Kisumu Yoder's: Of Service and Snakes........!!

"...and as thy days, so shall thy strength be." This verse is a comfort and blessing to me. And it has been proven true over and over since we came to Kenya. I keep thinking about how I dreaded coming here and absolutely could not imagine myself in a setting like this. But here we are... for 3 months now and we are surviving very well. God is giving strength a day at a time and we are actually enjoying life here most of the time. There are still things that are hard for me and that I wish I could be more relaxed with, such as dirt and germs and our drinking water... etc. But I suppose some of those things will always kind of stick with me and I need to just accept it as part of Kenya. It helps to realize that God brought us here and He will help us. Sometimes I feel like we might ruin our health with questionable drinking water, and with our exposure to all kinds of illnesses and things we weren't used to at home but I guess if God brought us here He will see us through.

We have been experiencing a number of "firsts" again this past week since Jason's left. On Wed. afternoon we had our first Bible study without Jason's. It turned out to be a rainy, chilly, and windy day. Normally we meet in the natives homes for Bible study but this time we met at Church since we couldn't make contact with the person who was supposed to host. Wayne parked the van under the church roof and then we kind of huddled beside the van for our Bible study and it at least protected us a bit from the wind and the chill in the air. Only 2 men and 4 ladies showed up but we still had a blessed time together. I was so thankful I had my leso along to throw over my shoulders. Thankfully we have enough of people in Church who understand English well enough to translate so we can usually get our point across when we are trying to communicate.

Vanessa was home from school on Thurs. sick with some kind of stomach bug. By eve. she was better but she didn't want to go along to Joseph and Becky's house for Prayer meeting and singing. I really didn't want to miss out on the singing because I knew it would sound extra good that night with all of Charity's visitors as well as Marlin and Lavina's. So Vanessa agreed to stay home alone while I went to the singing. It was wonderful indeed!!! Oh how lovely to hear those beautiful English songs in 4 parts!! I feel like I just have to drink it in when I hear it. Charity's visitors are 2 of her siblings as well as 3 other youth from her church. Marlins visitors are James Peights from Bedford, PA. Marlins sister is married to Lavina's brother so its very special for them to have such close family here with them.

Thurs. morning we ladies had a surprise Birthday party for Janice, planned by her mother. When Jake brought Janice home from town we were standing just inside the hedge and sang Happy Birthday when she walked in. :) The table was nicely decorated and we were served yummy treats. Becky decorated a lovely cake! While we were still sitting at the table Wayne came to inform me that he was going to town and then he told me that he found a snake under the door mat just outside our door!! I was horrified!! The snake was very small but I still hate them! It was in a bucket so I showed it to the milkman who comes to the compound and he said right away, "Its a black mamba!" Those are very deadly snakes but Wayne and Tommy say "no" its not a mamba because after researching they found out that mambas are already 16 inches long or so when they are born and also they are black inside the mouth. This snake was white inside his mouth so I was quite relieved but still I hope I can believe that info. So here we had a "real" snake and later that night we had an "imagined" snake!! One of our daughters, who doesn't want her name mentioned, :) came to our room at 1:30 am and said that she thinks a snake fell on her head! It wiggled and then she brushed it off and she heard it plunk on the floor beside the bed. We asked he how big it was and she said, "about as big as the one we saw today". I was instantly wide awake... I was going to check this out good and proper... just in case some snake had made his way into our house!! I flipped the bright light on and carefully and very cautiously began my search for this "critter". But the only thing I could find was a nice pink leso on the floor. When Wayne saw it he said.. "that's what it was". Sure enough... the decorative leso had been hanging on the wall the night before and I suppose with the fan blowing and all, it fell on Shonda's head and when it fell to the floor she probably heard the beads on the leso hit the floor. I guess our imaginations work pretty well at night sometimes. :) It took Wayne and I a long time to fall asleep again but all's well that ends well.

On Fri. Wayne, Bradlyn and I went visiting for the first time... just us. We went to Maurice and Caroline's house. They were both baptized in April. Caroline is Maurice's second wife... his first wife died. With all the rain we've had recently it was too muddy to take the van back close to their house so we walked for a ways. (I wasn't allowed to try. :) We drive 4x4 Toyota diesel vans that off road much better then US vans) wy. Maurice met us at the road and we donned our boots first. He took us to his mothers house for a short visit and then we headed back to his house. We tried to find as much dry land as possible to walk on but it was a challenge. I had a bad scare once when we came around a bend in the trail and here comes a herd of cows right toward us. There was nothing to do but stay right where we were while the cows passed all around us. Normally the cows here seem quite placid, but there were a few ornery ones in this bunch, they were mostly bulls. I held my breath as they went around us, and all was well until the one big beast paused right beside Wayne and put his head down as though he wanted to charge! My heart jumped to my throat for a second and instinctively I whirled and tried to "hide" behind Wayne. But just that quickly the bull turned again to join his "buddies". I think it was God that made him decide these "mzungus" were not worth chasing!! Thank God!!!!!!!!!!! Times like this make me realize that we are in God's hands and He has protected us so many times. I'm sure your prayers make a big difference too!! We really enjoyed our visit with this dear couple. Caroline has always seemed very reserved and bashful to me but I was amazed how she opened up and talked that day. I was so encouraged!! They seemed very interested in how things are in America. We don't like to spend much time on that subject though. Caroline wondered if we live in mud houses like they do. We tried to explain that our homes are made of wood instead of mud and we told them how it gets very cold and we must have heat. They can't seem to wrap their minds around electric heat and those things. Their simple houses can be built fairly cheaply and serve them very well. Most of them are fairly small, but who needs a big house when you can live, cook and wash outdoors year round. These dear brothers and sisters can teach us Americans a lot about being happy with less.We are SO blessed... I just don't understand why the differences have to be so great... but that's how it is. We took some time to sing and pray with them and they graciously served us black chai (no milk added) and plain white bread. We had some major ditches to go through on the way home... we had to try several times but thank God we made it without getting stuck!! One highlight for us was passing out Bible story books to the children who gathered around us as we were leaving. We pray that these books will point them to the One who can help them and save them.

This morning was our first service without Jason's. Wayne preached a challenging message for the youth. Amazingly there were more youth there this Sunday then there ever were I think. He used the rope illustration and showed them how important it is to live our short lives for God so that we can spend all eternity with Him. Before church started Bradlyn came to me almost crying because something was on his neck and back. I was horrified to see a good sized lizard there and I quickly brushed him off with my songbook. Sigh.... will I ever get used to these things?!!!! As usual we picked up a number of people to give them a lift on the way to church. We always stop at the Rabour church as well to transport people. With a van load of all of us, open windows sure are nice! :)

Have a wonderful week!! Clara