It’s hard to imagine that another year has passed and we are almost done packing our bags for our annual Kenya mission trip. I look forward to this trip as much as any vacation I’ve ever taken, and I’ve had some amazing vacations. But this is so much more than a vacation. In some small way, we get to give back for all the ways we have been blessed. And I can personally attest to the fact that I am blessed beyond measure.
I’m sure a lot of you have followed along with my blog on previous trips, but I want to give some background for those of you who are reading about this for the first time. So I asked the former group to bear with me. Some of this background detail I’m copying from some of my former posts if it looks familiar to you!
We are a group of volunteers who have been going to Kenya since 2013 to work with a ministry called SWOK (Start With One Kenya), run by Bill and Chat Coble. The team members vary. This has become an annual event for five of us on our team of sixteen, and this is our seventh trip. Three team members are going for their first time. But I can safely bet that their first trip to Kenya won’t be their last! The country of Kenya and her wonderful people have a way of drawing you back.
Our team this year is:
Tom Wolff - Team Leader
Cindy Wolff
John Heemer
Jane Heemer
Steve Trandahl
Dale Plummer
Casey Keiser
Dr. Christopher Williams
Owen Robbins
George Stewart
Mark Specht
Christine Specht
Lars Specht
Oksana Specht
Andi Hall
Jim Hall
Somehow, I appointed myself the team scribe the first year and have done it every year since. Although I write for the team, I don’t mean to speak for everyone. What I write are my thoughts and opinions, and I’m certain not everyone agrees with everything I write. I take full responsibility for it. I’ve never been accused of being humble, but I’m trying, and I’m open to constructive feedback if you take exception to something I write. Please let me know and I’ll endeavor to correct the record.
I also don’t want to offend anyone and it’s not my objective to preach or get overly religious in this blog. But I need to be true to what I believe. This is a team made up of Christians. We are going to do what we can to help and to “be the hands and feet of Jesus”. We do what we do because we are Christians and we believe we have a moral obligation to help our brothers and sisters wherever they are. The fact that we go doesn’t make us any better than anyone else, and it doesn’t “earn” us anything. Although Jesus calls us to do good works, we do them out of gratitude for His sacrifice and the grace He showed us in saving us. That’s the reason we go. There are plenty of non-Christian groups that do similar humanitarian projects, and their efforts are equally valid. The need for such efforts is huge, and there’s more than enough work to be done. There is plenty of work to be done in Kenya, and we feel the Lord has called us there. We have been blessed to work with the same group of individuals for the last seven years, and we have established relationships with brothers and sisters there. We're thrilled to be working with them again this year.
This trip is always a confirmation for me of the Lord’s goodness and provision. Many of you reading this blog are among our financial (and prayer) supporters, and we could not do this without you. Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU! We count it as a sacred charge to use your donations wisely and prudently. We always have more funds than we need, and we believe the Lord wants us to use the funds for Kenya in the year received and not to hold them on account for the next years' trip. We have always prayed about how the Lord wants us to use the excess funds. The needs of a ministry like SWOK are varied and sometimes overwhelming, and Bill and Chat are great about seeking the Lord's will and direction for where to help and what to stay away from. When we are there, we meet nightly to "download" our thoughts as a team about what we have experienced that day and where we have seen the Lord working. We function as a church body, unencumbered by process and protocol and able to act where we see the Lord directing. We talk about needs we have seen and how we might help. We have had the opportunity in prior years to use resources to help urgent medical needs, send teachers to college with a commitment to come back and serve in the Gituamba community school, send pastors for training, provide a daily lunch feeding program to keep kids in school, hire Kenyans to work construction with us and help support their families, purchase electric ovens for the school kitchen we built, etc. Having the flexibility to pinpoint needs and direct resources to them is a real blessing.
