Greetings from Nairobi in the name of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
By
God’s grace, today I was able to attend the church service at Bethesda
Baptist Church at Tassia, a suburb of Nairobi. Locating the church was
quite a hassle even with the help of mobile communications - and when I
got to the church, I understood why my driver, Pastor Maura and I were
all struggling to get us there.
In spite of our struggle, I got there before the Sunday School which ran from 10.00 to 10.40am
or so. Pastor Maura took the adult class and taught from 2 Samuel 7. He
taught us lessons about God’s election of David according to grace,
David as a type of Christ because he is an anointed person, and God’s
covenant with David as one of the announcements of the eternal Covenant
of Grace between the Father and the Son Jesus Christ (a covent which is
enduring and sure in spite of death, sin and time). He taught very
soundly. He used the lessons to encourage us to have absolute trust in
God no matter what our circumstances are and will be, and to be thankful
to him for predestinating us to be conformed to the image of Christ
even before the foundation of the world.
In
the main service, we read Psalm 27 and the Pastor preached an
evangelistic sermon from Romans 1.16: “For I am not ashamed of the
Gospel …” Using the suffering examples of the Apostle Paul, he talked
about the Gospel as the good news which is better than all other news in
a man’s life and in the world. He uplifted Christ considerably and
stressed that whosoever is ashamed of the Gospel is most likely not
saved. He pressed home the fact that anyone who has been saved by the
Gospel would know that it is more precious than anything, and will not
be ashamed to preach it to others. Secondly, he used the first reason,
“for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone ...,” to advance
very lofty arguments for why the Gospel is pure. His premise is that
salvation is entirely of God, and does not require gimmicks/methods such
as altar calls, crusades, instruments and rock music for souls to be
converted. To unbelievers, he used this power of the Gospel to encourage
them that God is capable of saving them no matter how much/many they
estimate their sins to be, whatever their backgrounds are. Thirdly, he
used the second reason, “to the Jew first and also to the Greek ...,” to
emphasise justification by faith alone apart from works of
self-righteousness. He urged unbelievers to seek for the imputed
righteousness of Christ, and to renounce any Arminian thoughts of
free-will, citing examples from Martin Luther’s experience which led to
the Reformation.
The
service was very solemn. We sang about 6 hymns (3 English, 3 Swahili)
and my heart was more moved by Isaac Watts' “I’m not ashamed to own my
Lord …” Although there was no organ, the congregation (less than 30
adults) sang well.
Clearly
the church is struggling in terms of material and financial resources
perhaps because it is only about 3 years old. It is using a room which
is about 1/6 or 1/8 the size of our church auditorium. It appears their
space is actually meant for a shop. It is located in an area which is
almost a slum, and that’s why we struggled to locate it. In spite of all
this, my heart is full of praise to God for His light which is shining
in Pastor Maura. Given that the Gospel is the power of God unto
salvation as we learned afresh today, their material and financial
resource constraints are nothing compared with the knowledge and zeal He
has given the Pastor to preach His Gospel to the salvation of souls.
One other remarkable observation I made is the simplicity of the people
who made up the congregation. They look very modest and humble, and were
very friendly to me.
His main helper, I suppose, is bro. David Otieno who conducted the service and led the Prayer Session which preceded the Sunday School.
On
the whole, my day has been made at Bethesda Baptist Church today; and
I’ll be very glad to fellowship with the church again. I hope we’ll
remember the labours of Pastor Maura in our private and public prayers
continually. He really needs them because immorality and perversion of
God’s word and ways are increasing in the country.
Please
find attached some pictures (in this mail and another I’ll send
afterwards) which I took with the Pastor and some members of the
congregation after the service. The other pictures were taken when I was
enjoying roasted lamb and bottle of coke at a local food joint. Kenyans
like and eat a lot of meat/mutton/chicken, and I hope I haven’t just
developed the same like :-).
Greetings to all the brethren at TMBC whom I miss. God willing, I will see you all soon.
Gamel.
