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A Missions Perspective: Kristen Fagley

Heather Zempel

Jun 07, 2007 · 1:04 PM

Over the next few days, I’d like to post stories and reactions from various team members.  Kristen Fagley just sent me a story from her journal and gave me permission to post it.  This is why we went to Kenya.

It was Tuesday morning, just about noon probably, and only my third day in Kenya.  As I walked back to the team bus I couldn’t stop the growing lump in my throat from choking me.  My eyes could no longer hold my tears.  All it took was one blink and they began spilling over my cheeks one by one.  I had just walked out of the slum Mathari.  “Pull it together.” I thought to myself.  “Don’t let others see you cry, especially the children.” The stomach nausea was taking over at this point as the reality of life here in Mathari for these children, these people, began to sink in.

“I don’t understand. I just don’t understand.” That’s all I could say to the team member I now sat next to on the bus.  She placed her hand on my shoulder for comfort.

Lord, how can people be living like this?  This is not living.

Rose Skola was the name of the woman who welcomed me into her tiny home.  I had her 7 year old daughter, Sarah, with me as well as one of my teammates, another young child Maurice, and Michael, a Kenyan volunteer who spent the next 15 – 20 minutes interpreting Swahili into English and English into Swahili for us.

I crouched down to enter the doorway and walked down 5 or 6 steep steps into a dark and dank little room adorned with hanging sheets to mask the cardboard and thin metal sheets holding the place together.  Rose made room for us to sit and began to share her story with us.  We learned that Sarah was in fact Rose’s niece and not her daughter.  Sarah’s family had been living in “the bush” with their tribe when her parents passed away from illness.  Rose took Sarah and her brother in to live with her.  This brought the total number of children Rose is currently caring for to eight.  She is not married but did have a man in her life helping her provide for the family until four months ago when he passed away from sickness leaving her as the sole caretaker and provider.

“Pray for strength to provide for my family.  Pray that the children will still be able to go to school.  Pray for my illness.” These were her only requests.

I placed my hand on Rose to pray for her.  But as I prayed, I felt so helpless with the words I spoke.  I felt the emptiness of them as I heard the words “hope”, “strength”, and “love” come from my mouth because inside I was questioning what hope there was for this family.  “Who am I to speak of hope to this woman?” I thought to myself.  Our time was up and we said goodbye and took a quick picture.  And so we walked back, through the maze of home upon home like the one I had just been in, to drop off Sarah & Maurice at school.  And there I was sitting on the bus in tears and disbelief.

The following night our team attended a prayer service led by Pastor Chip at ICC.  Through out the prayer service I was journaling furiously to God about the images etched in my mind and the emotions I did not know what to do with.  “Lord, increase our faith.  Help our unbelief.” I stopped writing and looked up as Pastor Chip spoke these words which pierced my heart like only the dagger of conviction can do.  I wrote them down in my journal, “Increase my faith. Help my unbelief.” Simple phrases that held great meaning for me and answers to the questions in my head.

“Who am I to pray for these people?” - Increase my faith. Help my unbelief.
“Who am I to talk of Jesus’ love and provision when I have so much simply because of where I was born?” – Increase my faith. Help my unbelief.
“What hope do they have for a better day?” Increase my faith. Help my unbelief.

Ephesians 1:17-21 “I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come.”

I read this verse to a group of us while in Kenya at a morning devotional and I still cling to it now.  I want to live out my faith as though I truly believe I have access to the power that Paul speaks of in the verses above.  The power that raised Jesus Christ from the dead is accessible to those who believe, including me.  And it is in this belief I am able, if only, to pray for others with all my mind, heart, and soul that all things are possible beyond my human inability to understand.  That the human limits I put on situations or circumstances are nothing for the God who brings life to the dead and exalts the humble and the weak.  So my prayer after Kenya is not only for the people I’ve met and relationships I’ve made, for the ministries that are in place and those that are yet to begin, but also for my own understanding of who God is and His power for those who believe.

Increase my faith.  Help my unbelief.

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