Day 28: Brokenness

Today was a stark reminder that this world is filled with a lot of suffering and darkness. Amidst all the luxury, routine, and "being comfortable" I experience in America, it's too easy to overlook all the people all over the world suffering so much pain and heartbreak. Today started with smiles and delight when Pastor, Dylan, and I went to Hill Top to eat roasted goat meat (which taste pretty darn good) and drink Stoneys. In less than an hour, however, we arrived at Chuka Hospital.

Now to be honest, I'm rarely even in American hospitals and so you can imagine what was going through my mind as I walked through a legitimate third-world hospital. We started off by going through the maternity ward. It was pretty cool seeing all the newborns, but at the same time, I couldn't help but think, "Man, how many of these kids are going to make it to my age? Even if they do, how many of them will be stuck in poverty for the rest of their lives?" Pastor, Dylan, and I soon arrived at another ward that housed sick infants and HIV-infected women. My heart broke seeing infants with tubes in their nostrils, children who couldn't walk, women (old and young) suffering through HIV, and all sorts of people going through circumstances I will never have to go through. We saw people whose whole bodies were in pain, whose legs were either nonfunctional or amputated, whose voices barely could be heard.

This is the reality of the third-world which is pretty much the majority of the world. We are the lucky few who get college educations, cars, and squeaky clean hospitals while everyone else gets cheap beds, flies, and mosquito nets.

I hate to belabor the point but...what the heck? I find it both disappointing and sad that while all I can think about is: my career, school, and stuff like that, there are probably 100 other people starving, suffering in piss-poor hospitals (if they even have those), and probably wondering, "What the heck?" On my bad days, I sometimes think, "Dang why does my life suck?" Then on days like this, when I'm going through my journal, I'll remember that there is not one Kenyan I met that day in Chuka hospital who wouldn't gladly trade places with me.

What am I supposed to do? What are we supposed to do?

Day 27: If Ever I Witnessed a Miracle...

Dylan obviously had enough strength to mess around on the hike back from Mpuri

Dylan with the Mpuri Fellowship

The original plan for today was for Dylan and I to get our first chance to go out and witness to people around Weru. The day started out normally, but soon enough, Dylan seemed sort of out of it. At first, I thought Dylan was just maybe having a bad morning or something, but soon enough, he told me how his stomach was hurting pretty badly. Now up to this point, Dylan and I were super thankful to God that neither of us had gotten sick or hurt (except for my motorcycle accident), so I was pretty concern for my ministry partner. Dylan's stomach ended up hurting so much that he went to lay down and sleep off the pain. When Pastor arrived at the family's house, we decided it was better to make sure Dylan was okay and so we ended up not going out to witness. Now since it was Thursday, we were going to Mpuri again to visit the fellowship there, but if Dylan's condition didn't improve, we would have to take him to the closest hospital (and trust me, hospitals in this area are nothing like those in America). After lunch, however, Dylan said he was starting to feel better. Not only that but he was very insistent on us going to Mpuri that afternoon.

So amazingly, we made the trip out to Mpuri just as we had originally planned. Not only that, but as the day progressed, Dylan's health just seemed to steadily improve. When I asked him if he wanted to me to prepare a message for Mpuri (it was his turn to speak at Mpuri), he shook his head and said he would still do it. At Mpuri, when Dylan was asked to speak, he honestly looked as if he was at full strength again. He spoke on Isaiah 6 about the glory of God, angels giving us hot coals, and allowing God to send us forth. Dylan later told me that as he gave the message, he just sensed that he was saying things that he had not originally prepared.

If ever I experienced any miracles, this might have been it. Just a few hours earlier, Dylan was bedridden and didn't even seem to want to move too much. Dylan not only managed to make it out to Mpuri on a motorbike and give a message, but he even made the hour long trek back to Weru. Dylan later told me that in the days leading up to this day, he had been praying to God to humble him. Dylan definitely got his prayer answered; I have no doubt in my mind that God was using those stomach pains to make Dylan rely solely on Him.

Today was such a powerful thing for me to witness. Not because I had some super spiritual experience, but because I saw my brother in Christ experience God in ways he had probably not experienced before. I'm certain that God revealed a lot to Dylan about relying on Him through any and every circumstance and pain. God bless Dylan. I hope God is continuing to show you new things everyday at Vandy.

Day 26: Lakers!

From left to right: Kendi (Pastor's cousin), Dylan, and Pastor

Our lunch at Meru. Total=$4

Today, Pastor Mwiti returned from Nairobi and decided to take Dylan and me to Meru, the largest town around. So we get into a matatu (a Kenyan minivan that averages 20 passengers when it really should only hold 14) and enjoy a sweaty, uncomfortable hour long ride to Meru. It wouldn't have been that bad of a ride, except my contacts started becoming uncomfortable during the ride, leaving me squinting and often using only one eye to see. We crossed the equator which was pretty anticlimactic.

Once we get to Meru, Dylan and I decided to go to an internet cafe, because we haven't had any access to the outside world for a while. So what's the first thing I do when I finally get my hands on a computer? That's right: I check to see if the L.A. Lakers won the NBA championship and sure enough, I get the good news 2 weeks after the fact. I also go through my email and find some words of encouragement from some friends (a lot of people also sent me emails telling me that the Lakers won haha) and I even found out that Audrey Chau and Sarah Chi made it safely to Manila for the Global Urban Trek. While it was really cool to feel slightly connected to America and the outside world, I felt really distant. Everything I read and did on the internet just felt really disconnected. There I was sitting in a slightly ghetto internet cafe with my contacts hurting, reading about how the Lakers won 2 weeks after the NBA Finals ended and how people at home were doing this or that.

