Into Africa Missions

James was the guard of our compound for about the first seven yearswe were in Kenya. He lived in the city. His wife and kids lived in their village home. James died of AIDS. James’ wife, Ruth, asked to be tested. She was negative. Thankfully, on his dying bed, James asked Simon to pray with him for salvation. We buried James and gave Ruth a little money to start her own small business.

A couple of years later, Ruth came to our gate. In the night, little Brian had a bad headache. By the time she got him to the city hospital, he was dead from malaria. With tears gushing from her eyes, her voice desperate for help, she pleaded with me, “If we collect his body within 30 minutes, I won’t have to pay morgue fees.” I pulled the white sheet that covered our copy machine and called for Simon. Within minutes, we were at the so-called Russian Hospital [built by the Russians during the 1960s, erroneously purported to provide free government medical services]. Soon, Ruth and I were pacing our steps down the dark, dank hallway on either side of Simon who had five-year-old Brian’s lifeless body, covered with the white sheet, draped across his outstretched arms.

Windows down, Ruth sat in the front seat with me, resting her head on the crook of her arm over the window casing. The hour drive up the hill and down into the valley to reach her village home was conspicuously long and very quiet—until we reached the dirt road which led to her home! What appeared to be a placid village instantly came to life. Ruth’s shrill yodel-like call seemed to alert every neighbor. I could see people coming from every direction. They knew the call of death. And they came for Ruth.

As if but an unnoticed pale shadow, I sat on the front lawn watching. Somberly, the men pushed their way into the tiny front door. Wailing as they hung on each others’ shoulders, the women circled the tiny mud hut before going inside. They obviously knew what to do. Soon, they were back out, wailing and walking around the hut again. Suddenly, Ruth bolted out the front door and fell with her face to the ground, sobbing. Bracing her with their arms, the women helped her up and walked her back into the hut. This cycle continued until, with a pastor’s influence, Simon gathered them all into the hut—a short sermon, a song, a prayer.

Before Simon and I left, I pressed money into Ruth’s hand, enough to bury her son and enough to buy a new dress. I told her to put it into her shoe. I knew eager hands would be demanding. She seemed despairingly poor.

Sometime later, Ruth came for a visit. She missed James. She glanced away when she admitted how much she missed her son. But she smiled when she told me she still loves Jesus and she knew she would see them both in heaven one day. And now she had Felix, born seven months after James died.

This last year, Into Africa has been giving monthly support to help Ruth. Besides struggling to feed her own three children, she has the responsibility of caring for two of her siblings’ orphans. Sammy wrote to say, “I visited Ruth’s family yesterday. Though I didn’t find her, I had a great time with the kids. Ruth had travelled to a funeral of a relative who had died. The kids always get very excited whenever I pay them a visit. It is always fun! As you can see from the pictures, Ruth’s kids had their friends come and share with them the little sweets I had carried on my visit, which they joyfully enjoyed. I had a short Bible story with them, sang a few songs and prayed together! Whenever I visit them, I always see them as my little sisters and brothers who need my help!”

We wouldn’t have known, had we not been told. He’d lived on the streets because his father was dead but, as a young man, he already knew what was expected of him. Now that he was a Christian, now that he was educated, he had some big choices to make. This is one reason why Africa is Africa. This is what he wrote:

In marriage, young people from age zero to thirty-five years are not allowed or permitted to talk with any one of the opposite sex. In case you’re found standing near each other, it is a grave offense.

In these days, adults from age thirty-five and above are forced to marry when they neglect or refuse to marry, because parents are the people to make the decision for their children. The parents want to have grandchildren. If you reject the decision, you will face it roughly.

You can’t bring a lady from just anywhere as a wife because the people in the villages will properly reject you and curse you very badly (i.e. you will have no children or your wife will run away). You must talk to your aunt to bring for you a wife from where she married. Even up to this day, even Christians choose their child’s mate, but they don’t put a curse on the one you choose. If, however, the aunt is not a Christian, she may choose for you a wife of bad character, so if you don’t want to marry her, she might put a curse on you.

If you go to your wife’s place or home, you must go with some gift to please the mother to your wife. Before taking dowry, you should not look at the roof of that house or even look at the face or eyes of your mother-in-law because that shows disobedience. Also, her mother should not be allowed to see your chest because it shows disrespect to her.

