Grace Lee

One of my favorite moments in Kenya was learning from Agnes and Naomi (two Kenyan ladies working on a missions base we visited), how to make a traditional Kenyan food called mandazi. Mandazi is best described as a Kenyan-style donut. These delectable little creations only require basic ingredients, but the secret to a successful mandazi comes from how the dough is prepared. As I watched Agnes and Naomi cook, they showed me the importance of kneading the dough thoroughly and waiting for the dough to rise, in order to achieve the mandazi’s fluffy goodness. You may have all the right ingredients, but if you do not work the dough and patiently wait for it to rise, you will just end up with a hot mess.

Thoughts of my spiritual life came into mind and I realized, I needed some work and kneading too. I had all the right ingredients available to me. I attended a great church, prayer meetings, had great accountability, but I had no heart behind each action.

Working alongside the local missionaries and pastors, I saw that they went to church because they desired Christ. Our team would wake up every morning around 6:00AM to start our day, and without fail, I would groggily open my eyes, only to see the missionaries already awake, praying and doing their daily devotionals. Speaking with Pastor Jivedi, a local pastor and translator, he described how the members of his church have a prayer chain all throughout the night, until the morning, calling each other upon every hour. During our visit to an orphanage in Kisii, Pastor Patrick, the founder and pastor of the church there, described how the orphans wake up at 5:00AM for morning prayer to begin their day.

Throughout the trip I realized that I wanted the results of spiritual character, without the work. I lacked discipline and patience for character to develop and I was living a comfortable, bland Christian life. I do not want to live a routine Christian life, rather, I want to develop a Christian lifestyle, rooted in spiritual character. Now that I’m back home in the states, as much as I do not want to, I know that what I need is to get stretched, molded, pounded, and kneaded into an uncompromising Christian. Therefore, my post-Kenya commitment is to be patient and make choices that will allow the Holy Spirit to work thoroughly in me so that I can experience and represent his goodness.