February 2017

Dear friends,

You'll be very pleased to hear that we had a safe and pleasant journey on Friday 13 January, to Nairobi. We

enjoyed an eight hour flight and then a 45 minute car journey to the accommodation that we're now

calling home in Zambezi. We were very kindly picked us up from the airport by Gerald Mwangi, who is our

leader and teacher here at iServe. It was an exciting start to our adventure experiencing Kenyan driving.

We arrived at our flat at around 11pm Kenyan time, where we were warmly greeted by Leah and Maggie

(iServe workers on our project) with incredible mangoes and tea. The team shares a room of two bunk beds

in our cosy two bedroom flat. We've been getting used to the functions of our flat, including not being able

to drink straight from the tap and the slightly unreliable shower. This change of lifestyle is something that we'll

need prayer for.

On our first weekend, we had a nice time relaxing and

acclimatizing ourselves to the local area. Where we are staying

in Zambezi is a little further out from the city centre, and

perhaps a little more rural than we were expecting, which

perhaps is a good thing! We had a great time introducing

ourselves to our new neighbours and playing with the local

kids. We took a walk around Zambezi town where we received

a fair bit of attention. We're getting used to being called

mzungu, which means white man!

On Sunday, we split up and visited some different churches, where

we each experienced very different styles. Nathan went to ACK

(Anglican Church Kenya), Kidfarmco, with Harrison, who is the

leader of iServe Africa. Although most of the service was in Swahili,

the worship was full of dancing and passion and the preaching

had some interesting lessons to learn. Ben went to Emmanuel

Baptist Church, in the centre of Nairobi, which was very American

influenced which was surprising to see. Josh went to Good

Shepherd Church, which had very good worship and pretty sound

teaching, which was almost all in English. Gerald and Louise took

Josh around the Kibera slums, where hopefully in the future we'll

be able to return. In the meantime, we’re thinking of ways to

spread the gospel there.

Nathan Prior, Josh Meynell & Ben Crook

iServe Africa

P.O Box 51575 - 00100, Nairobi, Kenya

Please contact your local Crosslinks office to change your contact details

Crosslinks, 251 Lewisham Way, London SE4 1XF Tel: 020 8691 6111 pletters@crosslinks.org

Crosslinks, 32 Montgomery Road, Belfast, Co. Antrim BT6 9HL Northern Ireland Tel: +44 (0) 28 9079 6028

Soon after, we met the rest of the TransformD team, who

come from all over Kenya. The team consists of seven guys:

Ben, Josh, Nathan (us), Kelvin, Dennis, Eric and Peter, and five

girls: Terryne, Mary, Junesi, Carol and Veronica. A lot of them

come from Samburu and the Central Kenya area. We've had

a great time bonding, teaching each other card games from

Kenya and the UK.

The TransformD programme's main aim is for us to grow in our

knowledge and understanding in the Bible, conforming more

to the likeness of Christ in all aspects of our lives and therefore

equipping us to evangelise the good news of the gospel throughout our stay in Kenya.

So far in the TransformD lessons we have started with some

basics, namely the Bible timeline. We’ve looked at how the

Old and New Testaments fit together and how the promise

that God made in Genesis 3:15 - that another Adam would

come and strike down Satan - is fulfilled in the New

Testament through Jesus, the son of God. We also learnt

some helpful lessons on how to interpret a passage in the

Bible, how to do devotions and the connection between

the gospel and how we are to live our lives. Some of the

people on the course are recent converts and so we hope

that we can be a blessing to them as we all explore our

faith.

In the near future we will be evangelising in local towns and helping out with various church youth work. In

our lessons we will be looking at more complex worldly issues and how the Bible deals with them and

learning how to give short talks. Finally, in April, we will be going to the north of Kenya to a rural place called

Samburu, where we will be doing mission work for a month. Soon we will start working in a local children's

home on Saturdays.

Unfortunately the girls Crosslinks team - who came out with us to Kenya and were staying in the flats above

us - were burgled and lost a lot of their valuables. As a result, they have had to move to a new location. This

has been a bit of a reality check for us, so please pray for a complete psychological recovery for all

involved!

We thank you for your support throughout our time here and would really value your continual prayer.

With many thanks

Nathan, Josh and Ben

2 John v12 “I have much to write to you, but I do not want to use paper and ink”

PRAYER POINTS

For safety in our time in Kenya, especially for the girls, in light of recent events.

That our hearts and minds would grow in the knowledge and love of God.

For ideas of different and plenty of opportunities to share the good news of the gospel all around

the area!

Give thanks for good health so far and please pray for this to continue (including Ben getting his

rabies jab at the interhealth clinic in Nairobi.)