If you’re married, your mom and dad are not supposed to sleep inside your house no matter what the situation is. As well, you cannot have sex with your wife at your parents’ house. Though you can visit them, you cannot spend the night there. If you do, later you will (supposedly) get a disease called chira, which is like AIDS—getting thin, little by little. If you have not said what you did, you will actually die. If you admit what you did, they can do some things which will help you become well and healthy. They would go to the elders, give a sacrifice of goats, chickens, and cattle, then they will perform witchcraft. Christians that live in the rural are generally not strong enough to withstand the pressure of this cultural way, so they also participate. Because they believe in the laws of this culture, it worries them, and they become confused. They don’t believe in the Word of God firmly.

Most men are always treating their wives mercilessly, miserably, and unfairly, because they know that women are like donkeys, doing everything in the house, on the shamba [garden], fetching water, looking for food, and all the work areas. Men are just going for a walk in the morning, from ten o’clock, out of the shamba in order to take alcohol. They roam around, finding nothing to do. They come home stinking of alcohol, gambling, quarreling, and their eyes are like Chinchilla rabbits (those with red eyes). Nevertheless, some men are kind to their wives, but it is because of the way they were raised. There are some foolish and arrogant men who are just ruling their wives and supervising them all day long. They don’t allow their woman to see the sky, but only the ground, jembe [garden hoe] and the seed.

If a married woman divorces her husband, and if she then has an accident and dies, she will be buried outside the fence of her father, not inside the compound. When a girl marries, she becomes part of her husband’s family and should be buried there. But being divorced means she has no place to be buried, so her father will bury her outside his compound as if she is a visitor.

If the second or third son marries a lady before the first son marries, he should not stay in his father’s compound with his wife. They must stay outside the compound in a rented house until the first son marries. Also, the married followers to the first son should not enter the house of the first son, even without his wife.

We wouldn’t have known, had we not been told. A young man who once lived on the streets already knew. This is the way he told it:

Once a woman’s husband dies, her aunt will shave the heads of the widow and all her children - Michael Jordan style (bald, without one hair). The widow should not walk outside the compound into the village until the funeral is over because she might spread that disease which killed her husband. She must also wear her husband’s clothes to indicate that she has a funeral. She must wear it until the funeral is over. Then, she will give the clothes to the person who shaved her head. Many “city” Christians don’t practice this, but they do in the villages. If the villagers see that Christians don’t practice this, they think there is something wrong with them mentally.

If people have three or more married daughters, the first daughter should arrive at a funeral first, the others following her. If she is late, the others will not enter the gate until she comes. Because the men share the compound with their father, the order of arrival is concerning the married daughters.

In a funeral, people come to mourn with those who are mourning. Others are just coming to try to grab the property. Some are crying because the person had died with a debt owed to them. Some are coming to drink and dance, quarreling with each other, or just as a place to celebrate. The sons of the man who died must return to their homes in a certain order—the oldest goes to his house first, then the others go home in order of their birth. When the oldest son returns to his house, he must have sex with his wife—which sets his brothers and sisters free from curses that they might have gotten at the funeral. When the oldest son has had sex with his wife, the other brothers must go to their houses and have sex with their wives. Then the older sister must go back to her home, which then allows her sister to be able to leave—in order of their birth. If this is not done properly, it is believed that you might have a child with physical or mental problems, or you can get sick yourself. Most Christians, even those in the cities, still practice this.

After the older brother has had sex with his wife, the people at the funeral celebrate and dance their Luo tribe’s traditional dances, sipping alcohol, going around as if they are celebrating for the dead person.

After the death of the father, a few months later, the brothers will divide all his property. The mother will only remain with property if she is very hard—becomes stubborn, goes to the police, or the chief.

When all the brothers are fighting, taking away their father’s property, selling everything, leaving the compound with nothing inside, it means that the spirit of the man who died was demanding his property. The villagers will keep quiet while the fighting is going on, hoping they quarrel until everything is gone. If the man was richer then they are, they want his compound to be reduced to less than theirs so that their name will be greater than the man who died.

When digging the grave, if anyone or any animal falls into the grave, they will bring a witchdoctor to perform a ritual so that nothing of destruction can happen in the house—like madness, death, and injury.