Steve’s Excellent Adventure

     Where have I been?  Well……   working(a bunch), working some more, biking, hiking, school and ministry stuff.  This is in addition to the husband and dog owner things:). 

     I am going to start back running next month after letting my heel rest.  We will see.

     The following is a post concerning a past house guest we had, Paul Omondi.  From “Chombo” to evangelist.  I stumbled upon his story on the Compassion website….    This is the body of Paul’s post.  From “Chombo” to evangelist…God is good.  For those of you sponsoring a child, God bless you.  For those of you who are not yet, please visit the link on the side of this blog and get started.  We are Compassion advocates because we have seen what Compassion really does (instead of what some organizations say they do).  You can truly change the world, starting with one child.

As a kid, I often played at the dumping site and scavenged for edibles that the various companies and airlines disposed of at the site. My friends and I named the dumping site “Chombo.” Chombo is a Swahili word meaning machine.We named the dump “Chombo” because we found biscuits disposed of by factories that the machine did not cut into the correct shape. Most boys ended up not going to school, but found a home in “Chombo.”

Not many kids made it to high school in my neighborhood, basically because of two reasons; one, to make it to high school, there is a national exam that one has to take. Passing this exam is not easy as such, and if one never makes it in the exam, then there is no place for him or her in high school.

Another reason is that, even if some make it in the exam, they fail to join high school because they cannot afford the school fees. I thank God for Compassion because it ensured that my school fees were paid for in high school. My sponsor family also encouraged and believed in me, hence I did so well in my exams and joined a government high school. Some of the kids I grew up with did not get the opportunity to join high school. Most boys went into drug addiction and to nurse their drug addiction, they turned to crime.  Ladies turned to prostitution, and most of them had babies as early as 14  years old.

I saw more than 15 boys I grew up with either being shot down by the police or being stoned to death by mob justice. The community was just fed up with crime and took the law into its own hands.  An event that turned my life is when I saw one of the young men I grew up with and even shared classes with being chased down the streets. Later, the crowd caught up with him, stoned him to death, and set his body ablaze.  I later learned that this young man had stolen an electronic gadget worth maybe less than $100. It saddened me seeing my friend die in the hands of an angry mob.

For a long time I blamed myself for not sharing my faith with him. I resolved to join an evangelism and discipleship class in church popularly known as Campus Crusade for Christ. Here I had opportunity to learn how to share my faith and I saw my friends come to Christ, though some rejected.

By the time I had completed high school, I did not know what the next step would be for me, because in Kenya at the age of 18 years I was due for graduation from the Compassion program and that was it.  For sure, high school education alone could not help me achieve my dreams. I became sad. I really had the desire to proceed with my education, but I knew without the help of Compassion I was not going to make it.  One thing surprised me, though; I did well again in my Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education exams. I became a role model in my community, and I often had parents send their kids to me to talk to them.

I had an interest in teaching kids in church; I found it fun singing with 8- and 9-year-olds and teaching them Bible stories. I also continued sharing my faith in the neighborhood through door-to-door evangelism.

     Sorry that I have not posted much lately, but this has been a crazy busy time.  I have, however, been doing a lot of biking in my quest to stay in shape.  Starting next month, I will start running again in preparation for the Disney Marathon.  We will see how the heel does.

     Some of the things we have been doing include many trip to the mountains, and it is a fantastic year for the wildflowers.  Also, I have been working ALOT.  We are working to become totally debt free.  I also am very busy working on my Masters Degree in Biblical Studies at the Front Range Bible Institute.  And I have also been golfing ALOT.  So, the running thing is in there, but it has to be done around everything else.  It is a busy time and can be tiring, but a good kind of tired.  All good. 

     I am planning on hiking a 14er or two yet this year, so look for pictures of those adventures.  Because of all the snow that did not melt until lately, the 14er season has been shortened considerably. 

     Ta ta for now.