Thank God for the caring staff of iServe and for their faithful teaching.

Thank God for providing all that we need, a place to stay and especially a lot of food!!!!

March 2017

Dear friends,

Sorry for keeping you waiting for our next update. Time has flown by way faster than we could

have imagined. We have so much to say, and a lot to thank you for, namely your prayers and

support.

Over the last month we have been continuing with the TransformD programme. For four days a

week we have been studying topical issues in today's society and what the Bible's view on them is.

This has ranged from social media ethics to unity with one another and Christ. In an especially

helpful study we looked at the African world view and its application to our Christian faith. It was

helpful to understand the world view we're living in to help us know how to effectively discuss the

Bible within it. It was interesting to see that the Bible challenges all societies, and that we need to

live with a biblical worldview, rather than a "Western" or "African" one.

Outside of the TransformD studies, we have played a lot of darts and volleyball, with fierce

competitions, over the breaks and a lot of the iServe staff have been joining in. We've also taken

up running early in the mornings, which has been good training for the fundraiser Walk for Rafiki

(the school/ orphanage where the girls team work), and the Run for the Bibleless, an event to raise

money for bible translation into the different Kenyan languages. We're sort of getting used to the

altitude, which has been a great challenge!

Once the first five weeks were over

we had a break for a week, where

the rest of TransformD went to their

homes to see family and friends,

and we were lucky enough to join

the girls team and Leah, and had

a relaxing few days at Lake

Naivasha. On one of the days, we

cycled around Hell's Gate national

park (33km), seeing many zebra,

giraffes, monkeys, baboons,

Nathan Prior, Josh Meynell & Ben Crook

iServe Africa

P.O Box 51575 - 00100, Nairobi, Kenya

Please contact your local Crosslinks office to change your contact details

Crosslinks, 251 Lewisham Way, London SE4 1XF Tel: 020 8691 6111 pletters@crosslinks.org

Crosslinks, 32 Montgomery Road, Belfast, Co. Antrim BT6 9HL Northern Ireland Tel: +44 (0) 28 9079 6028

wilderbeast and many more. After having part of our lunch literally robbed by the monkeys

(bananas were probably a mistake), we were able to have a gorgeous tour of the gorge with

George, and it was amazing to see the beauty of God's creation. We had a lot of laughter, fun

and games, especially on the final night where we had an awesome camp fire! We left Lake

Naivasha on Wednesday morning and for the rest of the week we went to the iServe morning

devotion on Revelation, did some washing and rested (we're good at that now).

On Friday Gerald (who leads the TransformD programme) and Fidel took us to a place called

Olepolos in Maasai County, where we swam in a very cold pool, then had a lot of goat meat and

ugali. It’s a very simple way to keep three hungry, meat loving guys happy. It's a shame we don't

eat goat in the UK, it's something that we will really miss.

On Sundays, we've continued to explore different churches. Notably, we were invited to a service

at the best performing high school in the country, Alliance Kikuyu, where we thought it

appropriate to perform a Christian gangster rap, in front of all 1,500 students and staff...

Over the next month we will be supporting a new church that iServe is planting with the intention

of bringing together a few local congregations and to set an example for faithful bible teaching.

We're really looking forward to being part of it before it opens its doors to the public.

The rest of TransformD team returned in the last few days and so we've resumed our routine. Over

the next few weeks our studies will include Revelation in the morning devotions, 1 Corinthians and

a character bible study of Daniel. We'll also be preparing for our month long mission trip to

Samburu in April, which we'll talk about more in a future prayer letter.

Nathan, Ben and Josh

Prayer Points

Give thanks for continued very good health throughout our whole time here.

Give thanks for Gerald and the TransformD programme so far and pray for the next

phase.

Give thanks for growing friendships with the other members of the TransformD

programme, the girls team, and the staff at iServe.

Pray for preparations for Samburu.

Pray for evangelistic convictions for Zambezi, where we are living.

Pray that the church plant will start up well and that the organisation of it will become

clear.

29 March 2017

Dear friends,

Despite what the girls think, it's not a competition to complete the most prayer letters in our time out in Kenya.

Only joking, they are just more organised!

We have been very busy since our last prayer letter, starting the next chapter in the TransformD programme.

Over the last month we finished the iServe devotion through Revelation, looking at God's wrath and seeking

our hope and assurance in the new creation. The topics in TransformD that we are now looking at are about

evangelism and church mission, preparing us for our Samburu mission trip, which we leave for on 31 March.

In the lead up to Samburu, we have been preparing for two camps (one for youth and one for children)

which we will run ourselves, with the Crosslinks girls team, in the middle two weeks. Josh has been given the

main task of doing three out of four talks on 1 Thessalonians in the morning of each day of the youth camp.

