Off to Kenya

Donald is leaving for Africa on Friday. He will be gone for 10 days, traveling with a team from our church to conduct a four-day medical clinic in an area somewhere in the middle of nowhere Kenya. The team consists of two doctors, a dentist, two medical assistants, a teacher, and a team leader/logistics person. Donald is the "teacher." He will speak to the people waiting in line at the clinic about hygiene, preventing diseases, and what to do if you get a disease, etc. The plan as of now is for him to have a 20 minute or so monologue that he will repeat over and over again for the entirety of each day... sun up, to sun down. If there is an overwhelming crowd, he may have to ditch those efforts and assist the doctors inside.

Our contact in Kenya sent a report last week on the latest news regarding the recent violence there. Thankfully, in the last few weeks or so, new developments have been made towards peace, healing and reconciliation. If you are not familiar with what's going on, here's a good summary that I just found online:

The scale and speed of the violence that engulfed Kenya following the controversial presidential election of December 27, 2007 shocked both Kenyans and the world at large. Two months of bloodshed left over 1,000 dead and up to 500,000 internally displaced persons in a country viewed as a bastion of economic and political stability in a volatile region.

To give you another idea, one of the team members called an emergency jet service to inquire about the possibilities for service in case of an emergency. The company responded, "There are three places in the world that we will not fly to: Iraq, Iran, and Kenya." Lovely... But things are better now due to some political movement that I don't quite understand, and I don't want to bore you with. You can read about it here.

The area they are going is somewhere between Ethiopia and Tanzania, to the east of Uganda and northwest of the Indian Ocean.

People have asked how I feel about him traveling so close to the baby's arrival date. The answer is that I am okay. We will be okay. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a bit anxious, but the anxiety lies more with getting him home safely than with her arriving early. I cannot wait until the day he returns. Ironically, I just received a phone call (while writing this) from the team leader letting us know that they won't be returning until Monday night, the 14th, instead of Sunday night because of some rescheduling after one of their flights was canceled. Just another opportunity to trust the Lord and give my anxiety to Him! Easier said than done.
There are many specific things you can pray for:

• Travel. That the team will be safe and remain healthy throughout the long route to and from Kenya.
• Luggage. That their luggage with all of their medical supplies arrives safely and un-pillaged.
  
• Health. The team has been immunized against most major diseases, but of course there are a few that have no vaccine. One that is prevalent in Kenya is a type of tuberculosis that is airborne. It is not treatable. It is scary. And I don't like it! A huge prayer of mine is that these team members will remain healthy and not contract this or any other diseases.
  
• Safety. That the team will be protected from any violence that may arise (probably won't and hopefully not) between two feuding tribes.
• Energy. They expect to see hundreds of people at the clinic everyday. The team will be worn out! Our prayer is that Donald's voice will hold up. We all know that he's a "talker," but 12 hours a day is a lot... even for the most experienced. :)
• Impact. The team's primary mission in Kenya is to treat, medicate and educate as many people as they can while they are there. It will mainly be women and children...some who will have walked miles and miles and miles to get there. While this is a primary objective, it is also a prayer that they can make an eternal impact on these people and the people they are serving with. It has been arranged for several Kenyan doctors and nurses to work along side this team. Also, there will be translators that they will work closely with. Please pray that these people will see the love of Christ in our team. That they can come to know a savior who loves them more than they can imagine.
• Baby. That our little girl will stay inside long enough for her daddy to be one of the first ones to hold her.
• Me. That the ten, now eleven, days go by quickly for me. That I can look to the Lord for strength and not in people or busyness. I praise God for this opportunity for my husband to serve in such a mighty way and the opportunity for me to put him in my Father's hands -- which is where he always belongs... this trip has really revealed that to me. I thought I had it mastered, but as the trip nears, my dependence on worldly comforts, like my husband, is made evident and my true dependence on the Lord is dwarfed.
  

I will keep you posted. Thank you for praying.