Maasai Development Project

The Maasai Development Project Blog will be used by members to post updates particularly while on trips to Kenya. Here you can view these posts and make comments.

Thursday, December 31, 2009

Proclaimer Radio-Faith Comes by Hearing

The following is a report written by one of our MDP lay workers, Immanuel Tumpes, serving in Oloitokitok District. He received a Proclaimer Radio when they were donated by my sister, Cherry Goodridge in May. These radio's are both battery and solar operated and have the New Testament in the Maasai language. To find out more how you or your church can get involved in this program go to the following website: FaithComesByHearing.com

Enjoy the report.

Truly Faith Comes By Hearing
by
Immanuel Tumpes

The “Proclaimer” radio has been a great blessing to my people and relatives since I received it. Many of my relatives have enjoyed listening as the Word of God is being read, book to book and verse to verse to all in our own language.

Here is an amazing story of the Proclaimer impact to society. A father in-law of my elder brother is blind. According to available information, his blindness was caused from an eye infection during childhood. Although his wife is a devoted Pentecostal church believer with some of her children, the father is a fulltime drunkard. One of her sons is our church member since earlier this year. Therefore I usually visit the family and discuss the Word of God. Yet the Proclaimer created another huge bridge to the salvation of this family.

One day for visitation I planned to visit the elder with the radio and have a time to listen with him who is a very good listener with very sharp hearing. I first tuned into the epistles of John, which in large content talks about love. He appreciated it very much and we exchanged views about how love should be cherished and practiced by all. The elder urged me to spend more time with him listening. But because other family members were out for duties, I promised him to come another day. I hereby got a new chance and style to talk to him especially about his serious problem. After some months of conversation, he changed greatly and dramatically his habits. Different from the past, he can now spend one to two weeks without getting into drunkenness. When he is not in the situation he comes to me, asking for the Proclaimer.

More amazingly, he now tells everybody that his church is only “Sabato”, although he has never attended. But what I receive with more appreciation is that two others of his sons have been discussing and studying with me the Bible truths. They have accepted the message but their mother, who is a leader of an evangelical church, was pressuring them, causing an obstacle for them to join the church. However, the elder of the family who had been listening to the Proclaimer, supported them in their decision and they now have a right to worship with us. By now the two young men although still students are our church members, ready for baptism. Whenever they are at home they attend all of the church services.

What I have learned is that many people are ready and willing to listen to the Proclaimer rather than to devote time to reading for themselves. Because so many of the Maasai people are not educated and cannot read, the Proclaimer is a wonderful tool for witnessing.

The great challeng is this:

If anything now days happens anywhere in the world, it will be known very quickly all over the planet because International Broad Casting Stations are present throughout and everywhere, even in the most interior areas like Somali land.

The same is true to the Word of God. If the Proclaimer radios can be found in every home, many learned and unlearned will be very blessed by the light of truth and will come to Jesus, “They Way of Life.”