Jacque delivered the morning devotional at “hotel Alice”

We packed our bags before leaving “hotel Alice” for our day of ministry in Maasai land. We would be going directly back to Openhand after our day of ministry.

We headed back to Bethesda Church Emukua Dikirr for the sake of picking up Lawrence at his house to go with him to the “Church under the Tree.”

While at Lawrence’s place we were able to get the tour of his finished house and the tour of the surrounding land. I was able to see the widows’ goats grazing healthily. FYI, some of goats gifted to the widows were pregnant.

The “church under the tree” was another 1 1/2-2 hour drive from Lawrence’s house. The roads were more like animal trials. Our excellent driver, “Sir” Charles earned his Sir designation today. This was a very remote and interior area, although there was a school and dispensary here. (A dispensary in Kenya has nothing to do with Marijuana…which is quite illegal here. A dispensary in Kenya is an urgent care facility).

The school and dispensary were still more than a few miles from the “church under the tree,” which is called by that name because the Maasai who meet here to worship on Sundays have no building. The trees are its building and its roof.

Wilfred (who lives in Lawrence’s Maasai community) became pastor of this “church under the tree” Maasai community when they had a vacancy in pastorship. He still lives in Lawrence’s community and borrows Lawrence’s motorbike to minister there.

This remote area of Africa gets very dry and there was a water project located nearby set up by the government.

Before the first sermon Lawrence introduced many of the Maasai, including those who had donated the land to the church.

It never rained that day, yet there were rain clouds in the area. So, Lawrence said, “we have to move quickly today.” He then proceeded to move and introduce everyone slowly.

Tyler delivered the first sermon that day. The sermon was awesome. He spoke on John 4 (Samaritan woman that Jesus meets at the well). Tyler was originally going to speak from another passage, but deftly moved to John 4 after Lawrence told us how water was the greatest need in this area.

I had previously heard Tyler deliver a sermon from John 4 a few times. This was actually the first sermon he gave in Kenya in 2023 when he preached on Sunday at Michael otieno’s Bethesda church in donholm. I heard a pastor once say, “you haven’t really preached a sermon until you have delivered it 3-4 times.” He has now really preached John 4.

It never did rain today.

I am told sometimes elephants wander into the church under the tree. Nearby here (actually not too nearby, about 70 km away in amboseli national park) there are over 1000 elephants according to the most recent census. During dry seasons some of these elephants wander far, even to the current area we were in. Alas, no elephants showed up today.

We then had lunch and also wandered the remote bush landscape.

Joseph then preached the last sermon of the day. It was a very similiar sermon to what he preached in the Maasai conference yesterday.

This was followed by more gifts being exchanged.

Jacque painted some of the kids faces.

It is apparent the “church under the tree” will need some furniture upgrades. One of the benches, made of sticks tied together, broke mid-way through by the weight of those sitting on it.

After the 2 sermons and gift exchanges we dropped pastor Lawrence off to his house. We gave a donation of money to support his church.

We then took the drive back to Openhand which felt like a homecoming. We all slept well that night.