Saturday, December 4, 2010

Kennedy leaves us to go on his mission

One of the most rewarding and spiritually uplifting aspects of our responsibility of serving in the mission office is to be able to meet and work with not only the Elders that serve in the Kenya Nairobi Mission, but also to get to know the ones that leave from Kenya to serve in other missions. Recently Kennedy, the young man who has been our interpreter for the investigator class we teach on Sundays in the Kilili Branch, left on his mission. His is an inspirational story! He has only been a member for a short time. However, in that short time he has been so committed that he was given many responsibilities in the branch. Catch this, at the time left for his mission he was the: branch mission leader, the young men's president, the English class teacher, a member of the branch choir and the alternate gospel doctrine teacher in Sunday school (that is before he started interpreting for us). He and three friends from other branches in the Kilungu Hills received their calls on the same day. Two were called to The Uganda Kampala Mission and Kennedy and another to The South Africa Cape Town Mission.

Here are the four Kilungu Hills friends the day they were set apart as missionaries. They left the next morning for the Mission Training Center in Johannesburg, South Africa. Kennedy is the one on the left. Also in the picture are Elder and Sister Blake (on Karen's left)-they serve the four Kilungu Hills branches from which these young men come; and Kenya Nairobi Mission President Steven H. Broadbent (on the far right) and his wife Sister Julie Broadbent (on the far left).

Here Kennedy is with several members of the English class he was teaching every Tuesday.

Here he is with his Grandfather and his mother.

He enjoyed singing in the Branch choir. Here are most of the choir members.

When he came to the office to be set apart, he was able to meet with his sister (who lives in Nairobi) for the first time in quite awhile. She is not currently a member of the church but was supportive of Kennedy's decision to serve a mission.
He will be a great missionary and we will miss serving with him.

2 comments:

Gayle J. Randall said...

So good to see this young man serve. I helped print the photo that went on his mission papers. We also met him when we taught a workshop in Kilili before we came home. Zion is growing and will be aided by this young man as he serves.

Robyn said...

What a great example of giving your whole heart to Christ.