March 2008 – Kenya Violence and Other Information
March, 2008
Greetings once again from Care of Creation! And a special thank you for praying for our people in Kenya over the last month – things are better but far from normal (see below for more on the current situation in Kenya).
First, some housekeeping items
As you can see, we’re trying out a new email system to stay in contact with you. Let us know how you like it. We’ve discovered that quite a few of our newsletters were not being delivered because your computers (or your ISP) thought we were spammers. We’ve signed on to this service in order to (hopefully) overcome that hurdle and get our news to you. If you haven’t heard from us in quite a while, this could be the reason. [On the other hand, if you really didn’t want to be hearing from us, please check the links at the bottom of this message – the service allows you to manage your own subscription with us, and you can unsubscribe directly if you choose to do so.] In order to keep these messages coming every four to six weeks, you might want to add “@careofcreation.org” to your mail system’s “white list”.
Keep Praying for Kenya
Here in Madison Wisconsin it seems like winter will never end – the snow just keeps on coming! It has occured to me that this is how our brothers and sisters in Kenya feel about what has been happening to them. Numbers are far from accurate, but we hear of more than 1,000 killed, 300,000 forced to flee their 
homes, thousands of houses and shops burned across the country. Even though there is now a settlement in the works that is supposed to bring in a coalition government, it will be years – years! – before this beautiful land is itself again. We don’t think much about “environment” in a crisis like this, but we should: Land issues and the pressures of population and poverty all contributed to the pent-up hostilities that exploded during this time, and God’s creation will suffer yet again as poor people scramble to rebuild by cutting more trees from forests already devastated and depleted, leading to still more poverty and suffering as the environment on which they depend for survival collapses under them. Thousands of people who are out of work, because of forced displacement or because their industries have collapsed will be even deeper in poverty than they were before. These are not happy days for this once-happy country.
We thank God that our staff, both local and expat, are safe after some tense days. Now that stability has returned normal project activities are starting to pick up again. Craig and his assistant Francis are trying to get 30,000 trees into the ground by Easter, and with it a message about God’s vision for his people and his creation in Kenya. New Kenyan staff are in the process of being added to increase our adminstrative capacity and to allow Craig and Francis to continue their outreach efforts to Promote God’s Vision, Plant God’s Trees and to teach people how to Farm God’s Way. [These are the main goals of our Kenya project efforts – read more here.]
Jan has arrived… almost!
Many of you have been praying for Jan Korbel as she worked hard at fundraising for many months. Jan has accomplished her fundraising goal, and as I write to you, she is settled in language school in Kenya for a three month refresher course in Swahili before joining the team in Kenya. Jan will be moving to Kenya at the end of May, and will be helping in a number of different areas dealing with the “Vision” component of the project mentioned above.
Praise God with us for providing Jan’s support needs; pray that these months will be profitable for her- both in terms of language mastery and to give her rest and spiritual preparation for what will be a busy task when she joins the team.
The Madison Team is also Growing…
Madison Wisconsin is not as exciting as Kenya – but the work being done out of our administrative office is critical; the Kenya project could not move without the support of the administrative team in Madison. Up to now we have been getting by with volunteers, including the services of Fred and Stacey Gluck, who happen to live in Vermont. Telecommuting can only go so far, however, and Fred and Stacey have decided to take a big step and move to Madison this summer to begin to serve full-time (Stacey, at least) helping me with administration. Please pray for them – we’re still working on funding for Stacey’s position, and Vermont to Madison is going to represent a significant change for these guys.
Pray for the planning and moving process; for a place to live in Madison; for the money necessary to underwrite this critical expansion of capacity for the organization, and for an easy adjustment – Fred and Stacey will be a long way from family.
Our Father’s World enters a new phase
We have been pleased with the response to the first edition of my book, Our Father’s World: Mobilizing the Church to Care for Creation. We hope for an even better response when InterVarsity Press releases the second edition in April. The new book is about 20% longer, has a couple of new chapters and now includes a discussion guide. You can pre-order it from InterVarsity Press here.
In conjunction with the release of the book, we will be holding a number of Our Father’s World seminars in the next few months. If you are in the area, we hope to see you in Madison (April 4-5) or Minneapolis (April 19) (scroll down to “Saturday Seminars”). We’re working on a Rhode Island date in May – more details on that in our next newsletter. There’s a trailer for the Madison seminar on Facebook – check it out here and share it with your friends. [And if you are on Facebook, feel free to friend me – I’d love to find out how you are thinking about God’s creation, whatever your stage in life might be.]
Director Needs Support…
That’s me and my wife Susanna. We raise our own support, just as the folks working overseas do. And while we’ve done a good job at helping the overseas staff keep their support up, our own has been flagging. Thanks for praying with us through this – and if you would like to donate, just click here. [Email fund raising seems to be working for the presidential candidates – maybe it will work here? Let’s find out!]
Pray that God would provide enough sustaining donors (people who give every month) so that we can continue to support those doing the work overseas without being distracted by fundraising issues.
Board Meets in Madison on March 26
Finally, our Board of Directors is going through a time of transition. As we mark the end of our third year as an organization, a number of our founding board members have had to drop off for various reasons. We have a number of new, very qualified people ready to join, but such a transition can be distracting. In particular, we want to raise up a board that can take over some of the leadership that staff have been doing up to now, and who can guide us with wisdom and spiritual sensitivity.
Pray for the right candidates; for God’s grace and wisdom at the upcoming meeting; and for God’s blessing on what are often mundane – but important! – organizational decisions.
Thank you for your partnership with us, and your concern for God’s creation. Wherever you are, you are, that is your corner of God’s creation. Take care of it!
Blessings,
Ed Brown, Director
for the Care of Creation family
