Dependence

Many of the students and staff here at Rohi have a deep and honest faith in Christ. You can see that they really love Him and depend on Him. God has radically changed their lives. Many have come from poor or rough backgrounds and now they are in school with all their needs being met. They thank God for this. They attribute this provision to God. Most students don’t question or doubt God because they see him moving and acting in their lives everyday. He is not distant and unknown; He is active and present in their lives.

Samuel

This was most evident when I was meeting in a small group of 18-20 year old male students. I proposed a question that I ask many students in America. I asked, “Can you tell us about your relationship with God, what questions or doubts do you have about Him?” After a pause, a student named Samuel began to speak about all the ways in which he sees God. He began, “I ran away from home when I was a young boy because there were seven children in my family and my mom could not feed all of us. So as the oldest son, I felt that if I left than it would be one less mouth to feed. I left home to live on the streets in Nakuru, begging for food and sniffing glue. After three years on the streets, staff from Rohi found me. I joined the rehabilitation center for some time and then was sponsored to come to Rohi as a student.”

Samuel feels a deep sense of gratitude and the only person he can say thank you to, is God. God is the one who motivated the right people and made the necessary connections to allow Samuel to come and live at Rohi. Samuel understands this and all he can do is cry out to God with complete gratitude. This is the faith of most of the children and orphans we have met at Rohi. Their deep and strong faith in Christ is teaching Sarah and I how to see God and depend on Him more.

Samuel’s faith in God is different from many of the youth in America. Many college-aged students go through a period of doubting their faith and questioning how they were brought up in the church. I am not saying this is bad, just different. In America it is hard to see God. If something good happens we attribute it to our own efforts. In general, in America, we are more dependent on ourselves then on Christ. In many ways, although life is easier and more comfortable in America, it is more difficult to see Christ. Good and evil are masked by comfort and materialism.

After hearing many stories like Samuel's, I came to a point where I had to make a decision. Was it random chance or divine intervention that brought these students to where they are today? Just as so many students have chosen to believe that it was God who saved them, I too see that it was God who has given them a hope and future.

If you believe that it was random chance then you must ask yourself some questions. What was this feeling or burden that the Mathua family (who started Rohi) felt to help these children? Where did it come from? If you believe that they were just good people, I think you must look deeper. It is crazy, especially in a place like Kenya where there is more poverty and less opportunity for finding work that seven children would agree to give up their land and inheritance. And why would a family from the US give up their comfortable life to move to a new and uncomfortable place to help others? And what motivates the 350 families from the US to sponsor these students, pay their school fees, write them letters and come to meet them? What conviction or belief is strong enough to motivate someone to do this and where or with whom does that conviction begin?

I don’t believe that it is chance that motivates people to sacrifice their lives to love others. I do believe that it is the only response that Christians have to the sacrificial life that Jesus lived. It is our only way to say thank you to a God that died so that we could live free. Jesus’ example of living an uncomfortable and sacrificial life should drive us and compel us to live a life modeled after Him; a life that is not for ourselves, not for the fleeting pleasures of the world, but truly and honestly dedication to Him.

But how, in America, do we develop this kind of faith that motivates us to sacrifice our lives for others? Anyone who has been on a mission trip knows it is easy to see Christ and love others when you go abroad, but what happens when we come back to our comfortable and distracted lives in the US? Where does the passion and conviction go, how do we maintain it?