Lee wedding is this Sunday in a friend's back garden in Karen.

Things are always changing in Nairobi it seems, one of our good friends who arrived around the same time as us is leaving soon having finished her contract here and not finding another job, we said she could be our house girl and wash our dishes but she wasn't up for it...she hasn't met shoot yet though. Here's a video of Shoot's first day exploring the apartment.