Getting outa town: Amazing Grace Church and singing with Masai

A few weeks ago we had the opportunity to take a day trip out of Nairobi, and visit some villages away from the hustle and bustle of the big city. Our guide was Pastor Mugambi. Though he is from a different tribe, he told us he felt God calling him to reach out to the Masai and start a church among them.

Pastor Mugambi drove us about an hour outside of Nairobi to Kisarian, a shanty town where he started Amazing Grace Church.

He and his wife have also started a school, though they only have pre-school through grade 2 right now. He told us he is praying for God to provide the funds to provide grade 3 and so on for the students they now serve. A man of faith, his face would light up as he told us one story after another of God’s faithfulness to him. When he first felt called to reach out to the Masai, he was given a bicycle to make the trek to the remote village where the Masai live. He would ride his bike over 25 miles of hilly terrain and poor roads just to reach them and share with them the good news of God’s love for them. He had been trekking out there a few times a week for a year when his bicycle was stolen. He prayed for God to provide another means of transportation, and after 6 months, he was given a car! Now, he travels out there often to meet with a small group of Christians, in addition to his commitment to the church in Kisarian, and the school he oversees.

Pastor Mugambi and his wife.

These are some of the kids that they have taken in.

A few images of their kitchen.

This is his office.

After visiting his church and home in Kisarian, we began the drive out to the Masai village.

Some roadside businesses

(Bycicle repair shop)

(Car Wash)

When we arrived, we were eagerly greeted by the Masai women who mostly make up the church. When we say church, we literally mean the people and not the building as they meet outside under the shade of an acacia tree. During most days, the men are all out with the cattle, so we only met one older man. John was asked to preach, right there on the spot and had to come up with something to share. Thankfully there was a translator, though we are unsure how much was actually communicated through the large cultural differences present between our world and theirs. Standing under that tree the sun blasting down on the ground those differences seemed vast as we looked through our sunglasses at a people who live all day under relentless heat. We also had the opportunity to sing with them, though we could really only clap, and try to pic up on some of the foreign words.

Singing with the Masai from Clarissa Holtz on Vimeo.

After singing with them, they shared with us some of the things they had made to sell, which have become one of their primary means of income, since a major drought, which led to the death of many of their cattle last year.


They also invited us into their home, a traditional mud/manure hut with rudimentary beds and a cooking area, where they served us milk from a gourd. Only a few of us partook, the rest decided it might be better to possibly offend our hosts than to carry home some strange illness. We feared drinking unpasteurized milk that had been sitting in a gourd for who knows how long, having come from potentially sick cows.

The Masai are often portrayed as an edifice of tribal culture, unchanged by the western world. They seem to represent the quintessential African tribe, with their brightly colored blankets, beaded necklaces and simple nomadic life style. However, there is a darker side to this romanticized picture.

It was not until we left the village that we learned some new facts about the Masai. While there are aspects of every culture that are good and beautiful, there are also aspects of every culture that need to be redeemed. One of the horrifying things we learned about the Masai is that 93% of them practice female genital mutilation and will marry their daughters off as young as 7 or 8 years old to whatever man is willing to pay the most cattle and goats. Men will purchase as many wives as they can afford, but then each wife is expected to construct her own mud hut without any help from the man; if she is troublesome to him in any way, he beats her. If she gives birth to a daughter, even as an infant, business deals are made to sell her off to her future husband. Boys are raised to take care of the cattle, and as soon as the boy is old enough to herd the cattle on his own, then the father gives the responsibility over to his son so he can sit in the shade with the other men and drink.

We are thankful that we were able to spend a day with these people, and though the language barriers are cultural differences made a wide gulf between us, we know that we made some friends.

On the hanger floor

A bustling center for safari, commercial, and private flights as well as a wide variety of humanitarian flights, Wilson Airport is also home to Africa Inland Mission’s hanger. Walking around it is not uncommon to see airplanes with logos for Red Cross or the UN World Food Program. They are constant visual reminders that we are in a place surrounded by much need. Wilson Airport is, in fact, the busiest airport in Africa. Nairobi is a major base for flights into the most remote and difficult to access places of Eastern Africa. Places like the Democratic Republic of Congo and Southern Sudan, places so torn apart by war and instability that something as basic as roads, and healthcare and food are virtually absent. Places which are hard on the people and hard on the airplanes, making well-trained pilots and mechanics essential. Being here makes us thankful to currently be training these much needed people at Moody, as well as eager to move here ourselves to contribute to the work being done.

AIM has a video that was put together as they were evaluating the needs of the hard to reach central region. You can watch it here. Be warned you might feel the need to get up and go!

Move Against the Fear from AIM On-Field Media on Vimeo.

The AIM Air hanger is not only staffed by missionaries but also by national staff, and walking around, it becomes apparent that Kenyan faces far outnumber wazungu (whites). We have the distinct privilege of working with our Christian brothers (and a few sisters as well) who often have as much of a desire to serve the church as we do. In many ways some of them make far more sacrifices than we ever will. The Kenyan aviation maintenance system is difficult to navigate (and full of corrupt bureaucracy), so part of what AIM Air does is work to help the national staff to get their Kenyan mechanics licenses. The Kenyans range in experience, from those who have been working for longer than I have been alive and have much to teach us, to those who have not even completed school.