During our time in Meru, Pastor, Dylan, and I ate out ($4 for a complete meal for all 3 of us), visited a museum, and paid a visit to Pastor's cousin and her business. It was a pretty long day and we got back to Weru around 9-ish. For me, it was sort of a depressing day. I just felt really out of it the whole time I was in Meru, partially because my eyes were killing me and partly because while Meru is nicer and bigger than Weru, it's no metropolitan area and it didn't even have the homely feel of Weru.

And as always, going on the internet and learning about what's going on at home or with my friends was a strange, almost depressing experience. While it was nice to find out the Lakers won, to read encouraging emails, etc., I realized how far I was from home and that it would be weeks until I saw those whom I loved again. For now, I just had to appreciate being in Kenya, with a good friend in Dylan and sharing lives with a man of God like Pastor Mwiti. They were my family in moments like these.

Day 25: Part II: The Infamous Chick Story

My first time catching one of the three newly hatched chicks

So by now this story has circulated around a bit but here is the rest of Day 25 (aka "Worse Day Ever"):

So Dylan and I finally got home, tired and still miffed about what we had to endure that morning. To lighten things up, we decided to play with 3 newly hatched chicks. Ever since they had hatched, Dylan and I often entertained ourselves by running around and trying to pick the chicks up. This task was harder than it sounds because the mother hen was extremely protective and would try to peck at us. On this day, the hen and her chicks were foolishly loitering in an open field, whereas they're normally by the house which meant they could run under things to hide from us. Easy pickings for me and Dylan. With Dylan fending off the hen, I managed to catch 2 of the 3 chicks. It was time to catch the last one, take a picture, and show everyone back home how skilled I was at picking up chicks (pun very much ended haha).

So as I'm cradling the 2 chicks in my hands, I rush at the third one. As I reach to scoop it up, I stumble over the uneven ground and trip. I drop the two chicks as I was holding...and accidentally step on one of them. The chick is immediately writhing and spasming on the ground, all the while shrieking in pain. I stare down at the creature and all I can think is, "Oh no..." Within a minute, the chick is dead. I had just killed a cute, innocent, little animal. For me, running around trying to catch the chicks was a game, but to my host family, that chick could grow into a chicken and provide food or something.

Doris, our host grandmother, comes by right then and looks down and sees the dead chick. I apologize and try to explain it was an accident, but she doesn't seem to care too much. But still, never before have I felt so much guilt. For the rest of the day, all I could think about was how I was so angry during the morning and how I killed a chick. I honestly couldn't stand the shame from knowing what I had thought and done that day. Later on in the day, Edith takes Dylan and me to her father's house (Pastor was still in Nairobi). When we're asked to share a word with her family, I let Dylan do it because I honestly was in no mood to try to say anything remotely spiritual in my current state.

So this is something I haven't mentioned yet, but by this point in the missions trip, my contacts were hurting my eyes. I hate wearing glasses though and so I still wore my contacts as often as possible.

As we're walking home, my contacts are driving me crazy and I'm still thinking about what I could do to make things right for the family. As we're heading to the normal Tuesday even intercessory prayer meeting, Edith turns to us and mentions that one of us will give a message at the meeting. I sigh inwardly because I know it's my turn to speak because Dylan had done so at Edith's family's home. Not only did I not want to speak, but I had no idea what I would even speak on. Just when we're entering the church, I feel a sudden urge to speak on Matthew 26 when Jesus is praying in the Garden of Gethsemane. When I'm asked to come up to give the message, my contacts are still hurting and I'm blinking like crazy as I'm reading the Bible. But as I speak, I feel like God is giving me the words to say. So for the entire message, I speak as passionately as I've ever spoken and with the knowledge that my words were not my own. When the prayer meeting ends, I walk out feeling slightly redeemed knowing that God had still used me despite my idiocy but I still had to deal with the dead chick.

Before dinner, I decide to talk with Doris. I tell her that I'm going to make things right and that I'll buy another chick for the family. I sort of expected Doris to accept my plan and that things would be cool, but she becomes slightly upset at the notion of me buying another chicken. Eventually she looks me in the eyes and says something I'll never forget: "You're my boy. Just be free."

In that moment, I felt God telling me, "Yeah, Myron you're a complete fool but whatever grace this woman has shown you, my grace is infinitely better. No matter how many times you fail me, I'll still forgive and love you. Heck, I'll even use you like I did tonight." I stood there in shock for a few seconds at her words really hit me.

When people ask what I got out of Kenya, it's moments like these. It's not like a had one monumental experience that completely changed my life; instead, it was God showing me lessons every single day through little things. Would that I could be just as in tune with God here in America as I was in Kenya. This day couldn't have gone more terribly wrong, but in the end, I learned tangibly that God truly does remove all the shame and loves me more greatly than I could ever imagine. It only took going to Kenya and accidentally killing a chick for me to get that.

This happened a minute before I committed the unforgivable act