Ben will do the other talk on the youth camp, as well as talks on the children's camp and one on work ethics

(slightly ironic). Nathan has been given the responsibility of organising/running the games sessions for both

camps, plus giving talks on the kid’s camp. Together as a team we have been working on crafts and activities

for the kid’s camp small groups, which will take place after the talks each day.

Outside of the class room there has

been a lot of laughter, playing

numerous games of darts, articulate

and monopoly deal. We've made a

special effort each week to do some

form of exercise, whether it's running or

volleyball. Volleyball is one of the

loudest games, with the iServe staff

shouting to the referee whether the ball

was in or out!

During our time in Kenya there have

been some great moments, one of

which was Lucy's birthday. It was

amazing to see Lucy's reaction to our

present (hamper), but the main

excitement was the afternoon of

Nathan Prior, Josh Meynell & Ben Crook

iServe Africa

P.O Box 51575 - 00100, Nairobi, Kenya

Please contact your local Crosslinks office to change your contact details

Crosslinks, 251 Lewisham Way, London SE4 1XF Tel: 020 8691 6111 pletters@crosslinks.org

Crosslinks, 32 Montgomery Road, Belfast, Co. Antrim BT6 9HL Northern Ireland Tel: +44 (0) 28 9079 6028

Ceilidh dancing, doing the military two step, double

time military two step, the Gay Gordon, strip the willow,

dashing white sergeant and Virginia reel. Getting the

Kenyans involved made it lots of fun as we taught them

the dances. The other main event was the opening of a

church plant, Grace Point Church, which is formed by a

group of iServe staff, relatives, friends and colleagues. It's

main aim is to set up a faithful bible teaching church in

Kikuyu, the closest town to the new iServe site, which

should be ready in June. At the moment the church has

been holding closed meetings to grow as a family and

we have been helping out with the music during the

service, picking the songs, playing piano, drums, guitar,

setting up the music system and running all the power

points.

We have been going to markets in the past weeks to

pick up things we want for Samburu in particular. We

have been able to get sandals made from car tyres,

Masaai shukas (the traditional thin blankets) and shorts,

as it's going to be very hot and trousers are not an

option! In fact, not many clothes are worn in the different

Samburu villages, so that will be interesting!

Looking ahead to the next month, we are heading to

Samburu on Friday 31 March at 4am on an evangelistic

mission. For the first week we will split into four groups

going to different villages (Seren, Kaisipo, Namarok and

Kileswa) where we interact with locals, see how they live,

share the gospel and invite them to the camps. The next

two weeks are the kids and youth camps which we are running. In the final week we will help with the

construction of more accommodation for people to come to camps!

Unfortunately there will be no network out in Samburu and so communication will be unlikely until we get

back... so basically our regular interval of giving you news!

Prayer Points

Pray for teamwork

Pray for the camps to run smoothly

Pray that the gospel will be spread

Pray for our safety

Pray that we can actually enjoy it despite the stresses!

5 May 2017

Dear Friends,

Our month long mission to Samburu has come and gone in the blink of an eye. We wanted to take this time

to thank you for all your support and prayers and to report back on how our last month has been in another

new culture. The TransformD programme has been building towards the Samburu mission and in the final

few weeks we merged teams with the Crosslinks girl’s team, in our final push in preparation for our trip.

We arose early on Friday 31 March so that we could set off quickly at 6am on the long trip to Northern

Kenya. Half asleep, we clambered into the buses and, after two changes on different buses at Nyahururu

and Maralal, we arrived in Tuum at 12:20 after 18 hours of travelling.

In our first week we were split into mixed groups and sent to four

different villages to experience how people in Samburu live and

their struggles with drought and little food. We all found that they

were generous with their possessions and very welcoming, despite

their tough living conditions! During our time in the villages we had

to make our own fires to cook food each day.

Nathan went to Seren, Josh went to Kaisipo and Ben went to

Namarok, where he spent the main part of the days going round

to the many homesteads sharing the gospel with them. During our

time in the villages we took part in many activities such as lifting cows due to the animals’ exhaustion from

no food or water or climbing mountains or exploring the villages. It was an amazing time and we learnt so

much about how to truly rely on God for EVERYTHING!

