News from outreach to Kenya | January 2015
Dear friends,
Happy New Year to you all! Let God’s blessings flow abundantly into your lives and His good and perfect will be done in you this new 2015 year.
After spending 7 months in Mozambique, Swaziland and Kenya I am back in Estonia! Though my heart is so deeply in love with Africa, I am very happy to be back home with my friends, family and church.
In December I took a group of Iris Mission School students from Mozambique to Kenya. We had a wonderful time ministering there and saw many people coming to the Lord and others returning to Him.
My favorite ministry time was witnessing to girls involved in prostitution. Almost every day we went out into the streets and bars to talk with them. Most of these girls live on the edge of poverty and selling their bodies is the way they have decided to provide for their families. Most of them see no other way, and most of them don’t have parents or husbands, but they have to feed their children and sometimes their little brothers and sisters.
One of them is 27-year-old Rukia (on the picture below it’s me, Rukia and four of her children with their friends).
We met her in one of the most expensive bars in town. I sat down with her and started speaking beauty over her. I told her that God created her worthy and beautiful, that He treasures her and wants to help her if she will let Him. She burst into tears immediately and told me that her parents died and she works as a hairdresser during the day but it is not enough to provide for four kids and her little brother and sister. She immediately gave her life to the Lord and we went to a local store to get some food for her children. On our way to the store we met two other girls whom I had witnessed to before. I was able to talk more to them, pray for them, and get them some food too.
The next day we met up with Rukia for lunch and encouraged her to hold on to Jesus and we connected her to some local Christians. We also visited her little room where she lives with all the children, and we prayed over them and blessed them. The following Sunday she came to church with her brother.
Another girl was Irene. We met her in the street the first night we went out to witness in the bars. When we started to talk to her about Jesus she laughed at us and told us that she is not interested at all. However, she agreed to meet us the next day for lunch. Irene did not show up. As we were going out every night we were always meeting her in the same spot and inviting her for lunch, and she finally came after we invited her for the fifth time. As we prayed and talked to her, she could not stop crying because she was so broken and undone. She gave her life to Jesus that day and came to church with her teenage daughter and son.
Please pray for Rukia, Irene and all other girls that God saved during our three weeks in Mombasa, Kenya. (Teresa, Adele, etc). It is very hard to break out of the prostitution that they are involved in and it is a huge step of faith to stop going out into the streets as they have come to rely on that for their income. Please pray that God gives them courage and faith to stop and to trust God to provide for them another way, and for them to get connected to a local church.
Besides street and bar ministry, we also lead a home group for people who are HIV positive. On the picture on the right are Charles and Victor - two young men that got saved and filled with the Holy Spirit during one of our home groups.
We also visited families with HIV children, gave out food packages, prayed for them and talked about Jesus. We organized a Christmas celebration for a local church and a Christmas feast for the poor in the local area. We prepared gift packages and took them to a local police station. We were able to explain to the police the meaning of Christmas (most of them are Muslims) and pray for them.
Twice a week we went into local hospitals to pray for sick people. On the picture below you can see Esther with one of our team members. She came hobbling into the clinic because she got hit by a motorbike, injuring the whole right side of her body. We prayed for her, Jesus healed her and she danced out of the clinic with so much joy!
One thing that touched me so much, happened when we were praying for an elderly lady in the street. She was in her 70’s, she had several strokes and because of that she could barely move. A Kenyan Christian lady saw us praying and immediately joined us. After we were done, she told us that it was the first time in her life she saw white people loving and praying for black people!
During our trip to Kenya one of the local pastors took us to some remote villages to witness and minister. We visited two villages on the South Coast where they still practice the highest level of witchcraft. They sacrifice children when they are in desperate need of rain, crops, etc. In a village called Mtongwe we met a girl named Lucy. When she came, she would not even lift her head up or look into our eyes because she was covered with a very strong spirit of shame! We found out that several years ago she gave her firstborn as a sacrifice and since then, that feeling of condemnation would not leave her. We told her about God’s forgiveness and after she received Jesus, we could feel that this spirit of shame lifted off of her. When we were leaving she gave us all a hug and looked straight into our eyes!
In the same village we went from house to house to evangelize and pray for people. We saw a few salvations and healings. In one of the houses we met a lady with a tiny baby. She was trying to breastfeed him, but he was very restless, crying and would not eat. He was seven months old, but looked as if he was less than a month old. As we were witnessing to his mother, we saw a witchcraft bracelet on his wrist. So, we explained to her what it actually meant and that it was an open door for demons to come and torture her child. The mother gave her life to the Lord, we took the bracelet off of the baby’s wrist and right after that the child calmed down and started eating!
In a village called Lunga-lunga we showed the Jesus film and prayed for people. That day 34 adults and children accepted Christ, and one woman got delivered from demons! It was very similar to Mark 9:22-27.
So, what are my plans for 2015? I came to Estonia to rest, have fellowship with my friends and family and to seek God for direction before I head out again to the mission field. I am praying about joining Lana in India, as she is opening a house in Kolkata for women rescued from slavery. Also, I am considering going back to Africa to be on staff at Iris Ministries Harvest School of Missions.
Thank you for keeping me in your prayers and if the Lord shows you something, please share it with me!
With love,
Natasha
(+372) 58 090 589
skype: natasha.shtembakh
