I came up to my “office” this morning expecting it to be the normal slow Friday. Most youth pastors don’t work on Fridays, so usually my emails are slow and phone calls are scarce. With summer just behind us and youth pastors scrambling to get the school year started, sometimes the 2007 mission trip is the last thing on their mind so these past few weeks have been a bit hit and miss in mobilizing groups. 

This morning, however, was not just another day sitting at the desk, I had the opportunity to see the fruits of my labor. The fruit of calling youth pastors and getting them motivated. The fruit of sending out an email about their payments being due. The fruit of emailing encouraging words, reading paperwork, rejecting medical releases as incomplete. It all culminated for me this morning in an email that I got from one of my 2006 group leaders.

Last October, I began corresponding with Janna a youth leader from Atlanta about Kenya. Let me just say that this was rough and my heart wasn’t in it (even with the wrong motives he blesses us). I usually take Kenya inquiries with a grain of salt. There have been
FEW (like 2) in my years with AIM that have come together because of all the details and finances that have to come together for this to happen. You have to have a strong core group of committed students to ask them to raise that much money and put in that much preparation and live in those conditions. But Janna stuck it out with me, it was a long grueling process to get answers about ministry and cost, emailing back and forth to our staff in Kenya that have sketchy internet and in this case were dealing with many health issues. So on faith not just in our organization but her Father and not even a lot of info under her belt, Janna decided to take her group for a plunge in Kenya.

I had an amazing time helping prepare her. She is my age and has a huge heart for Kenya and her students. Just in talking to her I was challenged and encouraged. She got to hear my heart for my ministry and I got to hear hers. We prayed together, and I think even cried together as she made tough decisions about her team. She was amazing! I was blessed just by her leadership and I was excited for their trip. I was anxious to hear how things went in Kenya and I emailed yesterday asking for details. This morning she sent me their prayer letter from after their mission trip! I was blown away!

God, I thank you for allowing me to be apart of what
you have done in these students lives. Thank you even more for allowing me to see it and be blessed by the stories. Please take the time to read these students words and I pray that you will be touched.

Vanessa Yeh

Atlanta Chinese Christian Church

It’s hard to describe my experiences in Kenya, mainly because you can’t really understand a place like Kibera or Musul unless you’ve been there, unless you’ve breathed the air or felt the Kenyan dirt beneath your feet. While I was there, God made me witness to a lot of things I didn’t understand, didn’t comprehend, and didn’t want to see. I felt overwhelmed. Maybe it was the sewage-lined alleys, or the rolling hills of dead, drought-ridden land, or the hundreds of street orphans playing in piles of refuse. Maybe it was the injustice, the suffering, the pain. Maybe it was the hope that still persevered despite all odds. God threw us into Kenya with little warning of what we might see. Of course, we knew we were most likely heading towards the slums and that we’d observe hunger and poverty and squalor; but it was more than that. God chucked us in, wound us into knots, turned us inside out, and then still had the energy to break us a hundred times over. Some of us took it all in without a sound. Some of us cried. Some of us still don’t know how to feel even though we’re back. But our God is sovereign and good, and it was His trip all along.

We say that not our will, but His will be done – and we learned (sometimes the hard way) that our trip to Kenya was most certainly not about us, but always about Him. He was in Kibera and Kijabe and Musul long before any of us stepped off the plane in Nairobi, and he continues to reign there despite our leaving. He broke our expectations more times than I can count, and he showed me first-hand the beauty of a place like Africa. I can’t possibly describe to you how it feels to step into a mud building the size of my kitchen and see 80 children crammed onto their makeshift benches. I remember the school in Kibera, where I had to grope around for my things because there was no electricity, where I had to stand the whole time because there weren’t enough seats, where the schoolbooks were ripped and faded. But how can I describe the sight of a child who looks up at you holding her tattered workbook to her chest, and you know she wouldn’t give that book up for anything in the world because it’s her chance of a greater hope. Can I make you understand what it’s like to watch the faces of the men and women of the Maasai tribe praise God in their little church, despite the drought that’s ruining their pastoral lives? Can I show you the passion in their eyes?

I know I can’t, and that’s a hard thing to accept. But God doesn’t call us to force these experiences on our brothers and sisters back home, and he doesn’t call us to sit in a corner and sulk because we feel that no one understands. He calls us to
be His, and to bless and serve others both in Kenya and here in the States, and he calls us to love Him and each other. In my brief time in Kenya, I’ve come to understand that more and more, and He’s shown me that He is the same God here as He was in Kenya, and that my attitude towards Him should not change just because my location did. As He revealed to me more of my own heart, so did He reveal more of His own.

Brothers and sisters, I cannot stress to you how faithful our God is. Time and time again He lifted us up after we had fallen and anointed our lips with His words. He sometimes took situations that appeared discouraging and turned them around to glorify Him. People still wonder how on earth we managed to raise $45,000 for this trip, and the beauty of that strikes me every time. I honestly have no clue how we managed to raise that much money, and it really doesn’t matter. God wanted us there and He saw it through, penny by penny, step by step, and His faithfulness is unceasing.

So now, I’m back in America, and how will my life change? I’m not completely sure, but I do know that God calls me to step out of my comfort zones and love His people as He first loved me. Now, as a sit and write this letter to you, I think of the millions of Kenyan children who will never see a keyboard or even learn how to write. When I sit at my table for dinner, I remember the amazing food we experienced at the hands of our cook, Vicki, and know that many Kenyans will never know that abundance. But most of all, God tells me that simply remembering them is not enough - that thinking of them and then going about my daily life is No. Longer. Enough. What I can do will
never be enough, and I know that, but my Father calls me to reach out anyway and to bless His people as they have blessed me. And it is now my prayer that we, along with our brothers and sisters back in Kenya, may sit together at His table and taste that, indeed, He is good.

Joyce Zou

Atlanta Chinese Christian Church

It is hard coming back from Kenya. However in the same way, it is easy to put this experience into the back of my head and get on with my life. It is easy to respond with an apathetic "good" after the unnerving question "How was Kenya?". It is also easy to withdraw from the world and sit and wallow in misery while using the excuse "People just don't understand what I have been through so why even bother?". The Kenya missions trip was more than just a place we visited and the activities we did during the day. I saw hunger and disparity but also, the beauty and the depths of not only the people in Africa but also our teammates.In desperate situations, God has given us beautiful and astonishing clarity. In moments of anguish, God provided with his comfort and reassurance.

Two and a half weeks later, it still hurts. And the thing is- it will always hurt. Our eyes have been opened. We
have seen and tasted. We have
heard Him. Just because our team arrived back in Alpharetta does not mean we can keep on living our previous life. When I see the faces of the children in Kibera and walking on sewage, How is it possible for me to look back? How can I compare the quiet suffering of their eyes to anything here? When I remember the endless sea of mountains displayed in front of me, how can I not surrender to His majesty?

He is always faithful to us and He calls us to be faithful to him no matter what the cost.Since we have been given much, and much is required in return. (Luke 12). Members of ACCCN, we
Have been given much and now, it is up tous to be the servant he has called us to be. When He calls, are we willing to listen? More importantly are we willing to do it? God will change and form us, challenge us and break us- just as we have been changed and challenged and ultimately broken before him. However, we cannot linger in the phase of "Kenya Missions Trip". Here, in Alpharetta, is where we start the rest of the trip. Bwana Asifiwe.