It’s absolutely amazing, profound, and life changing when a new life moves within you…when you feel your baby move from the security of being in your womb then into the world and finally into your arms. You fall so deeply in love that all else pales. It’s the only clear picture of God’s love for me that I have ever truly understood.

There has never been a day that my daughter has not made me laugh, smile, and feel all warm and fuzzy at least once. However, there are days that the monotony of cleaning the highchair AGAIN, or correcting her AGAIN starts to wear on me. I just get tired.

We’ve seen our friends and relatives deal with their two year olds, but only in limited time periods. I hadn’t felt the draining affects of a full day with a two year old, who last week loved listening to Mommy, but today has decided that Mommy’s words are just suggestions.

Recently, I read in The Message paraphrase Proverbs 31:17-18

“She senses the worth of her work,
is in no hurry to call it quits for the day.”

I realized I hadn’t read it that way before because I hadn’t studied Proverbs 31 since my work has changed to primarily raising my daughter. I was stirred to change my thinking.

Moms, Do you sense the worth of your work with your children? Do you feel the urgency and importance of your training?

When I don’t “sense the worth” and it all seems too much, I have been praying these verses for myself and as always God is faithful to renew and remind me-we have the amazing privilege, the honor, to raise the next generation of Christ followers.

The following testimony was recently forwarded to me and is posted here with permission. This testimony serves as encouragement to keep pressing on with the biblical parenting principles taught in Growing Kids God’s Way.

Howie’s Testimony

“This past Saturday, we had pre-arranged for a company to come in a clean some of our carpeted rooms. We had given our two children, Joel(11yrs) and Ainsley(8yrs) some instructions about where to play while this was going on. When the man arrived and began cleaning carpet, our kids came in and out a couple of times asking questions and observing the man working. My youngest had asked if she could stand in a adjoining room and watch and I said, “Sure.” My oldest was also watching at a distance and conversing with me from time to time. Both of them were very well behaved. At one point, the man stopped cleaning, cut the machine off and asked, “Can I ask you a personal question?” I said, “Sure.” He then asked me, “How do you get your kids to behave so well and be so polite?” I simply said that we had raised our children on godly, biblical principles from birth. We left the conversation there and he resumed cleaning the carpet. At that moment I began to wonder if God was opening a door to share the Gospel. Well, he finished and I began writing the check, and sensing that God had opened a door, I began sharing my testimony and went right into a Gospel presentation, building on the impression that my kids had made on the man and the source of their witness. He accepted Christ! After he left, my wife and I sat our children down and explained that the witness of their good behavior opened the door for me to share the Gospel with that man! You should have seen their faces when they realized that God had used them to reach that man with the Gospel…it was priceless! Thanks for the Godly principles you teach!
Sincerely,
Howie, Stacie, Joel & Ainsley”

I have been amazed at the way God moves! Even more, I am amazed at how God has transformed communities and even our nation throughout history. With this in mind, I look to a brief overview of spiritual awakenings.

Spiritual awakenings, whether in biblical or Church history, manifest patterns that are similar, often strikingly so. While all of the following elements may not be present in each instance, for the most part awakenings progress through a cycle whose phases include these various aspects of God’s working. 1) Awakenings are usually preceded by a time of spiritual depression, apathy and gross sin, in which a majority of nominal Christians are hardly different from the members of secular society, and the churches seem to be asleep. … 2) An individual or small group of God’s people becomes conscious of their sins and backslidden condition, and vows to forsake all that is displeasing to God. … 3) As some Christians begin to yearn for a manifestation of God’s power, a leader or leaders arise with prophetic insights into the causes and remedies of the problems, and a new awareness of the holy and pure character of the Lord is present. … 4) The awakening of Christians occurs: many understand and take part in a higher spiritual life. … 5) An awakening may be God’s means of preparing and strengthening His people for future challenges or trials.”Spiritual Awakenings in North America,” Christian History

What do spiritual awakenings have to do with a parenting ministry? Plenty! In my family, just the introduction of Growing Kids God’s Way set my wife and I on a journey that has lasted for 8 years! We were, in our parenting, in a state of need. Maybe not parenting “depression, apathy or gross sin” as the commentary above suggests. But we were in need of learning and applying the practical implications of God’s Word for our family.

