I very rarely remember my dreams, so when I do I sit up and take notice – even more so when I have back-to-back dreams about the same thing. Last night I had two dreams about things being stolen. In the first dream my Mum was with me (she died 35 years ago). I had taken her somewhere in the car, and then parked and gone off somewhere. When we came back to where the car should have been, it was not there. I walked the length of the street trying to find it, but it was nowhere. I was particularly upset because there were important documents in the car. At that point I woke up for a bathroom call.
Immediately I went back to bed, I fell asleep and had the second dream. This time I was in a house with some friends, and a man I know was robbing the house. We plotted how to catch him in the act and grab him, but we were somehow distracted and by the time we turned back to him, he had escaped.
I don’t believe these dreams were pointing to literal attacks on my car and/or caravan, but rather that they are warnings of a general (but serious) attack planned against me and the ministry. More warfare! and I have put prayer requests out to half a dozen different prayer groups. Really getting the impression that the enemy doesn’t want me in Africa. Praise the Lord, that means that God is up to good stuff!
Today was supposed to be a rest day, but as I was finishing off my morning Bible reading, Enoch (my host) came in and said that Pastor James (pastor of the local church, where I will be speaking tomorrow) was here and would like to meet me. Turned out Pastor James was the main speaker for a Pastors and Leaders Seminar today, and wanted me to go with him. At first I thought he just wanted me to be there, which I felt was a bit pointless as I would not understand a word of what was said through the day, but I said yes anyway. Then he said he would like me to take “a few minutes” to talk to them (“a few minutes” varied between ten minutes and thirty.)
Another rough, unmade road; and when we arrived another almost impossibly steep and slippery climb up to the building. The worship was good, but then there were multiple people giving speeches or mini-sermons in Swahili, and I had trouble staying awake.
Finally Pastor James got up and introduced me, and invited me to speak “for ten to fifteen minutes.” After introducing myself, I had a prophetic word for a lady, then felt impressed of the Lord to speak about priesthood. I knew it would need to be basically just dot points to fit in with the time available, but I felt it would give them some things to ponder even so. When I got to fifteen minutes I said, “I’m out of time” but everyone urged me to keep going, so I ended up speaking for about 30 minutes (still not a long time, given the time taken by interpretation.)
Coming after me, Pastor James spoke about the need to make sacrifices for the Gospel (speaking in Swahili, but with enough English asides for me to catch the main drift of where he was going.) At the end he asked people to come forward if they were willing to commit to this, and asked me to pray for them. So I got to do some of my favourite things, minister and impart to pastors and leaders. Who needs a day off?!
When we came back to the house, Enoch had some of his relatives here, and asked if I would mind talking to them a bit. So we just had a very informal chat about my experiences and ministry in general.
Tomorrow I preach here in the morning, then we head back to Kitale for a very full week of ministry before I head off to Uganda.