Building

It's pretty darn wonderful to see the Lord building, rebuilding, and restoring many many things around Mattaw right now.  He is in our midst and out of grace and love for us, He continues to establish and build all that He said he would.  Now I'm really not specifically talking about physically building but we do so happen to have some of that going on now as well...

We've become friends with this precious family that goes and lives in a very rural place to reach a certain tribe with the gospel.  They will at times come rest in Kitale and during that time and we've been blessed to have the husband come work on the roofs of the guest housing that is on its way to being finished.  So great for Bud to have extra hands around that knows construction well.  God always provides.  Here's some of the guest housing.  This picture was taken last week with the stack of bricks and today I saw the walls completely up and ready for a roof now.  Our interlocking bricks are fabulous.  

And here's house five but right next to it where the pile of dirt is, will be house six.  The roof is going up for house six this week!  

And here's our church building.  But our "church" isn't limited to those four walls!  Ha!  Pretty phenomenal what the Lord has been doing in our midst.  Jesus is our foundation, our cornerstone, the Lord over our household and is building away right now.  

"Therefore, leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ, let us go on to perfection (maturity), not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, of the doctrine of baptisms, of laying on of hands, of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgement.  And this we will do if God permits" Hebrews 6:1-3

"And as you go, preaching, saying "the kingdom of heaven is at hand" Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons.  Freely you have received, freely give"

This morning Bud preached one powerful teaching!  It was beautiful.  I loved watching him bring TRUTH with boldness and in love.  The Holy Spirit fell in power and we saw the love of Jesus meet the needs of so many this morning in many many ways.  People were given the tools from scripture to "all life and godliness" to live an overcoming life in Jesus.  When love shows up so powerfully, how can you do anything but melt into Him and respond?!  The service went until 2pm and even then, no one was ready to leave!  I sure love our church with no boundaries to what the Lord wants to do.  

And here is sweet Joseph.  This precious boy was tormented and living in complete control under so many.  He was "pawned" off by his parents and made to work daily, watching over someones cows.  He has been coming to church for months but would just sit in a corner and could not raise his head to even look at anyone.  The Spirit highlighted him to me last week and I saw through Jesus' eyes of love how much he was after Joseph.  Jesus did miracles because he saw a need.  He was moved by the needs of people and acted.  Because he is love and that's what he does!  Love!  *light bulb  Last week, sweet Joseph was saved, delivered, healed, and set upon the rock of Jesus Christ.  It was beautiful to watch Jesus at work in his life.  By the end of us praying with him, he was finally able to look me in the eyes and his eyes looked at me uncrossed.  We asked if he felt the peace from Jesus, the freedom, the love, and he just smiled and then bursted into laughter.  Who knows the last time he was able to laugh.  This morning he danced and smiled in worship so freely.  I looked over and caught him worshiping and just praised Jesus.  Glory to God!  His parents came today and said he has been testifying this week what happened to him last week.  Yay!  And the parents also agreed to let us put him in school!

Here's our household of guys.  We make sure to have a good 'ol family game night at least once or twice a week.  The guy on the left is our newest member to the Mattaw Family.  We are so thrilled to have him here.  I'll have to formally introduce him but I will give you a sneak peak.  David just moved here from Nairobi to work with us.  He has graduated from University in Nairobi and was sponsored through high school and university by Compassion International.  He also went through their Leadership Discipleship Program.  We have an office in town to run Mattaw administratively and David is now our Office Manager/Operations Manager.  What a HUGE answer to prayer he is.  We've already enjoyed growing with him in friendship and spiritually encouraging one another.  Jesus never lets us go with lack, if only we would ask and just trust!

And lets end this keeping it real.  These are my cake balls I excitedly made last week with Ian and Daniel.  Did you know they now make cake pans to bake cake balls now instead of having to tear up a cake and form the balls yourself.  Of course they aren't as dense with all that yummy icing mixed in but hey, they're pretty and they're easier this way.  And it was fun making the outer coat with Elisha and Claire.  Messy, but kids are messy and more fun.