Thirty years ago we established a church in a backward village in WestPokot, Kenya called Makutano. Following the command to baptize and disciple those who became followers of Christ, I established a training program. The people of Makutano were not highly educated and therefore we felt no need to begin a formal Bible school but rather a non-formal program that concentrated on equipping people for ministry (Eph. 4:12). I traveled on the dusty/muddy road to Makutano each month, sleeping in a mud hut, eating ugali, teaching new believers by kerosene lantern. With no study material available in Swahili, over the course of eight years, I wrote an entire three-year curriculum, which included take-home study notes and books.
This past month I was invited back to Kenya to speak at the graduation ceremony of the Bible Institute. It was with great pleasure and satisfaction that I spoke to the fifteen graduates and the forty first and second year class. I came away from the experience convinced that the greatest need for Kenyan Church was to move them away from the milk of the Word to meat for maturity. Though our early efforts in church planting and discipleship continue to show fruit, with thirty-five churches planted since our departure, there is a greater need for the pastors of these congregations to go to the next level in their spiritual growth.
God of course is faithful, but so, too, are the teachers and staff of the Makutano Bible Institute. May God continue to bless our partnership.
