Feeding Centers

Of the many cultural experiences the Huruma team has had here in Kenya, one of them has been to visit several feeding centers set up as a ministry branch through Crossroads Fellowship Church in conjunction with Manna Worldwide. Essentually, Crossroads finds areas where the poverty is so great that children are going without food. They build a church, kindergarten and feeding hall and then Manna helps pay for food, clothing and education for the children. Manna, similar to Compassion, gets different churches and sponsors to catch the vision and understand that children are dying unless something is done. But the great thing is that not only do these children get a meal, they get spiritually fed as well and they take what they have learned back to their families. Most of the feeding centers we have been to have had 150 to 200 children which is wonderful but there is still much work to be done. It’s heartbreaking to go to the centers and know that while you are helping 200 kids there are 4,000 more outside the compound starving. I think for me, that is the hardest part about ministry out here: you can never do enough! I just keep holding onto the knowledge that I am simply a vessel. The team is starting to understand that as well. We have been to five feeding centers across the Kenyan coast: 1) Gospel FC in an area called Shanzu where the surrounding community is very animistic. 2) Vipingo FC, the newest center built, was just a plot of land when I was here last year and now has a kindergarten, church and feeding hall thanks to a church in Florida who has sponsored 200 kids! 3) New Life FC is also in a very animistic area and the actual plot of land where the church now stands was used for human sacrifices up until a few years ago. 4) Tiwi FC, on the same compound as the youth camp we are leading, is in a predominantly Muslim area amongst the Digo tribe. 5) Pirani FC (pictured) was the last feeding center we visited. I purposely scheduled it last because the area is so incredibly poor. Kenya is a 3rd world country and poverty is all around but Pirani is so far into the bush (rural area) that the people are living in mud huts that wash away with each heavy rain and drinking from the same river their cows use. Visiting that center was hard for the team but very eye opening. It’s incredible to see people who have so little and yet are so generous and hospitable, so full of joy! Listening to these tiny kids sing songs about Jesus’ love, forgetting your sorrows and being a light really puts everything into perspective. God’s love is simple and it simply is.