Maximum miracle church

I have been in Western Kenya over the summer. Each time I visit the country there are invariably advertisements for big ‘Christian’ rallies promising the most extraordinary divine interventions.

One that sticks in my mind from a previous trip was the ‘Holy Spirit Explosion’ crusade. This time a certain well-known health and wealth preacher who frequents London was plying his trade among the poor of the city of Kisumu promising ‘financial breakthrough’. It was the usual approach. People are assured that, as they give their money to finance his ministry (and luxurious lifestyle?), the Lord will take them out of their poverty and make them wealthy.

Misled

The marks of false teachers are written all over these prosperity preachers. They focus on feel-good rather than faith, on the Holy Spirit rather than Jesus and on this world rather than eternal salvation in the world to come. And poor Christian people without Bibles and pastors with little education are so easily misled. I had the opportunity to meet with a lovely group of pastors from churches from across the theological spectrum in the little ‘wild west’ town of Bondo. The pastor of ‘The Maximum Miracle Church’ turned out to be a humble, gracious brother with little training and desperately hungry to understand the Scriptures. Similarly the pastor of the ‘Glory to God Church’, which he had started himself, was a lovely guy. It was a joy to drop in on such a diverse ministers fraternal.

One of the ‘prosperity prophets’ in Western Kenya had been majoring on Acts 20.35, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive’, to press his hearers to hand over their money. But reading the whole verse it becomes crystal clear that the people we are meant to give our money to are the poor and the weak, not flashy pulpiteers. ‘I showed you’, said Paul, ‘that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak…’ is the context. When this was pointed out to some pastors it was as if scales fell from their eyes. (However, the exhortation to give to the poor reminds us that there are many needy people in our own country also. The government’s cutbacks are beginning to bite and EN has received a number of messages from Christians encouraging us to highlight the needs of the increasing numbers of unemployed in the UK.)

Organisations including the Langham Partnership and Grace Baptist Mission are working in Western Kenya seeking to get alongside and train pastors and their wives in understanding the Bible. They are doing a good work and we thank God for them. But the needs are great. For example, in the South Nyanza region the African Inland Church has around 300 churches, but just 130 trained pastors.

The lighter side

Apart from the joyful songs of the Christians, there are many things to make the Westerner smile in Kenya. Sometimes you find the most extraordinary names, not just for churches, but for local businesses also. Here is a selection of some we came across. There was ‘The Joy Ride School of Driving’; the ‘Little 2 Late’ taxi company and the ‘Praise the Lord shoe-shiners’ which operates out of a little wooden kiosk on the Nairobi road in Kisumu. I also giggled at a repair shop which said it dealt with ‘all electricals and solar systems’. But I think what tops them all was one I was told of by a missionary friend. He assures me that in the town of Kericho in the tea plantation area of Kenya there really does exist ‘The Lazarus Funeral Services’.