Great Beginnings

As I mentioned in my last post, Duncan and I took a quick, two-day trip out to Kisumu last week to check on things and meet with our other Director, Cornel. CARE for AIDS started the process of opening a second region in Western Kenya back in November, and over the last few months we developed a partnership with Central Baptist Church in Kisumu. After interviewing all kinds of applicants, we hired a Regional Coordinator (Geoffrey) and two center workers (Lazarus and Elisabeth). In December, Cornel and his family moved to Kisumu to really get things going, and the whole team held a launching ceremony at Central Baptist during the first week of January. During the last month, Lazarus and Elisabeth successfully recruited a full group of clients, and Duncan and I timed our trip to coincide with their first full seminar.

This trip really made the growth of CFA in Kisumu seem real. We arrived in time for this first seminar and found a full group of 75 clients along with the CFA staff, all excited and ready to go. Duncan and Cornel, along with the pastor of Central Baptist, spent the morning telling the clients more about what to expect over the next nine months while they come to the center, attend seminars, and receive our workers for home visits. We've learned that it's important to give the clients proper expectations and a good idea of what the future holds, and everyone did a great job of this last Thursday. After the seminar we took the staff out for a celebratory meal of fish and ugali by Lake Victoria, and it was an absolute blessing to see the joy on all of their faces. Lazarus, Elisabeth, and Geoffrey are almost bursting with anticipation as they prepare for the first week of center days and home visits, and Cornel is extremely proud to be finally providing the services of CFA to the area where he grew up.

I want to give you all this update so that you can first thank God with me for the way that he has brought this progress about. I am so thankful for the way He brought just the right workers together, and I'm thankful for the success he has given them in finding clients. I'm thankful for the way that the pastor of Central Baptist and the congregation as a whole is standing behind this ministry, and I'm thankful for the heart of service that I see in them.

I also want you to pray with me for the future. I know that our workers have a lot of learning ahead of them - their job is an incredibly challenging one, and they truly need divine wisdom and strength to walk with this group of clients for the next nine months. Please pray that the clients themselves would feel the love of Christ through CARE for AIDS - pray that they would find a new hope in life, and that they would be inspired to find ways to provide for themselves and their families. Please also pray for the Nyalenda area in Kisumu where we are working. It boasts one of the highest HIV prevalence rates in all of Kenya, which is having a devastating effect on the community. Our workers recruited 75 clients in less than a month, which is remarkably fast, but they also had to turn away about a hundred additional HIV-positive people who live too far away for this center. Pray that all of those people would find help now if they need it urgently, and pray that God would provide the funding for CFA to open another center in Kisumu soon so we can reach a greater portion of the population. On behalf of our clients, our staff, and the people of Kenya, I thank you for praying with us!