NEWS MID APRIL 2012
Dear Friends,
I am happy to be back in Kenya. At home all are well. My first days and weeks back in Kenya are always interesting, because the UK context still remains very vivid in my mind. Hence certain exchanges are especially stark:
-- The taxi driver who took me from the airport to the bus station in Nairobi talked of the recent death of a younger brother having been caused by witchcraft.
-- A young man, two days after my arrival, explained that he would not plant vegetables although they were desperately in short supply in the dry season, through fear of the jealousy of others.
-- A divorcee who is troubled about their partners walking out on them cannot be a Christian, I was told, because true Christians would not become so attached to a spouse as to be so troubled should they divorce them or die.
To receive access to papers, video recordings and power point presentations from the Global Conference on Vulnerable Mission held in the USA in March this year go to Global Conference on Vulnerable Mission and pay $10.00. A link giving you access to the files will then be sent to you.
I am glad to announce that another of my books has been accepted for publication. This is the book that I wrote during my sabbatical in May to July last year. It is about communication in mission and development in Africa and is 55,000 words long (about 200 pages).
After speaking at a church in the UK, I was told that a lady wanted to see me. "Thank-you for that message," she said in tears. I was a little taken aback by her emotion. "I am from Eastern Europe", she said. She explained how many missionaries from the West who had gone to Eastern Europe took too little time to listen to the people. She was very happy to hear a message about vulnerable mission.
My final presentation on 10th April to 30 or so PhD students at Oxford Centre for Mission Studies went very well.
See this discussion in the British telegraph of the importance of Christianity for the UK.
Best wishes,
Jim
Get your copy at: Wipf & Stock.