The next 10 days we spent running two

camps. For the first five days we ran the

kids’ camp (for 8-13 year olds), which was a

big challenge due to there being 375 kids

and only 23 of us to lead them! The

language barrier made things tricky and so

we needed a translator for everything. The

theme for the camp was "Who is Jesus?" The

days all had the same structure, beginning

at 6-7:30 with devotion and morning

Nathan Prior, Josh Meynell & Ben Crook

iServe Africa

P.O Box 51575 - 00100, Nairobi, Kenya

exercise. During the day, we had three main one and a half

hour sessions, beginning with a short talk altogether,

followed by small groups to discuss the talk that had just

been given and to play games and do craft activities. We

then had games in the late afternoon and a meeting in the

evening, which we popped into occasionally. Nathan gave

two talks about Jesus as a boy in the temple and his

baptism, talking about how he is the son of God and giving

a demonstration of baptism by pouring water over Phoebe,

taking any opportunity to dump a bucket of water on one

of the Crosslinks team leaders. The kids enjoyed it and it was

a good way to show how we can all be cleansed!

Ben gave a talk in the kids camp on the Resurrection of Jesus, which was captivating, getting all the kids

attention, and really hammered home the awesome truth that Jesus has risen and therefore we can have

assurance that our sins our forgiven if we believe in Jesus.

All of us helped lead small groups in twos and threes, ranging from 20 to 50 kids per group. It was an

amazing opportunity to really get to know some of the kids and to spend many hours over the four days

teaching them a wide amount of biblical truth.

Immediately following the kids’ camp, 150 youth

arrived on the same evening, ranging in ages from 13

to well over our age. The theme for this camp was

"Servants of Christ", and so we were able to properly

get into meaty spiritual food over the four full days. The

day before the youth camp, some of the iServe staff

and apprentices came up to Tuum (the town we lived

in in Samburu) and helped throughout the rest of our

time there. This gave us such a boost of energy to keep

us going even though we were shattered from the kids’

camp. The structure was very similar to the kids’ camp,

rising early for devotions and exercises. In the morning

we went through 1 Thessalonians, followed by the

second session which was all about why and how to

read the Bible. In this session, we split into small groups of around 15 to go through bible passages together,

teaching the youth how to read the Bible for themselves. The third session in the afternoon was on topical

issues, including work ethics, sex and relationships, and cultural issues such as FGM and young marriage.

Josh did three of the talks on 1 Thessalonians, with Ben doing the other. It was amazing to be given the

opportunity to preach to such a big number, about very key and relevant issues that cultures face. Ben

does like talking and could have gone on past what was an already an hour and a half long talk, if allowed

to (to be fair, he did have to cover chapters 2-3 in one session).

Throughout the camp, we had a question box. It was wonderfully encouraging to see how many people

put questions into the box! We answered the questions over the course of each session, with Ben leading a

panel of people answering the questions. During both camps Nathan was running sports and so got up to

lead morning exercise at 5:30am each day and ran the afternoon games sessions from 4:30-6pm. The

camps went so well, although exhausting to the point of collapsing! We couldn't have asked for a bigger

turnout, and we pray that God would use what we have taught to change their hearts and affect the way

they live. It really was a truly life changing experience.

For the last week we were divided into two teams: one group stayed in Tuum and the other went to Waso

Rongai, where Okiki, a second year iServe apprentice, is doing his placement farming. In Tuum the team

painted an office and one of the dorm rooms with an empty tomb on one of the walls, knocked down an

old brick store room to create space and did a bit of farming. In Waso Rongai (or "Wazzers", as our team

calls it because we think we are cool) we were put to work farming, preparing the ground, weeding and

hoeing, creating water barricades, digging holes and planting and finally watering the farm.

It was such an amazing experience, having some rest but also some solid manual labour to help those

staying in Samburu and put our big team to work.

The journey back to Nairobi and the iServe

offices was much more manageable as the

hard part of the journey was over by

lunchtime and after that we had a smooth

ride back, although before lunch a couple

of times the bus got stuck in the mud and

we had to get out and push - we got very

muddy! This was because the rains finally

began a few days before we left Tuum,

which is really great news for the area.

Thankfully we got back safely and in good

time, and we then crashed and head to

bed exhausted from the journey.

Our last couple of weeks here will hopefully be enjoyable and restful. We will be having a short holiday in

the Maasai Maaras next week, before we continue with the TransformD programme. We're so grateful for

the people that we have been able to get to know here, and so we really hope that we can make the

most of our last couple of weeks by enjoying our time with them. Leaving is going to be very emotional,

although at this point we are ready to come back home! We thank God for giving us such an amazing

time.

Prayer Points

Give thanks for the safe trip.

Give thanks that the camps went smoothly.

Ask that the youth and kids would take the message to heart, keep it secure, and that it would

change their lives.

Ask that we ourselves would be changed from our time in Samburu, and that our values would

be renewed.

Ask that we could get rest and recuperate from our mission, enjoying our last couple of weeks

in Kenya.