Advertisement
Published: August 13th 2006
Edit Blog Post
Masai Preacher
Vincent Korio is a lay preacher in the Olgumi SDA Church in the Rift Valley. The morning was beautiful with blue skies and snow-white clouds as we left Advent Hill in order to go to a Masai church. We left the ECD compound at 09.30. By 11 we had reached Maimahio in the Rift Valley. We were just following the bus with Americans we had met yesterday. They wanted to go to a Masai church nearby. After 90 minutes driving several people realised there was something wrong. There had been a misunderstanding between the local people organizing the Sabbath trip and the leaders of the American group. Apparently the local organizers had wanted to show the Americans the most authentic Masai church possible.
At 11 o’clock we still had about 45 minutes to drive in order to reach the church. Several figured that by the time we reached the church the worship service would be over. Besides, the Americans needed to be back at Advent Hill around 1.30 for lunch. There was no way they could have both the worship with the Masais and the lunch. After a lot of discussion they decided to return to Nairobi.
Birgit and Philip, Elsie and I had just come along with the Americans. Now we wondered what to do. Should we just go for a Sabbath drive around the countryside? We reasoned that if the Masai church had been notified of a visiting group they would surely be waiting for us. We decided to go. Samson Osana, a local elder who knew the area, came along to show us where the church was. We drove 16 kilometres out of Maimahio and then took off along a track over the Savannah. It took us 30 minutes to drive the last 10 kilometres. With Philips Toyota four wheel drive it was no problem. As we arrived at the church we had driven 91 kilometres from Advent Hill. Just as we had expected, the Masais were waiting for us.
A group of about sixty school children and thirty adults greeted us. They sang a very melodious song. As I picked up my flash from the car, Philip asked me: “Could you preach today?” “Sure”, I said, asking to use his English Bible Within minutes I was on the platform with two Masai men, the local elder who had directed us and an American lady who had come with Dina from the ECD office. Every visitor who had entered their name in the visitor’s book was properly introduced to the church members and had to say some words of greeting.
The service followed a fairly well known pattern within Adventist churches. There was no instrument to accompany the congregational singing, but they sang beautifully. I preached a sermon on Hebrews 10. I did not have a single word as sermon notes. Just what was in my head. Fortunately I have preached that sermon many times and I think it went reasonably well. The service ended at 2 o’clock.
They had a very interesting custom as the members were leaving the church. The platform group started to form a line outside the door. Then each person greeted the platform group and joined the line. In that way the line became longer and longer and every person in church greeted every other person. When the children came out we were not supposed to shake their hands. They bowed their heads towards us and we then touched them on the head.
Afterwards we chatted with people, saw their school and took pictures for about an hour. The school was sponsored by the Ngong Hill SDA church just outside Nairobi. They had 207 pupils and six teachers. The school was not really completed but they were teaching in classrooms that really held nothing but a blackboard. We asked if the students were sitting on the floor, because we saw no desks. Then we realised that the desks doubled up as church pews on Sabbath.
The return trip took us almost 3 hours including a photo session to document the enormous cloud of dust that built up behind the car as we were driving. There was dust everywhere and it became very hot inside the car as we were forced to drive with all windows shut. We also took time to drive off the track to come closer to some zebras we spotted. On our way to the church we had seen two secretaries birds.
Our visit to the Ongomi Masai church was a tremendous experience. It was touching to see that there exists a strong bond of love between people of the same faith even though we come from vastly different cultures.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.073s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 6; qc: 44; dbt: 0.0499s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb