Nairobi - Kids of the Street

For the past few weeks, we have been attending Ridgeways Baptist Church here in Nairobi. They are a very mission active church fellowship we have really come to enjoy. We volunteered to help out with a Christmas mission project to provide help for the street boys in downtown Nairobi. We tried to meet their immediate needs with food and a blanket but we also tried to meet their eternal need with prayer and the gospel as well.

RBC has many ministries to minister and evangelize the community. Through another ministry, several people, in a nearby slum area, recently prayed to receive Christ. When we met Tuesday afternoon to make homemade items for the boys, eight of those people showed up and volunteered to help. We were so moved by the commitment of these new Christians and RBC,s commitment to missions

First we made butter sandwiches to eat along with the hot tea we were taking them the next morning.

Then we rolled out and cooked around 200 Chapatis. A Chapati is a flatbread that is eaten with many meals here in Kenya. Even though it is only flour, water and salt, it is quite tasty once it is pan fried (Anything is delicious if you fry it, it’s a southern thing).

Chapati recipe: http://www.justkenya.org/kenya/recipes/chapati.asp

Other things that were cooked for them were beef sausages and Mandazis. A Mandazi is a delicious donut like pastry. We made up the dough, rolled it out, and cut it into triangles before frying them in deep fat (Jeff almost ate all the dough before we could get it fried). Yum! Here’s a link to a Mandazi recipe: http://www.allthingskenyan.com/food-mandazi.html

We met at the church at 5:00 AM and headed downtown (Those of you who know how much Jan loves mornings can really appreciate this). When we arrived, the boys were already waiting on us, lined up seated orderly against a wall. The first thing we did was to serve them hot tea and the butter sandwiches. We then began passing out the rest of the goodies as well as a new blanket for each of them.

After everyone was fed and the goodies distributed, we divided ourselves up among the boys and shared our testimonies, and their stories. Here, Jan is sharing with two boys. One said he did not want to be on the streets anymore and would I please pray for him to find a way off the streets. The other said he wanted to be able to go back to school. After we talked, the one on the right prayed to receive Christ. What a praise! When the other one was asked if he wanted to pray, he said “I’ve done that before, but Jesus keeps letting me down.” Needless to say this was very heartbreaking.

These boys lead a very tough life. As you might figure, most of the boys do not have adequate clothing or shoes.

They go around collecting plastic bags from garbage and sell the plastic. Unfortunately, many of them will use the money they make to purchase glue to sniff. We were told that the glue will cut the hunger pains. Please pray for these children.

This is a shot of our pastor, Pastor Wanje, and Eunice, a lady who works regularly with the street kids, praying with another boy to receive Christ.

I want you to meet another one of our new friends from Ridgeways. His name is Fred. Fred has been working with the street kid’s ministry for about a year and a half. You can see his passion for these kids. That comes from the fact that he was once one of them. Fred recently wrote out his testimony. It can be read under the “Stories and Prayers” section on the right. We are thrilled to tell you now, before you see where he has been, the direction his life is taking now. He has been called by God to work with street kids and teens. The Lord has also put the need for him to have formal training on the hearts of some believers. He started a three year course in November, concentrating on Youth Ministry, at the seminary in Nairobi. Please pray for Fred as well.

Freds story: http://jeffandjan-n-africa-prayers.blogspot.com/