That’s when we entered our first class. And slowly, through a small group of God’s people who led us, we yearned for the peace that would come in our children being a blessing to others and a testimony of God’s grace. The spiritual dimension of parenting involves parents proactively, consistently, and graciously engaging their time with their children, training them in the way they should go.

My prayer is for our nation to go through a spiritual awakening. It can begin anywhere. Why not let it begin with the family? Why not let it begin with our role as parents proactively engaging in our roles of teaching our children the things of God?

One other highlight and then I’m almost finished - Lillian’s husband Ezekiel is a Pastor and also teaches at the local high school - when attending their church on the first Sunday - he was teaching on the Family and one could see and hear he has a passion for the family and making positive changes in that regards for Mbita and Kenya. As a result of all the time Lillian and I had together, it became obvious that we were ‘kindred spirits’ and hearts knit for healthy families. As I explained about my prayer request regarding my time with Lillian and our relationship together it became obvious that God was answering that prayer beyond our wildest imagination - she said “you must speak to Ezekiel, I will arrange for that” and she did. Toward the end of our second week, the three of us met in their home and I was able to explain about how the ’small groups’ work for parenting and would also allow Ezekiel to disciple future leaders for the church. They now have the GK workbook, all the On Becoming books and by next week Lillian will have GKGW CD’s. They are unable to use our DVD’s but do have an MP3 player - so we are going to see what needs to be done to put the info in that format. Their home does not have regular electricity but they do have a generator that is ‘fired up’ when there is something they want to watch on the player. Fortunately, they deem GKGW something of value to watch. Please pray for Lillian & Ezekiel - as they are respected in their community and can see some wonderful things coming out of the little village of Mbita that could impact Kenya positively for the family. Lillian already was grasping the concepts and understands the idea of the ‘principle’ and ‘vehicle’ to deliver the principle. The plan would be for them to study the material and then present it to their small group. Not sure if they would show the information or not - might depend if they want it to become an English lesson as well. Fortunately they understand both U.S. English as well as the ‘Queens’ English, - yes there are some differences.

June 30th our second Saturday - was Field Day for the students - forgot to mention 3 members of our Team did PE and sports with the students. One of our Team, Mari, has been a girls basketball coach for years so it was neat to watch her work with the upper end girls teaching them to ‘catch & release’, ‘follow- through’ ‘dribble’ etc. I actually learned a few things myself. This was the most difficult day as it was when we had to say ‘good bye’ to everyone - many tears where shed both by students, teachers and our Team members. We spent many hours each day with these lovely children and adults and after nearly two weeks and knowing the likelihood is that most of us will not return…the fun memories of the day was a fitting end.

July 1st - Sunday morning at 6 a.m. our Team gathered to load up in two Vans [fortunately we unloaded all we brought over so many of the suitcases were able to fit inside one another and we consolidated down to only 18!] We now began our trek back to Nairobi via Nukuru where we stayed in the National Park - the site does provide some good info as well as their links - except I disagree with the early part and the ‘millions of years ago’ deal. But once you get to the last 5,000 years………

Our journey took us through many towns - experienced one minor ‘breakdown’ with one of our vehicles - which provided us a chance to get out and stand on solid and still ground. Did I mention the “African Massage” - oh we got a real good one on this trip and also made us extremely grateful that we were able to fly from Nairobi closer to Mbita at the beginning of our two weeks, another answer to prayer! We arrived in Nukuru in time for a late lunch which provided us our first taste after 12 days of, well talking like a spoiled westerner, a nice variety of food including ‘chocolate’! We quickly checked into our rooms and at 4:30 p.m. went on our first safari - Kids’ there are monkey’s everywhere - all types. Since it was evening though we didn’t get to see any of the ‘big animals’ they were either already settling in for the night or hiding waiting for the rest to settle before they went ‘out for dinner’ - think you get my drift. Remember we’re talking wild life!

