Children's Sunday School Easter Egg Hunt
At the International Christian Fellowship
Nairobi, Kenya
Searching for Resurrection
The rainy season has returned to Kenya. The dry and seemingly still earth is opening up and new life is springing forth. Of course it is only from our perspective that the earth seems death and still. Our agronomist friends tell us that there is actually a lot of life and unseen processes going on beneath our feet. In the darkness, something is happening: life is stirring, new molecular bonds are reshaping organic and inorganic matter, and God is moving in mysterious ways.
Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta has declared this Easter weekend a time of national mourning for the 148 people who were murdered this past Thursday by Al Shabbab terrorists in Garissa. It has been a somber time in Kenya mixed with grief and anger, people are stunned by yet another massacre.
It is not hard to relate to the doubt and fear of the disciple Thomas, the disciple who missed Jesus' appearance among the other ten disciples. When the others celebrated "We have seen the Lord!" Thomas shook his head "I will not believe, unless I see the nail marks in his hands and touch the place where the nails had been and the wound in his side" (see John 20:24-29). Surrounded by so much death and despair, Thomas couldn't see what God was doing below the surface. He wanted to believe, but how could he? It had seemed so clear that evil had won and that hope was lost.
But the story was not over for Thomas, it is not over for Kenya, and it is not over for any of us. Signs of resurrection are breaking through the darkness, but we need to seek them. Like the women and disciples who went to the tomb on Easter Sunday, Pope Francis recently shared that as Christians, “we are called to be sentinels of the morning, who know how to see the signs of the Resurrection” (Read more). Thomas did not give into his despair, for we read that a week later he remained with the other disciples, he stayed in the community of faith and there in their midst Jesus appears and everything changes for Thomas.
We gathered this morning with our community of faith here in Nairobi and joined together in prayer and songs of hope. We do not know, nor do we understand, how God is moving within this situation. It is hard to imagine how any good can come from such a time of suffering and senseless loss, but we are seeking signs of resurrection. We believe that God breaks through the darkness. That the story is not over. That Christ has overcome.
As a grain of wheat that dies, but then it must bears much fruit (see John 12:24-25)
In Prayer
Please join us in praying for Kenya and the community of Garissa. We pray for comfort and healing for the families of the victims of this massacre.
We pray for local churches throughout Kenya that they might witness a powerful movement God's Spirit reconciling them to their neighbours through the love and compassion of Christ. The Statement of the Primate of the Anglican Church of Kenya is such a call for unity and grace.
