Worship services in Tala, Kenya!

We left for church around 9:45 and got to the AIC (African Inland Church) in Tala with enough time to meet a few people. We seem to be the local celebrities which enables us to meet a lot of people in town! Here at the AIC they have a service in English for the secondary students at 9 am along with Sunday school for the younger children (Grace and Eric attend that class) then at around 10 the second service begins and that is in the Akamba language. They have about an hour of worship, with singing by the choir, the youth and young adults. They are quite animated in their singing and I can’t wait to show you some video. But with our slow internet that is impossible here. That will have to wait until we are back in the States! During the offering the people who couldn’t afford the tithe would bring in produce from their shamba (farm) and after the offering was taken they would auction off the produce and the cash would go to the church. That was a little strange because I felt like I was at an auction! But it was neat to see the people get involved. They introduced us to the church and the pastor is very excited to have us working with Gideon, the Academy, and the local destitute children. I’ve noticed that everyone I meet is willing to give me everything they have. Pauline said that what little they have they get much joy from giving it to those in need. We went to a fundraiser after church for a local pastor and his family to raise money for the tuition of his children’s education. (It is said that schooling is free in Kenya, but there are annual fees that need to be paid, so it is far from free.) People were happy to give 10, 50, 100 schillings of what little they have in order to help someone else. Pauline said they do this quite often for other needs of members of their church. This helps everyone to feel as if they are in a community and helping one another. She said the pastor is changing things up a bit in the church and requiring everyone to have a task at the church. That way if someone is doing two things, they will now only have to do one because everyone will have a job or responsibility at the church. It’s their way of involving people and making them feel responsible for their church. It was such a blessing to see everyone giving to a cause they felt called to give to. Another way they helped raise money was by selling boiled eggs! You can purchase an egg at the market for about 7 schillings, but they were starting the sale at 100 schillings each! After we purchased our eggs we sat down to eat them while others were still purchasing. Then they started to reduce the price until finally they left it up to the individual as to how much they could afford! It was a great way to raise some money and Pauline said sometimes they will bake a cake and do the same thing with tiny pieces. When we left the pastors wife gave us a pumpkin as a thank you for what we had contributed. These people are very concerned for the education of their children and it was a good thing to see in the midst of true poverty. Please pray that these adults will continue to make education a priority and with your help we can achieve the level of excellence that is needed for this country at the Academy. Mungu is good! (God is good). Here is a picture of the van we had to tie the door shut on!