We are blessed to be able to work through and for SWOK with Bill and Chat Coble and their team of fantastic Kenyans. They have become dear friends, and we look forward to seeing and working with them each year. When you get a chance, take a look at the SWOK website. (http://startwithonekenya.org/) If you feel so inclined, their ministry can always use funds, and you can donate easily through their site. Your funds will be used wisely. Their mission is difficult, but their philosophy is simple: Start With One. If you look around in Kenya, the possibilities are limitless but complex. Everywhere you look, there are problems and issues, and it would be easy to become overwhelmed with the magnitude of the work that needs to be accomplished to improve the lives of the people. But you're not going to get anywhere if you don't get started somewhere.
So you Start With One -
One problem.
One individual.
One school.
One church.
One community.
And you look forward and you get started. And you know what? Positive change happens, and the ball gets moved forward toward the goal. I've personally witnessed it. In the last six years of going to Kenya, I have seen positive progress every single year, and when I look back on the same issues and places, the improvement is phenomenal. Start With One Kenya has a multi-faceted mission, including clean water, construction, education, improved health care and access to economic opportunities. They have brought access to clean water with family filtration units to over one quarter million people in Kenya in the last four years, and that number will surpass ONE MILLION by the end of 2020. Each year, our team has had an active role in that. And this year, we will be continuing to do hygiene training and water filter distribution in their campaign in the Kabazi area of Kenya. Clean water is such a vital part of health, and it's a blessing for us to be able to be a part of this program.
Education is another critical aspect of helping a society move forward, and we have had several opportunities in that area over the years. We have done field days with students at several schools and were able to provide textbooks for a school of 1200 one year out of our surplus funds. We have worked each year on construction at the Gituamba IDP settlement, and much of this work has revolved around a large old stone barn. The Lord gave Bill Coble the vision that this building that most would have knocked down could be a thriving school for nearly 500 kids. Over the last six years it has been transformed through SWOK efforts into classrooms and the addition of a dining hall, kitchen, playground and additional classroom buildings. It is a real testimony to what can be accomplished when you let the Lord direct the vision, and our teams have had the opportunity to see this transformation first hand.
And speaking of “vision”, I get the opportunity to introduce you to another exciting “first” for our team! This year, we will be starting a new ministry emphasis for SWOK. In our trips, we’ve noticed that very few people wear glasses. The common explanation is that Kenyans have great vision. The truth of the matter is that glasses and vision care are almost non-existent in Kenya, and their vision needs are as great as ours! There just isn’t much available to them. There is one ophthalmologist in all of Kenya, for 46 million people! But for two weeks, we are going to double that, because we have my friend and ophthalmologist, Dr. Chris Williams on our team!! I’m certain there are some optometrists in Kenya, but in general, vision care is not available to the average person. We have been working through Kendall Optometry Ministry in Kentucky that loans vision screening equipment to Christian teams doing vision-related ministry. We will be doing at least two vision clinics in the Bahati Region. We are taking an autorefractor connected to a laptop and will be able to take readings of each individual’s needed prescription. Now comes the tricky part! Over the last few months, we have collected over 500 pairs of used glasses from local eye doctors in Pennsylvania, and we have purchased another 1750 pairs from Kendall. With the help of dedicated friend volunteers over the last four days spending more than 65 manhours, all of those glasses are now marked with prescription, bagged, organized into shipping boxes and cataloged and scanned into the PC, ready to go with us. When we do a clinic and read someone’s prescription, the computer will cross-check the inventory and identify the proper pairs of glasses for the individual to try. From the quantity of glasses we are taking, we should be able to provide 20/20 or 20/30 vision to at least 300 individuals. We are leaving an autorefractor and laptop setup and our excess eyeglasses inventory in Kenya with SWOK so that other ministry teams can use it on their trips and so we can continue the work again with our team next year.
I am particularly excited to be on the team introducing this vision ministry. I have personally benefited from the best vision care in the world, so this effort is near and dear to my heart. I personally have had emergency retina surgery on four occasions, but today I see better that 20/20. I never take vision for granted, but I cherish it. I look forward to helping on a team that is able to help Kenyans see clearer, maybe for the first time in their lives.
I look forward to keeping you up to date on our daily activities and challenges. The next two days are filled with lots of travel and long hours. We arrive in Nairobi late on Monday night local time, and we'll be dead tired and ready to crash in bed after our team meeting. I'll try to get a short post up during the flights but the first real post will probably not be until sometime late Tuesday, so check in for an update. Thanks again for reading and for your prayer support!
