Monday Evening, 5/30/11

Good evening friends,

I am posting this evening, and it may be the last post I make until we get to Israel! I'm not sure I want to buy to many more shillings worth of internet here in Kenya!

I am hoping that you had a wonderful Memorial Day and that you are not only thankful for those who gave their lives for the great Country we live in but more than that, the one life that was shed for the freedom of the entire world, from before he died and rose again, to the last souls that will ever live when he comes again! My Lord, what a Savior! Remember Calvary!

We had a tremendous day, going through Nakuru Park with my sister Sue and her husband Merle!





The only thing is that it is a fenced park, but the animals are completely wild and unfed by humans!

Now there was one that was wanting Cheryl to feed him, as she was getting something from the vehicle, a giant male baboon came and tried to puch her away and get into the car! She screamed and kicked, and then chased the sucker! What a valiant lady! He hid in shame and then she posed in front of him! Crazy!



Nakuru Park is all around Lake Nakuru. The lake is the central theme of the park, although it has most of the wild animals except for the elephant and the wildebeasts!The lake is absolutely loaded with Flamingoes and Pelicans! What an intriguing watch! We so greatly enjoyed the day!




The park is especially noted for its White Rhino! They are very docile and will seldom charge or harm humans unless threatened! We had oone that had around a 3 foot horn! It was amazing to see! It so reminded me of 'The Fillup'! :-)





Oh folks, we saw another Leopard! This time he had a baby Giraffe (that was sad) killed and up in the tree! I thought we had attained with the other Leopard in the tree around dark! No, No! This one is the MACK DADDY! Check it out!





Some other amazing waterfowl, without naming them are below!






Bwana Asifiwa sana! (Praise the Lord very much)! In Him, Lael and Cheryl

Happy Memorial Day to everyone!

Good morning and the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you and upon you and through you!

I appologize; I had not had the time to post last Friday or Saturday, so I shall take the time to do that quickly before we head out to see Nakuru Park with Merle and Sue Beachy, my sister and brother in law, today. Our unlimited internet runs out sometime this evening and I want to download as much as I can with it too before it does.

Friday and Saturday found us spending more time in the compound at Kichakani Camp than normal - just trying to catch up with everything, meaning studying, writing, praying, and whatever else of necessity that needed to be done.

We read the whole book of Job those days. Oh what a joy that was. My Lord! WHat dialogue with heaven! Job, a man of God, speaking out of turn a bit, but God had regard to him by his offering. His three miserable comforters could only be restored to God if Job would offer the sacrifice for them! Thinbk of the tremendous amount of weight that we as believers carry on our shoulders before God, for the relationship of those who do wrong before Him! Contemplate that a bit!

On Friday, we had the baboons in the camp again. This one took off with the chicken scraps and ate then just outside our tent on the other side the fence where JJ couldn't get to him!


The other somewhat unsettling thing that was just outside our tent that day and then literally under our porch the morning we were leaving was the Monitor Lizard. OIYYYY! I know you can't really see it here but he is almost 7 feet long! His mama and daddy are 15-18 feet! Just sat away big guys!


More Maasai Mara

I thought we shall post a few more Maasai Mara photos of the last few day that we went out for a short time.

The Topi a rust and bronze colored fellow. There are quite a few of these on the range. They seem to be the cops that warn - maybe better; the watchmen on the wall that warn everyone else oof impending danger! Notice all the Thompson Gazelles around. There are hundreds of thousands of those everywhere you go.

Talk about the greatness of nature and God's creation. Here is another chameleon. Notice his change in color from the first photo to the last one, about 3-5 minutes later, after he sheds his skin coat to change his color! Don't be a chameleon and blend in to whatever surrounding you are in! Here he had just climbed up onto the rock!


Here he is shedding his skin and blending into the rock color!


Have I told you that my favorite animal on safari is the Giraffe?!?!?! Yes - they are so graceful! Here is a large male!


Here seems to be a male Hippo following a female! Notice they bring their back ends up out of the water to do their business! Quite a scene!


We saw sooooooo many guineas. Never have we seen so many on safari! I always found them so annoying in the states. They are even more annoying if they are in the big fig tree outside your tent early in the morning!



The work of the Weaverbirds! They sew their nests so intricately!

Here is one upclose!



The african version of a Killdeer! Far more beautiful than the american version!



Here is one of the more exciting photos that we took. The amazing Kitebird or African Flycatcher. Cheryl caught this magnificent fellow in action. The first one he is coming toward his wife on the left - you can see her, and then he keeps dancing for her! Notice that tail!




Not sure of the exact name of this one but it is in the robin family!



And then we found ourselve in the middle of a huge herd of Cape Buffalo! My Lord! Thanks for your protection! There were hundreds of them maybe toward a thousand. As we drove through, several of the mamas snorted and threw their heads at us and feigned a charge. Remeber we had been charged by a bull earlier!





As the sun set that evening, JJ our guide, and Mary our cook, built a fire for us out in the middle of the Mara, amongst the lions, and amid the hyenas wailing! A great test for the strong of heart as the sun went down and darkness settled in!

I ust go, they are waiting! In Him and for the Kingdom, Lael



A Quick Sunday, 5/29/11 Update

Hello Dear Friends,

Greetings from the great country of Kenya! We may not be back! We are madly in love with it! PTL!

Oh we had such a wonderful day today! We were asked to hold church at the Kichakani Camp for the workers there! God moved in such a glorious way and the Lord had his way among the believers and unbelievers alike! They set up so beautifully in the open lodge, a few chairs in a semi-circle for 18 of us.

There we worshipped, shared together, and I preached - and most importantly, God moved!

