kenya: the story of Peter

I first met Peter outside the gates of the Deliverance Church on the outskirts of Kitale. It was a Saturday morning, and occasionally on a Saturday, Deliverance Church has a ministry washing and feeding the street kids of Kitale. The word was out that the mzungus (white folks) were in town, so there was quite a crowd.

Peter spoke pretty good English, and surprised me at first as he immediately asked for my email address. “Homeless, but has email?”, I thought, as I scribbled my email down as best as possible on a scraggly piece of paper. Peter was pretty tall and though it was hard to tell, he looked even skinnier than me. He told me he was 22 years old and had been on he streets for around 8 years. It was a warm day, yet he was wearing jeans and a pretty thick jacket. Mind you, this was his only set of clothes…

I only talked to Peter for a minute or so, long enough for him to ask me for my shoes. I obliged, figured out how I could get them to him at the end of the week, encouraged him to get washed and fed, then moved on to greet others of the multitude waiting outside the gates to get in.

About an hour or so later I saw Peter again, this time inside the gates, looking kind of hesitant about the whole goings on inside the church property. There were kids running everywhere, lines of guys and girls waiting to be washed, people preparing food… it was a beautiful chaos. I made eye contact with him and then walked him down to the join the line where the guys were being washed. I left him in the line and went inside the bathroom area to survey the craziness. Kids everywhere, clothes everywhere, water everywhere, and a few of us white guys pretending like we have some kind of organizational structure happening!

Peter pulled me out of the guys bathroom block and told me the girls were finished in their side of the bathroom block. I told him he could go in and use their showers, and he replied, “I would like you to wash me.” I was puzzled! We walked over there, and while all the other people were “clothes off and into the water” in front of everyone, I could tell there was an uneasiness with Peter. After helping him take his layers of clothes off, I found out why he was uneasy.

Even though Peter’s ribs and hips stuck out from his skin, they were of the right proportion, as opposed to his torso, which was about 15 inches in diameter. His arms were super-thin and he didn’t have the strength to raise them above his head. His spine was literally popping out of his now hunched-over back.

Water was barely dripping out of the shower head, and formed what could be best described as a cold constant drip. I began to scrub Peter’s back with a remnant of left over soap and a hand-ripped section from a potato sack. As I washed, we chatted. He told me about his family, and how some bushmen came to their village and had killed his parents when he was younger. He then moved to Kitale to live on the streets and got a job loading and unloading trucks. He suffered different illnesses from both the work and living on the streets. I am not exactly sure of the spinal condition he has, but I know he has a combination of different illnesses. He told me he didn’t have HIV, he had been tested five times, and was very proud of the fact he was negative. As he talked he occasionally had to spit out some blood. I think I might have been scrubbing too hard. He mentioned it had been about eight months since he had been able to bathe, as he needed assistance to wash because of his spine and arms.

I had Peter wash his own face, but I had to hold his elbows up by his chest in order for him to get his hands on his face. The soap was running out, but he asked to be scrubbed some more. Skin was coming off faster than soap was going on! Even though the water was cold, I know he was being refreshed by this experience.

Obviously, washing another person is not the most glorious task, and I am not trying to pretend that this was a comfortable action for me to undertake. But, I was surprised at what God taught me in that moment.
It wasn’t about pride (no one knew I was doing this except Peter).
It wasn’t about feeling good about myself for “doing good.”
It wasn’t about how the story woould make an awesome blog.
I think God taught me about the real meaning of doing ministry. All I was doing was “meeting needs in love.” There was no need for a reward for my actions, as the action was a reward. Peter could have thanked me a hundred times, but serving him was the real reward for me.

Eventually we rinsed off, and I helped Peter put back on those same grimy clothes we had just taken off twenty minutes before that.

This was not the last I saw of Peter, as I have had several encounters with him since then, both in Kitale when I was there, and now via email. Side note: I still have trouble with the fact he doesn’t have a roof over his head, but he has an email account and visits an internet café!

I will post more about my interaction I have had with Peter, including how I have been trying to figure out the best way to “support” him now that I am back at home. I am learning plenty from this experience too!