I’m sure a lot of you have followed along with my blog on previous trips, but I want to give some background for those of you who are reading about this for the first time. So I asked the former group to bear with me. Some of this background detail I’m copying from some of my former posts if it looks familiar to you!
We are a group of volunteers who have been going to Kenya since 2013 to work with a ministry called SWOK (Start With One Kenya), run by Bill and Chat Coble. The team members vary. This has become an annual event for five of us on our team of sixteen, and this is our seventh trip. Three team members are going for their first time. But I can safely bet that their first trip to Kenya won’t be their last! The country of Kenya and her wonderful people have a way of drawing you back.
Our team this year is:
Tom Wolff - Team Leader
Cindy Wolff
John Heemer
Jane Heemer
Steve Trandahl
Dale Plummer
Casey Keiser
Dr. Christopher Williams
Owen Robbins
George Stewart
Mark Specht
Christine Specht
Lars Specht
Oksana Specht
Andi Hall
Jim Hall
Somehow, I appointed myself the team scribe the first year and have done it every year since. Although I write for the team, I don’t mean to speak for everyone. What I write are my thoughts and opinions, and I’m certain not everyone agrees with everything I write. I take full responsibility for it. I’ve never been accused of being humble, but I’m trying, and I’m open to constructive feedback if you take exception to something I write. Please let me know and I’ll endeavor to correct the record.
I also don’t want to offend anyone and it’s not my objective to preach or get overly religious in this blog. But I need to be true to what I believe. This is a team made up of Christians. We are going to do what we can to help and to “be the hands and feet of Jesus”. We do what we do because we are Christians and we believe we have a moral obligation to help our brothers and sisters wherever they are. The fact that we go doesn’t make us any better than anyone else, and it doesn’t “earn” us anything. Although Jesus calls us to do good works, we do them out of gratitude for His sacrifice and the grace He showed us in saving us. That’s the reason we go. There are plenty of non-Christian groups that do similar humanitarian projects, and their efforts are equally valid. The need for such efforts is huge, and there’s more than enough work to be done. There is plenty of work to be done in Kenya, and we feel the Lord has called us there. We have been blessed to work with the same group of individuals for the last seven years, and we have established relationships with brothers and sisters there. We're thrilled to be working with them again this year.
This trip is always a confirmation for me of the Lord’s goodness and provision. Many of you reading this blog are among our financial (and prayer) supporters, and we could not do this without you. Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU! We count it as a sacred charge to use your donations wisely and prudently. We always have more funds than we need, and we believe the Lord wants us to use the funds for Kenya in the year received and not to hold them on account for the next years' trip. We have always prayed about how the Lord wants us to use the excess funds. The needs of a ministry like SWOK are varied and sometimes overwhelming, and Bill and Chat are great about seeking the Lord's will and direction for where to help and what to stay away from. When we are there, we meet nightly to "download" our thoughts as a team about what we have experienced that day and where we have seen the Lord working. We function as a church body, unencumbered by process and protocol and able to act where we see the Lord directing. We talk about needs we have seen and how we might help. We have had the opportunity in prior years to use resources to help urgent medical needs, send teachers to college with a commitment to come back and serve in the Gituamba community school, send pastors for training, provide a daily lunch feeding program to keep kids in school, hire Kenyans to work construction with us and help support their families, purchase electric ovens for the school kitchen we built, etc. Having the flexibility to pinpoint needs and direct resources to them is a real blessing.
We are blessed to be able to work through and for SWOK with Bill and Chat Coble and their team of fantastic Kenyans. They have become dear friends, and we look forward to seeing and working with them each year. When you get a chance, take a look at the SWOK website. (http://startwithonekenya.org/) If you feel so inclined, their ministry can always use funds, and you can donate easily through their site. Your funds will be used wisely. Their mission is difficult, but their philosophy is simple: Start With One. If you look around in Kenya, the possibilities are limitless but complex. Everywhere you look, there are problems and issues, and it would be easy to become overwhelmed with the magnitude of the work that needs to be accomplished to improve the lives of the people. But you're not going to get anywhere if you don't get started somewhere.
