We are Home and the trip is over,,, or could it be just beginning?

So now we are home, safe and sound (Thank you all for all the thoughts and prayers and communications). We all go back to our "regular" jobs, being moms, engineers, teachers, learning how to manage retirement, preaching and studying. So far it seems kind of boring, but I guess what we do here is also Gods work and equally important, as the sign (that was hanging in my front room when I came home) suggests. Now my house didn't really look "3rd World" when I left but it kinda did when I got home.....

Today, in church we were able to stand up and recap some of our experiences and emotions. Dr. Ralph talked about seeing diseases that he had never before seen, like leprosy. Diseases I thought didn't exist anymore. He conclude with a very moving statement of (I am paraphrasing best I can) of Never Seeing People Do So Much, With So little, For So Many!!!! I think that sums up alot about what we saw and about how we felt.

I was blessed to give the children's message this morning. At first I was mortified to do this. Children's messages are for preachers and preacherettes and other very spiritually (older folks--did I just say that outloud) trained folks. I think my only qualification for the kids message is that "it takes one to know one!!--yeah and I wear reading glasses now. I brought necklaces from the Samburu, the Swahili bible and some photos of the Kenyan kids. We talked about what was the same in the photos and what was different...Kenyan kids like to play soccer and volleyball and so do we.
Kenyan kids like to wear necklaces, and so do we-- but they look very different. We have dogs and cats in our backyards and Kenyans have Leopards in their's. We drink coke and Kenyan kids drink Stoney Tanagawisa. Rafiki, our Baboon friend from the Lion king, His name means Friend in Swahili. We looked at that pics and after all kinds of differences the subject of color never came up. (How Cool is That!). When we looked at the Swahili Bible and an English Bible we talked about how all the way around the world, Kenyan kids read the Bible, different language but same stories and as we were in Church on Sunday Morning, so were the kids from Kenya. We can be a good "Rafiki" to all the different kids of the world, who really aren't so different and who are just the same as God's Children. (pic below shows how we had to "hold them back" until time for mission school.. Amazing Even though we have many differences, We have many, many similarities including the most awesome similarity of all being Gods "kids".

Kyle O shared why he went and then why he thinks God "sent him" to Africa. To renew his faith and to prepare him for something great. Something greater even than the experience of standing in the pulpit, witnessing to the congregation as he did today.. !!! Awesome

So I guess this is not the end of the trip.. its the beginning, at least for us, and I hope for more of you... its the beginning of a new and renewed spiritual journey.. So where will we go? What will happen next.. Don't know.. but should be fun..

"What's in Your Wallet?"