One day Claire and the other wives came to visit for lunch. Claire got to have the same lunch that John orders every day from a man who comes to the hangar and delivers Kenyan style food.

Claire was ecstatic that there was a cargo crate from Prince Edward Island, she kept squealing, “this box came from the home of Anne of Green Gables!”

The hanger has over ten aircraft in its fleet: Three Cessna Caravans, one DC-3, one King Air, one Cessna 2-10, and five Cessna 206s. Here are a few of them after the hanger was closed up for the day.

The Kenyans take their Chai (tea) breaks very seriously, everyday midmorning and midafternoon. Here is John pouring a cup of afternoon Chai.

Elephants, Giraffes, and Warthogs! Oh My!

We were recently able to see some of the wildlife of Kenya up close and on one account VERY personal. Thankfully, these encounters were within the confines of fences with wildlife experts and gamekeepers nearby.

The Sheldrick Wildlife Orphanage brings in baby elephants and rhinos who have been abandoned due to mothers being poached or injured. Were were able to visit the orphanage and see some of the baby elephants being fed, though apparently the rhinos don’t do so well with lots of people, so we didn’t get to see them.

When the baby elephants are brought in, one gamekeeper becomes more or less their mother for the next potentially 10 years as they are slowly introduced into the wild. The game keepers even sleep with the elephants!

On the same day, we also stopped by a giraffe center that allows you to feed giraffes and they will even kiss you! (if you put food in your mouth). Needless to say, John was willing to try, while Clarissa was not.

I guess the warthogs are friends with the giraffes because they were wandering around their feet the whole time.

Even Dickens would be at a loss for words…

by Clarissa

Being the literature fiend that I am, I often see things through the lens of great authors. I am reminded of how Charles Dickens wrote prolifically about the poverty he witnessed in industrialized London. He labored to use his pen to raise awareness of the horrendous conditions endured by children living in the city. And yet, as we visited two slums in Nairobi this past week, I found myself thinking that even he would have been challenged to portray what is there.

This past week James took us to visit a church/school that he serves at in the heart of Kibera. It is true that words cannot really describe Kibera. Poverty, squalor, filth can come close, but there is a depth of suffering and resilience that can only be understood when walking though looking into the faces of the residents. Right in the middle of Kibera is a Christian school, run by a church and also working in partnership with Compassion International. Our group walked through the gate and we were stormed by hundreds of little children crying “wazungu” which means “white people.” Speaking with the headmaster we were told that many of these children have lost parents to AIDs and live on less than 2 dollars a day. Surrounded by such precious little faces, suddenly all the ridiculous concerns that I normally carry around seemed to dissolve.

As I pray about how I will spend my time in serving the people here when we move here in the next few years, I can’t imagine living so close to these little ones, and not taking time to be with them. On Thursday I will be going back with two other wives to read stories to the kids and then leave them with some books. Pray that as we spend time with them that God will communicate to them that they are loved and valued.

This painting was in the church...I love it.

Living in the Heart of Nairobi

After arriving in Nairobi, it took us a few days to get over jet lag and be oriented to our new surroundings. Our team is staying at Mayfield guest house. A cozy establishment owned by Africa Inland Mission that offers comfortable rooms, common living rooms and three square meals a day.

The entire establishment is run by Kenyans who have been quite helpful in learning Swahili, and they only laugh at our bizarre Americanisms occasionally. James and Samual are two of our favorites and they both have a wonderful sense of humor and are always joking with us.

This is James

Mayfield, like pretty much every other building (aside from the slum) is surrounded by a wall with barbed wire and has big steel gate with a guard 24/7. Crime is a huge problem so everyone tries to make their property look less vulnerable than the next guys’.

This is the little house where the gate guard sits all day and night.

Also included in our orientation was “transportation lessons” which consisted of James teaching us how to ride the Matatus (a.k.a suicide vans). These 15 passenger vans careen around Nairobi taking over every spare inch of pavement, even if that pavement happens to be the lane of oncoming traffic. There seems to be no rhyme or reason to where they stop and how much they charge you, making it a daily adventure.

Goats blocking the road are a common occurrence.

Beyond the gates of Mayfield, Nairobi fits the profile of a big city in a developing country. Plumes of diesel smoke being spewed above a never ending snake of traffic, bicyclists hauling all manner of freight, roadside vendors taking advantage of the traffic to hawk their wares to weary drivers, sprawling slums with open sewage, people burning piles of garbage, and small children running about seemingly unsupervised.

We have started to settle into a rhythm here. Monday through Friday 8-5, eight members so our team take matatus to Wilson Airport where they are serving in the AIM Air hanger doing much needed maintenance to airplanes that are constantly enduring African runways. Clarissa and two other wives, plus 2 young children have the opportunity to connect with other wives of AIM Air pilots and mechanics as well as serve in various ministries around Nairobi.

This friendly little Chameleon was a bit timid, but didn't seem to mind us picking him up.