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I just got back from a whirlwind visit to Kenya and Uganda with our Rock chairman, Dan Vick. So much was accomplished in so little time that I’ve told friends it was as if God put a strong tailwind at our backs. (Actually, I had prayed for a tailwind crossing the Atlantic as we only had one hour for a connection in Paris to Nairobi. God provided!)
Here are the highlights:
· We prepared to launch a joint agricultural program with Uganda Christian University to promote self-sustainable mission projects and teach discipleship at the same time;
· We encouraged and taught our Uganda university scholarship students on accountability while readying the second generation of student leadership to head the group;
· We took decisive action to improve the academic performance of children in Rock-sponsored mercy homes by placing them in an excellent school with a strong emphasis on academics, structure and discipline;
· And we taught Rock-sponsored businessmen in Kenya on dealing with adversity and managing cash flow while also providing individual business and spiritual counsel.
While God enabled us to achieve many practical goals which will have a long-term positive impact on those we serve in The Rock, the things that stick out in my mind are much more personal interactions.
I was delighted to see a marriage completely restored which had been threaten
ed by tribal tensions and violence in Kenya. Daniel Mwangi and his wife (pictured at right) are restoring the business which was destroyed during violence two years ago and grinned as they said that despite their earlier separation during the tensions, their marriage is now stronger than ever. They credit God and counseling from Joseph Musungu, our Rock East Africa program manager.It was heart- warming to hear one of our newly-wed businessmen share with Dan that Dan’s advice for the young man to call his new bride during the day to tell her he was thinking of her was the best advice he had been given “and it gets me a very good reception when I come home at night.”
We counseled, laughed and commiserated with a couple of our Rock scholars who are facing communication challenges with their prospective fiancés because of their busy schedules. It was a great opportunity to mentor them and discuss God’s design of men and women.
Dan also told of his high school friend and football teammate Bobby to the boys in the mercy home. Bobby always was looking for a good time in high school and never studied. Years later, Dan, who had started his own successful business by then, ran across Bobby, who was working as a laborer on the loading dock. The boys, who needed the pep talk, got the message. Then they thanked us sincerely for loving them and caring about them enough to expect more from them and to put them in a better learning environment.
-- Mark