Had a wonderful dinner and off to bed. Here we did have electricity and brewed Kenyan coffee. The next morning Monday - July 2nd was another early rising as we needed to be packed, breakfasted and ready for our morning safari by 7:30 a.m. and we were not going to miss breakfast! Fresh fruits, breads, omelets and well they called it pancakes but actually they were more like round ‘French toast’ [that is bread dipped in egg and cooked on a grill - not sure if my friends in other parts of the world reading this are familiar with French Toast. Don't ask me how it received its name - kind of like English Muffins - those are not ‘English’- anyway breakfast was scrumptious and we were ready for our Safari by 7:30ish.

This was the day we saw just about everything except the lions - if you've ever watched National Geographic or Nature Channel and the lake where there are more Flamingo's than you could ever count - well this was that! There were so many Flamingo’s they sounded like, well the whirr of a propeller or helicopter and there was the color Pink all along the shore line. Then there were the Waterbucks, the Giraffe family, Daddy, Mummy and baby. Antelope; Rhino; Zebra's, dik-diks, spotted a leopard [no pun intended] Impalas; gazelles; no elephants, guess they are not in this park and of course still lots of baboons and monkeys. If you visit Kenya.com you can see some neat pictures at this site of the park.

Can’t remember if it was before or after we reached Nukuru but passed by miles and miles and hillside after hillside of Tea Plantations!

KERICHO - this is tea country! Kenya is the world’s third largest producer of tea after India and Sri Lanka and Kericho is in the heart of Kenya’s tea plantations. There are rolling hills carpeted in neat, bright green tea bushes as far as you can see. The climate here is perfect for tea with rain falling almost every afternoon. Kericho - named after Ole Kericho, a Maasai chief who was killed in battle by the Gusii in the 18th century -

Okay, I’m almost done - we left Nukuru around noon and started our last leg of the journey to Nairobi and had our last “African Massage” until we were just about to Nairobi before the roads improved. As you can see Nairobi looks like many other large cities - once we arrived there about 2ish - spent the next couple of hours ’shopping’ - well we were tourists you know and still had all those women looking for deals. Although some decided a nice Chicago Pizza sounded like a better idea. Anyway - we split up for a bit - the adventuresome[which did not include me] went to the Duka’s - which is a series of small shops and lots of bargaining - I actually went to the local supermarket - fun place to see what is available and also make a reasonable purchase of Kenya coffee. We regrouped around 5:30 p.m. to go to our final destination prior to the airport and that was a restaurant called ‘Carnivore‘. Actually, to me it was Africa’s version of a Churrascaria [Brazilian Barbeque] - if you care check out the link The best part of the evening was the fact that a couple who was in one of our very first classes in California, Doug & Kathy Ghrist, were able to join us for dinner. Doug’s grew up in Kenya where his parents were missionaries and he, Kathy and their 3 children came to Nairobi via AIM Missions about 9 years ago. When we met them in the mid 1980’s they had one 18 mo. old son - we’ve kept in touch these many years and hoped to be able to connect at some point while in Nairobi. As it turned out, the gentleman who provided us the drivers and vans for our return trip from Mbita to Nairobi [David] knows Doug & Kathy very well. Small world! It was wonderful to reconnect with them in person and for some of our Team who sat close enough to be a part of our conversations. Although our time was short it was sweet.

Well, our flight from Nairobi to Amsterdam was scheduled to leave at 10:15 p.m. and we wanted to be at the airport around 8 p.m. - which would have been no problem except who could have expected a traffic jam that late in the evening? Anyway we made it and all boarded the first leg of our journey home.

Tuesday July 3rd - we arrived in Amsterdam at 5:30 a.m. and had a 6 hr. lay-over - well, we couldn’t be so close to downtown Amsterdam and not take the train in to walk around! Think there were 5 of us that went in - The last time I was there was Sept. 1963 - yes, a long time ago and with Auntie Anne - it was a graduation trip! Some of it still looked as I had remembered it.

Our flight from Amsterdam took off on time and we arrived in Detroit, think it was around 2 p.m. still the 3rd of July - we had an even longer lay-over there - but were so exhausted, so after getting a ‘hamburger’ - several of us actually took a nap [on the floor] At 11:15 p.m. Tuesday July 3rd we touched down at Charleston International Airport where we were greeted by happy family and friends! My dear husband was there waiting, it was so good to see him. Don’t think we’ve ever been apart quite this long. Home safe and in time to celebrate the 4th of July.

