Dear friends,

Once again as we reflect on the goodness of the Lord to us, our hearts are full with excitement over His dealing with us here at the ‘Grace Baptist Church' in Kisumu Kenya.

I traveled to our capital city Nairobi on 20^th February 2009 to join with the Eldoret pastor, Naphtali to help in constituting the church ‘Injili Bible church'. 17 members were constituted. It was also necessary to set apart the two elders, Joseph M. and Sukesh P. We shared the task, with Naphtali leading the setting apart of elders, and I led the members in constituting. I later preached from Acts 11: 19-30 to an attentive crowd, bringing out a model of a strong church, viz: have clear testimony, Bible centered (Barnabas goes to look for Paul for purposes of teaching the word), evangelistic, and caring for one another. The day ended with great joy. On Sunday I spent the day with brethren in Nairobi for the Lord's Day.

Back to Kisumu, another great day was waiting for the weekend. Sunday 1st March we had a wonderful day. Three people were baptized and added to our numbers. Nila (my daughter), Carol, and Benjamin. After baptism every one present joined together for a lovely potluck lunch that the church ladies prepared. Church members then joined together in observing the Lord's Table and officially gave the right hand of fellowship to the three. This now brings our membership to 31 since the church was constituted eight years ago. Sadly we have suffered 2 excommunications, one being a church deacon.

After the Lord's Table, the church, as had been planned and prayed for very long time, at last chose more leaders to work with me. Paul O. and Osborn O. were unanimously chosen to be elder and deacon respectively. Paul has been working as the church evangelist for the last two years and has shown his ability in the service for the Kingdom. Osborn works for the Kenya museum and has been leading the Sunday school activities. Paul will therefore join me in the eldership as Osborn serves in the deaconate. Do pray for these men. Our last leadership team crumbled after serving for 5 years. The enemy attacked, bringing their reputation under reproach. Their conscience could not allow them to serve and they stepped down. It is lovely to see the other two seriously working at overcoming the issues that brought them down. Like I said earlier, one had to be excommunicated after insisting on his sin. On the other hand, we thank God that we have a reserve of possible leaders in the church and we can always look to them to serve in various capacities in the church. With the new leaders in place, we are currently planning to set apart Paul as an elder on 5-4-09 and also hold church our Annual general meeting in 18-4-09.

In February, the ministry at Maseno University continued. As usual I made two visits, one with Paul O. and the second one with a church member Ezra. Both meetings had lively discussions. Pray for the students' souls. In our last meeting on 27^th February we invited them to the church function over the week end. Five came at their own expense in terms of fares, which as far as I am concerned was a sacrifice from their end. It was lovely to have these five students at the morning church Bible study and at the service, baptism and the potluck lunch. My daughter Nila also invited her school friends to witness her baptism. They are not believers, but came with presents for Nila. This put us to shame as her parents. We realized too late that we too ought to have bought something for her, which we have promised to.

Yours Sam.