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A team of 20 from PC3 spent the last part of their Christmas holidays and the first few days of 2009 helping lead a youth conference for about 250 Kenyan youth – including the boys at Mama Hellen’s Rehabilitation Center.  One of the team members, David Sapp, provided the following blog about their time there.

Months after a trip, the memories in our minds begin to fade like old photographs; not fully capturing the moment in its full splendor, but sparking the memories that have somehow seeped deeper into who we are and who we have become in reaction to the experience.  In that way, Kenya will always be a part of who I am.  The following are the things that have now become a part of me as a result of Port City’s trip to Kenya in December.  The goal of our trip seemed simple enough, put on a youth conference for upwards of 200 Kenyan youth; however, the reality of engaging young people cross-culturally, as well as spiritually is much greater a task.

God is good though, to use us in spite of our deficiencies and weaknesses.  Our team set out the day after Christmas to Nakuru, Kenya, to Mama Hellen’s Rehabilitation Center, which would be the setting for our three day conference.

Kenya is a beautiful land rich with not only wildlife and possibly the bluest sky one has ever seen, but also rich with a timeless culture that has sunken deep into this now developing country.  We saw this reflected in each child we interacted with in Kenya – a keen  awareness of God’s creation around them and a tension of being firmly established in their culture while grasping for the new.  Our goal was to focus their grasps towards Christ and the pursuit of all He is.  This took the formal shape of a conference consisting of large group meetings and breakouts into small groups of around 15 young people each.

While the teaching of this time was invaluable for the spiritual growth of these youth, the moments in between were the ones that will mean all the more for years to come.  The smiles shared, games played, stories heard, and most importantly the time shared, were the moments in which we modeled Christ to these kids.  The one moment that still to this day, five months later, hits me to the very core of my being happened in the smallest of moments of my time in Kenya.  After a full day of talks, conversations, and games, we began walking back up the hill from playing soccer in the fields and a small boy grabs me by the hand and slowly walks beside me up the hill.  As we walk he just stares at me and smiles as I smile back at him, no words were exchanged but I knew it that was a moment that would shape me for the rest of my life, and I pray it will for him as well.  This is the essence of missions for me, not the well thought out plan of a conference full of activities and moments meant to engage these youth in the reality of the gospel, but the moments between the moments where we simply get to walk up a hill holding hands with a young boy.  As many have experienced, well thought out events can flop, schedules can be confused and things can fall apart; however, God is great enough to use the smallest of moments that we never plan, to mean the greatest for His glory. It is in these moment were I believe we are the fragrance of Christ drawing others to Him through our expressions of His love.  So to me, the trip to Kenya was worth every second just for that one hand held.  It is in this that I encourage you.  If God’s calling you to go and you feel like you have little to offer, offer that little bit to him and allow him to use it.  He can use even the smallest things to influence another life on the other side of the world…..as well as your own.

—Submitted by David Sapp