The Romans Project in Kimilili, Kenya

After two hours of hard driving crammed into a compact car, we arrived at a church on the edge of Kimilili, Kenya. The last stretch was on red dirt roads with an assortment of "holes" filled with water and "hills" high enough to get high centered on if not taken at the appropriate angle. We drove through rural western Kenya, and it was beautiful. Yes, some of the people live in dirt huts with thatched roofs, but I will say that i see a lot more smiles on poeples' faces here than in much of Europe.

As we entered the area of Kimilili where the church was located, we were greeted with a huge - and I mean huge - banner with all the details of the Romans Project. Ken, and his regional coordinator, bishop Charles Naibei, together with a committee of 10 others, canvassed Kimilili and up to 40 km in every direction with personal invitations, three huge banners, and a car driving around for the past three days with a loud speaker on top announcing and reminding pastors and church leaders of today's Romans Project.

The church building was way too small to accommodate the expected 1500 participants so they set up plastic chairs and took the wooden pews out into the courtyard. In the center, under an enormous avocado tree, they constructed a platform from which we were to teach. I've never experienced anything quite like this in all my years of ministry, and it's not just because we don't have avocado trees in the Czech Republic.

In the end, 1280 pastors and church leaders showed up eager to learn. It's not so much that the numbers are large, but that the large numbers show the people are hungry for God's Word. This simple, yet profound challenge of the Romans Project to read Romans 20 times and write it out once in a notebook is spreading like wildfire. In testimony after testimony of those who have completed the challenge we are hearing of lives being changed by the power of God's Word. When pastors saturate their hearts and minds with the message of the gospel in Romans, their lives are being transformed. In fact, their entire ministries are being transformed and their people are being properly fed God's Word. Oh, the joy of hearing how the simplicity of preaching and teaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ transforms the lives and ministries of these pastors!