Challenges

I don’t know if the following story is what is really supposed to go in a blog from a missionary, but this is what I am going through and some of the battles that we face here. God is at work and doing mighty things, but there will always be opposition.

I think I have experienced two of my lowest points since coming to Kenya 7 years ago.

In July, one of our third year secondary students decided to leave his school. He had been having problems for several years now and we had been trying to counsel him and advise him. He had finally had enough and thought it was best to leave. When he returned to Mbita we were very kind and gentle towards him even though we were upset at his poor decision. Our Kenyan Principal, Mr. Gwalla, and I sat and talked with him and tried to help him think about his future and the right way to move forward. We reassured him that we were committed to supporting him in the future. After our conversation ended with prayer we left the office. The boy returned quietly a few minutes later and stole our principal’s phone. Talk about biting the hand that feeds you! By the time we noticed, it was too late as he was already across the lake and well on his way to Kisumu. Fortunately his family helped us to recover the phone, but it was damaged by the time it was returned.

Over the next few weeks we heard some stories of how over the past couple of years he had been trying to involve some of our younger girls in sexual relationships. I was greatly disappointed because of all that I had invested in this young man, but was satisfied that he was far away from Mbita and wouldn’t be coming back any time soon to cause more problems, or so I thought…

After a few weeks he returned to town which worried all of us because of the girls being in danger. I decided to go find him one day and when he saw me, he started running… so I decided to start chasing him. I knew I wouldn’t catch him with my heavy boots on running through the bushes in this rural area he knows so well, but I thought that at the very least, I could put a little scare in him.

It was difficult to understand what was happening. This is the same boy that I taught for three years in primary school, helped him get into one of the best high schools in the country and visited him regularly in his school. Now he is running away from me. How did it get to this point? I didn’t catch him, but I found his mother and requested her to make sure that he leaves Mbita and returns to his family in Kisumu or his father in Nairobi.

They didn’t think I was serious and he decided to stick around. So a couple of days later we had the police arrest him and put him in jail. Our principal, Mr. Gwalla, and I were able to go to the assistant police chief and spend a few hours with the boy and his mother. The policeman had the boy read aloud the minimum jail sentences for breaking and entering and also for defiling a minor.

The following day the policeman brought the boy up to CGA to do a practical lesson for all the secondary students who had come for extra teaching that week. He led the boy, handcuffed, in front of the awaiting students and was met by a lot of shocked faces and long stares. It was a good lesson that the others will not soon forget.

A few days later they let him out of jail with a strong warning that he should find a new school as soon as possible and told to stay away from Mbita. Even though we will not be able to continue to help him, we are praying that his eyes will be opened and he will turn back to God before it is too late.

A few weeks later something else came up. Another boy that is one of the main leaders among our secondary students had some problems. He comes from a very poor home where his elderly grandmother has raised him along with his brothers. The boy was the school leader while he was in primary school at CGA and always comes back to volunteer at school helping with anything that is needed during the holidays. He is hard-working and has a very outgoing personality. We have shown a lot of confidence and trust in him. There were some inconsistencies we noticed on the report form he handed in when he came back to Mbita over the holiday. We asked him questions about it, but he had some excuses. Because of some other issues we decided to bring him back to his school to start the new term. After arriving we quickly realized that he had changed his report form, not only this time, but he had been doing it for three years now. So this student who we had thought was doing so well in school has been struggling throughout, undetected by us. We also realized he had been deceiving us about other things also. The worst part is that even when he was caught red-handed he still wouldn’t admit it. He continued to try and make-up stories and acted like he hadn’t done anything wrong until finally at the end he was able to speak the truth. It was painful to witness.

Adding insult to injury… after discovering these lies, the deputy principal at his school told us that the boy needed a new mattress before they could readmit him to school. So Lillian (our orphan overseer) and I had to drive to the nearby town and spend more money to buy the boy (who had been deceiving us for three years) a new mattress because the grandmother had no money to assist. Lillian used the opportunity when we gave him the mattress to tell him that it is a picture of God’s grace with us. He blesses us and does so much for us that we don’t deserve, but he does it because of his love for us. I still believe he will learn a lot from this experience and change for the better. He knows right and wrong. Maybe this is a good “wake-up call” that will help to put him back on the right path.
To be totally honest these cases really got me down for a while. Through prayer and scripture God continues to remind me to not focus on the problems, but to focus on what God is able to do, which is much more than we can ask or imagine. All of us are “works in progress.” Sinners saved by grace.

CGA has 90 students in secondary school and most of them are doing so well, working hard and being a “light” in their schools, but it is easy to get focused on the few negative ones. Without God, there wouldn’t be much hope, but as believers we continue to be faithful to what God has called us to do and leave the results in His hands!