Food from the Wilderness - Fresh Manna and Quails

Sunday dawned hot and sultry, but I woke excited. I always do when it is time for church.

And today we had two churches planned.

Fresh Manna is our church in Kibos, established on our land it is a community church serving the surrounding village. It has a committed, core congregation and worshipping and preaching there is always a joy. I look out on a sea of familiar faces – my second church family.

But today I went, for the first time, to a new church that we have established by the rubbish dump at Kachok – and it is, quite literally, by the rubbish dump. In a small, sparkling new building of bright Mbati sheets sat a small gathering of young and old.

Moses got out his guitar and we began to sing familiar Swahili worship songs. I have picked up the words for some, but occasionally Moses will throw in a new one, and then I am lost, trying to catch a phrase I recognise.

As the praise rang out over the rubbish dump, so more and more people came to join. Faces I knew from the Tuesday and Friday fellowships, men who have been coming for years, children who have found hope in their education, and new faces, men and women from the community round about.

As I looked out of the small shiny window over the spoils of rubbish, piled in large heaps a few yards from the church door, I felt quite moved. As we sang, tears rolled down my cheeks, touched by God’s goodness and grace.

I preached a simple gospel message of love, hope and redemption, of a God who doesn’t discriminate against those that society would look down on, who loves the unloved and seeks the lost. At the end, more than 20 hands were raised in surrender to God and we prayed for an outpouring if His Spirit in that place.

I left exhausted and moved, greeting everyone I could manage, before Moses whisked us away to Kibos, and our second church of the day. At home, sometimes, in Burnley Methodist Circuit (with apologies to all Pentecostals, Anglicans and Catholics out there) we are planned for two services in a morning, at 9:30 and again at 11:00, and, apart from the praise and worship, the call to salvation, the loud cries of intercession and the wonderful African dancing (how do they all have such an amazing sense of rhythm?) it is very similar.

I feel at home in Kibos church, as I said, they are my family. After the service the greetings were warm and friendly.

We adjourned to the house and rehabilitation centre we run in Kibos, the first stop for boys from the street. Moses, and his wife Tatu, run the house and rushed off to change and begin preparing lunch.

I love my Sunday lunches at Kibos, there is a beautiful garden filled with vegetables and at the back of the house Moses has an ever growing smallholding, packed with geese, chickens, pigeons and, on this occasion, a small wicker basket of quails.

“Lunch”, he proclaimed, with a broad smile on his face.

I went to sit in the living room with one or two of the boys, whilst Moses, Tatu, Florence and Sheila began to cook.

I talked with Moses Peace, one of the first intake of boys from 2003. Moses came to us when he was 12, after meeting us in the street programmes in Kondele. He has had a chequered past, struggling at school and going backwards and forwards between different programs, but finally he is settled.

He told me that he is training in Electrical Engineering. He has been doing it since March and really enjoys it. To demonstrate his skills he dismantled one of the amplifiers from the church on the table in the living room “Moses will argue with me if he knows” he grinned.

He pointed at the different components. ”I can make this” he said, pointing at a circuit board, “but this one I am still far” he added, pointing at another that looked almost identical.

“I really want to appreciate what has been done for me” he said. “I know I haven’t always been great and I know that I dropped in and out of school, but I am grateful. When I think of where I was and how far I have come, I can only say thank you”

We rent a small room for Moses, whilst he is training. He will take another year to qualify, but he clearly loves it. He tells me that he cycled to church this morning from his aunts. I ask how far that is, “about 45km” he said, “I set off at six and was here by 8:30”.

“If you have others who want to train”, he says, “bring them to me and I will train for nothing. It is the least I can do to appreciate what has been given to me”

My day began by the rubbish dump and ended with hope fulfilled.

We ate quails and rice, with Moses homemade chilli and marmalade relish, and it couldn’t have tasted sweeter.