Beyond the tourist stage.........

Wel Certainly Being in Hald was great and the warm welcome in oslo was perfect.it,s been three weeks in oslo now,we have still been getting to meet people and get to attend the laget fellowships in OKSL.(Oslo Christian students group). What amazes me is that the students movement in kenya (FOCUS) ans NKSS have an almost similar approach to students' work. However because naturally we are prone to use what we are familiar with as a standard of making judgements, i must admit that at first i thought of the fellowships here to be shallow."dont make that face as you read this", just think of the way you have always reacted to new things especially when you use what you are familiar with as the scale of measuring things.Experiencing a new culture however does something to us and i had to go back to the drawing board again, I had to think over what Christianity is and why am i a christian?. Is it ;

• The enthusiasm, zeal and competence in the bible all motivated by love Jesus,i had always seen back at home.
• The genuine questions that would seem ignorant but were motivated by a deeper love and a desire to know Jesus.

I had to think over what Christianity is and why am i a christian?. This may sound funny and i know you are wondering whether i have never understood;even i thought that i really knew and understood quite well, but believe me if you have ever been in a new culture you will understand why i had to think. it is definately true that different cultural experiences dissorients us, but i believe that as christians there is a need to see where all the new experience fits in God's greater mission for transforming humanity through deeper love.As paul writes to the Phillipians in his paryer for them.

Phil 1: 9-11, "And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ. filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ-to the glory and praise of God."

As Paul G Heibert puts it, "it is important that we recorgnize the quality and extent of our cultural biases when working in cross cultural settings, for then we can work to reduce our ethnocentrism and mutual misunderstandings.”

beyond all the experiences there is something happening to us,but it is only when we examine it in the light of scriptures, that our experiences become a tool used in furthering Gods mission for transforming humanity through his love for us.

our fathers love