Space, Time & Deep Fried Potatoes

It’s hard to believe that a month has passed since we arrived here in Nairobi! It’s been amazing to be here. We have enjoyed gathering with Kenyan believers at church services and in their homes. We love how often they extend their hands to greet you with a firm shake and how devoted they are to taking tea (which consists of cupfuls of tea, pastries and conversation for no less than an hour.)

One of our first weekends here, we traveled with our hosts, Andre and Coline, up a couple hours of bumpy roads to the hills where a sweet family raises livestock and grows delicious produce. Their home is made of sheet metal, and is filled with the warmth of love and homemaking, not to mention fabulous cooking. When we sat down for the lunch they had made, I was naively bracing myself for some sort of odd, exotic delicacy. Ha! But instead, I was delighted by THE most yummy, baked and then deep fried, golden Irish potatoes ever to have existed. AND amazing beef cabbage stew. I’ve never been so glad to be so wrong.

In general, the first weeks of our trip have felt pretty spacious time-wise, allowing for a soft transition from the states, though also creating moments of restlessness. But any discouragement in me about a slower schedule has given way to a realization that it has been from the purposes of God. This space has allowed us the quiet needed for truly taking in the Spirit's heart and intentions for the film, surprising us by shifting what we thought this thing was about to what he wants it to be about. The focus is no longer on capturing inspiring humans who radically follow God, although their stories will certainly play a part, but rather the attention will be on God himself: our transcendent, majestic, awesome God of Israel, whose presence is thick all around us and who seeks to be intimately within every aspect of our lives because of his great love. It’s been exciting to discover how greatly the life and birth of what we are creating flows out of his Spirit first, not ours. Elements of the film—the structure, the imagery, the style—are being solidified so that we can really begin to film next month, and be able to approach each new destination with consistency. And beyond that, this is not just a project we are working on while our lives remain unchanged. The truths he is fixating on in this are the very ones our personal family is purposed to be built upon. This both thrills and terrifies us, as God is so much bigger than the ways in which we sometimes try to confine him. †