So you Start With One -
One problem.
One individual.
One school.
One church.
One community.
And you look forward and you get started. And you know what? Positive change happens, and the ball gets moved forward toward the goal. I've personally witnessed it. In the last six years of going to Kenya, I have seen positive progress every single year, and when I look back on the same issues and places, the improvement is phenomenal. Start With One Kenya has a multi-faceted mission, including clean water, construction, education, improved health care and access to economic opportunities. They have brought access to clean water with family filtration units to over one quarter million people in Kenya in the last four years, and that number will surpass ONE MILLION by the end of 2020. Each year, our team has had an active role in that. And this year, we will be continuing to do hygiene training and water filter distribution in their campaign in the Kabazi area of Kenya. Clean water is such a vital part of health, and it's a blessing for us to be able to be a part of this program.
Education is another critical aspect of helping a society move forward, and we have had several opportunities in that area over the years. We have done field days with students at several schools and were able to provide textbooks for a school of 1200 one year out of our surplus funds. We have worked each year on construction at the Gituamba IDP settlement, and much of this work has revolved around a large old stone barn. The Lord gave Bill Coble the vision that this building that most would have knocked down could be a thriving school for nearly 500 kids. Over the last six years it has been transformed through SWOK efforts into classrooms and the addition of a dining hall, kitchen, playground and additional classroom buildings. It is a real testimony to what can be accomplished when you let the Lord direct the vision, and our teams have had the opportunity to see this transformation first hand.
And speaking of “vision”, I get the opportunity to introduce you to another exciting “first” for our team! This year, we will be starting a new ministry emphasis for SWOK. In our trips, we’ve noticed that very few people wear glasses. The common explanation is that Kenyans have great vision. The truth of the matter is that glasses and vision care are almost non-existent in Kenya, and their vision needs are as great as ours! There just isn’t much available to them. There is one ophthalmologist in all of Kenya, for 46 million people! But for two weeks, we are going to double that, because we have my friend and ophthalmologist, Dr. Chris Williams on our team!! I’m certain there are some optometrists in Kenya, but in general, vision care is not available to the average person. We have been working through Kendall Optometry Ministry in Kentucky that loans vision screening equipment to Christian teams doing vision-related ministry. We will be doing at least two vision clinics in the Bahati Region. We are taking an autorefractor connected to a laptop and will be able to take readings of each individual’s needed prescription. Now comes the tricky part! Over the last few months, we have collected over 500 pairs of used glasses from local eye doctors in Pennsylvania, and we have purchased another 1750 pairs from Kendall. With the help of dedicated friend volunteers over the last four days spending more than 65 manhours, all of those glasses are now marked with prescription, bagged, organized into shipping boxes and cataloged and scanned into the PC, ready to go with us. When we do a clinic and read someone’s prescription, the computer will cross-check the inventory and identify the proper pairs of glasses for the individual to try. From the quantity of glasses we are taking, we should be able to provide 20/20 or 20/30 vision to at least 300 individuals. We are leaving an autorefractor and laptop setup and our excess eyeglasses inventory in Kenya with SWOK so that other ministry teams can use it on their trips and so we can continue the work again with our team next year.
I am particularly excited to be on the team introducing this vision ministry. I have personally benefited from the best vision care in the world, so this effort is near and dear to my heart. I personally have had emergency retina surgery on four occasions, but today I see better that 20/20. I never take vision for granted, but I cherish it. I look forward to helping on a team that is able to help Kenyans see clearer, maybe for the first time in their lives.
I look forward to keeping you up to date on our daily activities and challenges. The next two days are filled with lots of travel and long hours. We arrive in Nairobi late on Monday night local time, and we'll be dead tired and ready to crash in bed after our team meeting. I'll try to get a short post up during the flights but the first real post will probably not be until sometime late Tuesday, so check in for an update. Thanks again for reading and for your prayer support!
God's speed and all his blessings for the team and their efforts.
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