In the early 70’s Willie Sang was a Kenyan teenager running up and down the hills around his hometown of Kitale, Kenya.  His running ability was not unusual since he belonged to the Nandi tribe which is known for producing some of the greatest distance runners in the world.  Willie’s uncle was the great Kip Keino, winner of gold medals in the 1968 Olympics in Mexico and the 1972 Olympics in Munich.  Similarly gifted with his uncle’s running ability, Willie longed to go to a university in America and his ticket was a track scholarship.  While trying to find a school to give him a scholarship, he was directed to Hugh Rhodes, track coach at Lubbock Christian College.  Willie enrolled at LCC in the fall of 1975.

That same semester another young man enrolled at LCC.  His name was James Johnson.  He and Willie were assigned to the same dorm room and became good friends. Willie attended church with James at Quaker Avenue.  At that time, we were a church in decline.  Once a thriving church enjoying between 300 and 400 in attendance each week, we had experienced several disheartening events with attendance often dropping below 100.   But Willie loved our church and soon was asking if a church like Quaker could be started in his hometown of Kitale, Kenya.  The idea seemed outrageous really.  We were still struggling through our recent trials, were in no position financially to embrace such a task and certainly did not see ourselves as any kind of a model church for anyone.  But Willie persisted, telling us that his father was an influential leader in his hometown and would be able to make any arrangements needed there.  It was just a matter of sending people over. 

Gradually we decided that it wasn’t just Willie who wanted Quaker to send missionaries to Kenya, it was God.  Willie was our “burning bush.”  Through Willie, God was telling us, “Go.”  And like Moses, we could think only of the reasons why we were not qualified for the work we were being called to do.  Soon, however, a fact-finding team was put together to travel to Kenya and explore the possibilities of taking responsibility for such an awesome work.  What they found was a country eager to hear the good news of God.

Such was the modest beginning of a mission work which has grown to bless literally tens of thousands of people on two continents.  Now, thirty years later, the seed God planted through a young African boy has blossomed not only into well established mission works in Kenya, Uganda and the Sudan, but also a home for abandoned children, a ministry to children orphaned by the AIDS epidemic, a Bible Institute and the early foundation work for an African Christian University in Uganda.  The impact of this work, as future lessons will explore, would bring more blessings to our church, prospering the local work, enabling greater unity among churches nationwide and giving the next generation of members an even larger vision of the kingdom of God.  But it all began with God sending an African teenager to deliver an unthinkable invitation to an unlikely church to be a part of an unimaginable work.

SPIRITUAL TRUTH #1

My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.  2 Corinthians 12:9