So what did I do while the ‘teachers’ were in the classroom? Made ‘house calls’ with Lillian the Orphan Overseer - that role is actually a combination, Social Worker/Public Health Nurse/Counselor all rolled into one. Lillian is a lovely young woman almost 38 and with wisdom beyond her years. After we got to know each other, she shyly shared with me that there was a slight concern about how much ‘walking’ etc. I would be able to do [guess she figured out any woman with two grown children and all those grandchildren, well I wasn't as young as she. And this is where I also believe prayers were answered, as I had no trouble keeping up with her and as a result, we were able to make many days of home visits.

The average Kenyan lives in a rural environment. The picture above is of a family in front of their traditional house. The houses are in most cases coated with a mud wall and the roof thatched with grass where the family cannot afford iron sheet roofing. The houses are basically three roomed with one partition being the main sitting room, a bedroom for the parents and a separate bedroom for all the children. The kitchens and bathrooms are usually separate tiny buildings and the mode of cooking is firewood. Most of the families grow food in farms for their daily survival and strive to produce a surplus which they can sell in local markets to supplement their other basic needs.

"Home" is in the eyes of the beholder as I saw everything from a home that most of you would be okay with to the picture above - mud huts with thatched or tin roofs. No indoor plumbing of any sort and none outside either. So the water had to be hauled up every day from Lake Victoria or other distribution points either by the children or adults. For the most part, I found the homes were neat and what continually amazed me was how the women not only had very clean clothing, but well pressed! Remember they did their washing by hand - no washing machine and the women used what many of our grandmothers or for some of you 'great-grandmothers' used the 'hot iron box' for ironing. They didn't have much but what they did own was neat. Most had some sort of small garden growing 'maze' and chicken's for laying eggs. In several homes these hens were sitting on their eggs, in the house! For some reason the chickens acted more like house 'pets' - the cows, donkeys and goats roam pretty freely - especially the goats. It was a common site to see the women in the morning walking down the road with various items on their heads, and I’m not talking light loads. Definitely a 'skill' taught young. A couple of our teachers tried to be helpful for their hostess on the Sunday visit by going down to the lake to help fetch water - much to their dismay, some of the local children came to their rescue and carried the water back for them on their heads. [the children]

June 26 & 27, the Tuesday and Wednesday of our second week I had the opportunity to share with the parents/caregivers of the children at the school - Tuesday’s group included ages 3 yrs and up - majority were women, but about a dozen men attended as well. Considering it was planned for 9 to noon, it was good that any men attended. Amazingly enough, parents in the small fishing village of Mbita deal with many of the same issues as parents around the world - the context is different but the issues the same. Children are children and do childish things and of course, they do grow and still do some childish things - so it was helpful to explain to them as many of you have learned, providing the ‘moral reason why’ is critical. Of course, it was necessary to deal with the example being set etc. Wednesday’s group were 3 and under. Although a count wasn’t taken [to my knowledge] there looked to be about 75-100 people both days. Lillian was very pleased. I could go on and on but won’t bore you with the details. A fun comment made by the U.S. teachers who got to sit in on some of the teaching time was that they felt it was the first PTA meeting being held in Mbita! After the meetings which extended way beyond the noon hour the parents were told that they would receive a ‘mattress, blanket and mosquito net’ for each of the students they had attending the school! That was met by cheers - they were not aware this was happening. Talk about a site - as those ladies left, some with 4 mattresses tied up in a roll and carried on their head, walking down the hill from the school to the main road! [Remember what I said about the roads]

One cute story to share - just as an example about some of the ‘tricks’ older siblings like to play on younger, again only the context is different. There was an adorable 3 year old who came with her Mama on Wednesday and arrived a bit early, so we had a chance to ‘chat’ although neither of really understood the other except for the smiles and hugs she eventually allowed me to give her. She held back any hugs until she was sure that I was not in the habit of ‘eating little children’ - yes you read that right! Her Momma who spoke enough English said her little one wanted to know if I ate little children. Evidently the older children in the family or neighborhood like to scare the little ones by telling them the ‘white people’ eat little children as the older like to see the little ones cry etc. when they see a white person [not many] walking down the street or waving at them. Once she was sure I was okay, we became friends. Thank you for indulging me on that one.

Kenya Report - Part V