We then hustled along to head for Nakuru to meet with my sister and her husband for several days! I drove from Maasai Mara, all the way from camp to almost Mai Mayisha, and just about to head north to Nakuru when the radiator exploded - and I mean exploded! Well, we prayed immediately, and asked the Lord to do a miracle in providing assistance. Well, to make a long story, someone who knew Bishop Mulandi stopped to help us within 10 minutes of sitting there, and before that Bishop had already gotten someone who was to be 2 hours away, but was only 10 minutes away to come and tow us. Here is us being towed by the tow truck.

So, we were picked up by my sister's friends and taken to Nakuru! Here we are! Praise God, such difficulty made easy by the power and leading of our God!

I will post more tomorrow, the Lord willing!

We miss you all! In Him, Lael



May 27, 2011 Devotional, Blog, and Photos (Large and Exciting)

Devotional

Hello and good evening again friends,

I pray you are all experiencing his glorious presence – oh how that is the longing and cry of my/our heart. God’s grace be upon you as you bathe in the light of his glory!

Cheryl and I were doing our ‘read through the Bible in three months’ today and I was so moved to read in Job 20; listen;

Job 20:4  Do you not know this from of old, since man was placed on earth,

Job 20:5  that the exulting of the wicked is short, and the joy of the godless but for a moment?

Job 20:6  Though his height mount up to the heavens, and his head reach to the clouds,

Job 20:7  he will perish forever like his own dung; those who have seen him will say, 'Where is he?'

Job 20:8  He will fly away like a dream and not be found; he will be chased away like a vision of the night.

Job 20:9  The eye that saw him will see him no more, nor will his place any more behold him.

Is this not cause enough to serve God with sincerity of heart - to avoid this plight! Yes! I implore all of you with me; let’s walk in integrity, and the power and glory of God!

Today's Events

Well today we went out early again to find our family of lions! We found them again in their original home place. That was great to find. We watched them for a little while and then came back to the house to take care of matters. We played just a little Rook, and then took care of other matters. If you get a chance, be sure to email Cheryl and congratulate her for winning her third game while on this trip. It’s been thorough domination by yours truly! J

After her little 'glee tizzy', she went to doing laundry at her hi-tech Laundromat! She had quite a bit to do and got it done very efficiently.

She had a bar of laundry soap for the stains, which actually gets them out quite well after rubbing them together a while.

The dryer is powered by solar! Well at least somewhat! There is a clothesline strung out on our porch, as well as the railing is used.

I commenced to reading a little while on the new book I started reading, ‘Wolves in Shepherds’ Clothing’, another one by Ernest Weaver. Those of you who have it, be sure to read it ASAP! It is more wonderful than I thought.

After I read a while, I worked on writing some more for the book I am writing. I actually made real good headways today – not so much because of the amount but more distinct clarity for the direction to go with it. Thanks to those of you that are praying regularly for this!

This afternoon then, we spent about two hours lounging at the pool while napping and reading, as well as I do approximately 30 minutes of workouts a day!

OH, I also discovered that today is Friday and not Thursday. That was a little saddening for both of us, as neither of us are ready to give up our post here at Kichakani Camp yet.

Today’s Game Drive!

In our quest to find the lions today, (both morning and evening) we had a few more animals to add to our photo album. (Birds as well, but those will be the last, but I promise they will be great – you’ll enjoy.)

How about this male Impala! I think he’s very worthy of eating some 30-30 lead, don’t you! I know that of all the animals here, he is the one I would most like one of on my wall! You could call him Solomon, because there are groups of hundreds of female Impalas, but only one male services the whole herd until he is worn down and another beats him out. There are times that I believe the group of wives rivals Solomon! Poor guy - but he does seem to enjoy himself!

And then we ran across a wonderful baby Giraffe with its mama. Wow! Was it ever cute! It checked us out under the supervision of its mother, and then they jogged away together!

And then, as I promised you that we would give you a better picture of the Warthog! Here is the delivery of this promise. Isn’t he handsome!

Well, I need to give you another photo of my buddy, Big Boy!

We were sitting there watching him scout for food a while, approximately 15-20 yards away, and then I told him, “Big Boy, give me a big yawn!” Literally within 3 seconds, he yawned a big yawn for me! All of us laughed tremedously, as it seems he and I have a little friendship going on - I always call him 'Big Boy' by name!

 We have been following him and his pride of lions for all this week, hoping to see a kill. This evening after dusk, we saw them chase a zebra, but miss. It was somewhat sad, and yet not, because we couldn’t see it because of the dark. We could only see outlines, but the zebra they were chasing ran 20 yards away from our vehicle! WOW, it was a short thrill. Hopefully they won’t kill before morning!

Here are the photos of the birds we saw today!

The first one we saw was the (not sure of the exact name because it’s not in the book but it is in the Korhaan family. 

This Lilac Breasted Roller was a little distance away, but worth the photo nonetheless!

This African Eagle was more than happy to pose for Cheryl!

Is the Paradise Fly Catcher amazing or what! He and his wife were dancing for us and singing the day away just outside our tent today! I have several more great poses and photos of him.

I’m not sure which Batis this is, but gorgeous he is!

The Heuglin’s Robin needed a quick shot because he was on the move.

While not technically a bird, Cheryl was amused by the unusual, beautiful Dragonfly!

 

Oh my, where did beauty go! Look at the Ground Hornbill couple!

This one of the Ground Hornbill is noteworthy because we had not seen the Gabar Goshawk was in the background and we didn’t even realize we got him on camera!

 

Look at the magnificence of the Tony Eagle! Notice he is eating – we saw him tearing the flesh apart before our very eyes!

 

So, God bless you again! May the Lord give you a good day while we go to sleep! In Him and for the Kingdom of God! Lael and Cheryl