A Sunday always feels different when I am not in my home church and when I did not preach. This Sunday felt very different for some awesome reasons. First we were in Kenya which is a few thousand miles from home. Second we were in worship with our kids and grandkids here in Kenya. Some here are some of my musings …

-The 9 hour time difference allowed me to pray for the service and people back home as they were worshiping. That was kind of cool.

-I was amused to see that the church we attended here had 3 times as many people in attendance at the end of the service as they had when the service began. It is possible that some of my people back home are just trying to be like the Kenyans given the time they arrive for worship.

-The service we attended was 90% in English, though it was English with a heavy accent.

-I could get used to not having to have any furnace, no need for a foyer because you gather and fellowship outdoors and to walk out the doors of the church look at the mountains. Could we get some mountains in the corn fields around our church back home?
-One of the highlights of our time of worship yesterday was to look down the row and see my grandsons with their bibles open when the pastor announced the scripture. It was a proud and heartwarming moment I will cherish for a long time.

-The more interesting service would have been the one following the one we attended, that second service is a Swahili congregation. That service is longer and more energetic. Since it was completely in Swahili I don’t think I would have understood much. The service we attended had a couple of songs in Swahili and I followed them well because I recognized the tune. That was fun.

-Time is treated much differently in Kenya. If I were serving here that would take some adjusting on my part.

-We walked to church. I walk to church back home, but the walk is about 50 yards back home. The walk here was a little longer, but not bad. The biggest differences in this walk was the up and down of the terrain, the beauty of the flowers and plants and seeing mountains. I see no mountains on my regular walk to church.

-I loved seeing how many children were in the worship service here yesterday. Prompted me to pray for our children and children’s workers back home.

-I loved seeing the ministries of this church and noting that their most active ministry was their missions ministry.

-We spent great time with our family yesterday afternoon and evening playing games. Some of my greatest memories of our family are from times when we are playing games, or sitting around talking following a game.

-My greatest musing from yesterday was being humbled and thankful for all who helped make it possible for us to make this trip and be able to spend time our family.

Here’s hoping you have musings to reflect on with thanksgiving from your activities on Sunday. I will attempt to post another couple of updates from our time here in Kenya before we leave later this week.

Dennis