4.30 at MITS

  We are so excited about the 4.30 Classes -- we are doing month-long units in Bible, Business and Computers.  Our skills training students come weekdays from 4:30 to 5:15.  We are doing 5 units in each area (that is 20 classes per unit) -- Bible is 1) business ethics, 2) personal counseling, 3) relationships at work, 4) serving Jesus on your job and 5) relationships outside of work.  Business is 1) getting a job, 2) keeping a job, 3) accounting without a computer, 4) marketing and 5) secretarial.  Computer is 1) personal finance, 2) small business finance,   3) business English, 4) appropriate use of technology and 5) office computing.  

  We have someone writing Bible 1 and 2 and 4, Business 1 and 2 and Computer 1 and 4.  We need you to help us with one of these courses.  Essentially it is a one-page lesson plan for 20 days for a Unit, with a Scripture for memory, a purpose statement, methods to use in class, activity /discussion /small group, etc.  

  Please look at the blog at  www.made-in-the-streets.blogspot.com  at Moses Okoth's great article about the 4.30 class in computer that he is teaching.  You will see how valuable it is.

HONOR                                                                                                                                                                                        

   

We try to give honor where it is due.  This month Joel Njue, our student affairs director at MITS, is receiving an honor in church for his role in the Sunday school and in development of Vacation Bible Schools at Kamulu.  He has also taken students on many trips to do VBS at village churches, and they have been happily received.  

Besides leading worship at Kamulu Church, Joel also spends some time in Eastleigh each week on the streets.  Here he is a Rounda Base - he's the one on the left in the white cap.  

We are truly proud of the men and women who serve, at low pay (we call it ministerial, but not the kind in government), the street children of Nairobi.  How wonderful the feet of those who walk through garbage to tell the Good News!

Student of the Year at MITS

STUDENT OF THE YEAR - TEAM MEMBER OF THE YEAR  2008



Friday was a happy day - we are always happy when we can honor someone.  We went through a process of choosing students of the year and a Team member of the year.  We asked students and Team members to write nominations -- not just a vote -- but to write what they appreciate about someone, how they work, the benefit MITS and the students get from this person, and so on.  We received some beautiful tributes!  

The end result was the choice of Ken Wabungu as male student of the year and Jackline Njoki as female student of the year.  

Presentations of a certificate and a "bahasha" (means envelope, and it has cash in it) were made, and Dr. Coulston praised them and shook their hands.  They were obviously pleased.  The bahasha was turned over to the Administrator to be saved for when they leave Made in the Streets.  

  Chosen as Team member of the year for 2008 was Philip Kariuki, who is the supervisor of our literacy education program.  Many wonderful praises were written about him.  He was very surprised to hear his name called.  He was given a certificate, a new pocket version Bible, a bahasha and a poster for his classroom entitled "Footprints".  

 We are very proud of our Team and our Students.  Praise God for people who work well together, who desire to succeed, who honor God and are good friends.

Visitors at Made in the Streets

We have always loved having visitors from churches in the USA spend time with us.  We know that some people are troubled by short-term missions for various reasons, but the many people who come and work with us for 10 days or 2 weeks or a month have been of enormous benefit.  

Our ministry is so complex that we can use almost any skill a visitor has, so we make good use of what people know and do all the time at their own work.  We have made good use of farmers, Bible teachers, educators, preachers, engineers, woodworkers, businesspeople, accountants, tailors/sewing skills, hairdressers, photographers, law enforcement officers, mechanics, event organizers, graphic artists, cake decorators, computer-oriented folk...there are more, but you get the idea.   

And sometimes what is most important is not the skill, but that it is combined with encouragement to our Team and to the kids.  And we find that visitors appreciate our Team and find them capable and energetic and loving and God-devoted, and that makes the Coulstons and Conways happy.  Because we have poured our hearts and energies into this Team, and we are thrilled to see what they have become.  

Maurice Colby of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, wrote me an email this week praising Ben Mwami, our farm manager.  He found Ben devoted to the farm, wanting to feed as many kids as possible, ready to accept new ways of doing things...how great!  

Time fails me to tell what wonderful things people have said about Francis and Jackton and Moses and Philip and others.  

Visitors get to do some wonderful things and have permanent

memories of the difference they can make in the lives of street kids.  This picture is a group from Thousand Oaks, California, who spent a week at camp with 9 street boys who came out to Kamulu the following week.  And all of them are with us now, most doing great in their studies, several baptized already, and none have had any thoughts about running.

We have a project going on now.  We are asking our Team and our students to make nominations for the Team member of the year and the Student of the year.  I've gotten several wonderful letters about different people.  It makes me rejoice greatly in our students as well as the Team.  Nominations cease on Dec 1, and we announce the awards on the 5th or the 7th.  So please pray that we can give honor where honor is due.  

If any of our visitors from 2008 would like to email me a nomination, I'd love to receive it.  And I'll let people know that you honor them.

peace and joy, charles