While in Kenya, our first stop was Nairobi, where our Regional Director of Africa, Terry & Karen Duncan live. Terry & our field director, Jon Mayo, just completed a survey trip to Juba, Sudan. They were able to meet with one of the pastors we have been training, John Onek, and they were very excited to see the potential for WGM & AGC in Southern Sudan. It was great to talk to Terry about their trip, and we feel optimistic that God is opening doors for us to begin to plant churches there! We also had the opportunity to talk with their son, Brent, and another WGM missionary, Joy Phillips, 
who both work with Samaritan's Purse. We were able to discuss future possibilities of partnering in ministry and working together in Sudan. It was really exciting to dream about the future and where God is leading us and WGM. Brent also took us to the Giraffe Center in Nairobi, which is basically a field where they keep a few giraffes, and you can come into CLOSE contact with and feed the world's tallest animal, the giraffe! It was pretty cool!We then traveled to see Staci Wells and the Africa Gospel Church Baby Center (a WGM project in Nakuru, Kenya).
This is a ministry for babies who have been left abandoned by their parents on the side of the street, at the gate of the Baby Center or somewhere else where, by God's grace, they were found. It was a truly a special time with Staci and these adorable babies. It was so hard to not take one of these precious angels home with us. And Erica nearly decided to serve her last year of service in Kenya and commute to Uganda! Just kidding!
Next we traveled to visit the world famous Tenwek Hospital region of Kenya. Dr. Ernie Steury (retired WGM missionary) was one of the founding doctors, and for years, he was the only doctor in Bomet, Kenya. Tenwek is an amazing place. It was started in the 1950's, and today it is a beacon of health and hope to a whole community surrounding Tenwek. (To learn more check out: Stories from Tenwek, a recently published book in memory of Dr. Steury) The purpose of this hospital is stated on their sign, "We treat. Jesus heals". Our friend Dr. Carol Spears is one of the doctors who has dedicated herself to this motto.
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he is a practicing surgeon at Tenwek and also trains and disciples Kenyans to become surgeons. We had a great time catching up with Carol as well as with the Roberts, Vanderhoofs & Bemms (fellow WGM missionaries).
From Tenwek we were off to visit the work in Masai land, near the border of Tanzania. Our dear friends Jon and Vera Steury live and work with the Masai people. The Masai are famous for their wearing red clothes & tons of beads, jumping sky high when they dance, being fierce hunters and a living in a culture who are happy to live in mud huts. This WGM project in Masai is called the "Olderkesi Development Project." It includes an Africa Gospel Church, a pastor
training center, a welding facility, a farm that yields many crops that they provide for the Masai people, a well, production of bio-sand filters so that the Masai can have clean drinking water, a carpenter, and much more! And it's all in the middle of nowhere! It is amazing! We were blessed to see the ministry Jon & Vera have out with the Masai people and also had a great time of catch up. Plus, they have a pet Thompson Gazelle, that Erica got to feed with a bottle! So cute, and so cool!Finally, we made it back to Nairobi to end our trip in Kenya, where we got
to spend some more quality time with the Duncans, which was so special to us. AND we got to visit the "Animal Orphanage" in Nairobi where they bring in abandoned animals and care for them. We got to actually get in a huge fenced in area with THREE CHEETAHS, and we actually got to pet a cheetah! It was so amazing!Over all, our time in Kenya was quite fast, but it was so beneficial to see what our fellow missionaries are doing in Kenya and try to coordinate ways to work together in the future as we begin to plant churches in Sudan, Congo, Northern Uganda and beyond.
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