Scorpions no deterrent

Long-time missionary baptizes hundreds of Kenyans

By Todd McGregor, March 19, 2007 My finger throbbed in excruciating pain, and a plastic bag functioned as a tourniquet. The northern Kenya medical treatment for a scorpion bite consisted of gasoline and some type of traditional ointment that my students had just applied to the infected area.

Just minutes earlier, I was checking to make sure I had enough film in my camera for the upcoming baptismal service – our first in this new village. I knew it was going to be a long service, as 400 came to faith in Christ over the past few Days and approximately 200 had decided to be baptized on that Sunday morning. In that camera case also awaited a sleeping scorpion, until I disturbed it.

Immediately after calling my group and informing them of the scorpion sting, I had five students by my side. One removed the scorpion from the camera case and crushed it on the ground with a pointed stick.

“What are we going to do now?” one of my evangelists asked, aware that the last person bit by a scorpion in the area was very sick and out of commission for two days. “We are going to have a baptismal service starting in 30 minutes,” I responded. That is exactly what we did.

The Lord was gracious to us as we arrived at Kamboe, 40 kilometers south of Marsabit, on the previous Tuesday. A team of 30 people had been invited to come and begin our primary evangelism mission among the beautifully beaded Samburu people. Every morning we sent out five groups into each village (manyatta) to share the creation and redemption story.

In the hot afternoons, some of our men would gather under the sacred acacia tree with elders of the community while our women would gather with the ladies and children under other trees. In the culture of the Samburu (cousins to the Masai), there are certain places where women and men are forbidden to gather together in public.

After the brilliant sun set, we would gather people and teach new songs, share from the word of God and watch The Jesus Film. Not until the Sanburu people left would we eat and head to bed on a thin mattress, sleeping under the stars in the open canvas tent.

I was exhausted from the six-day evangelism mission. Using The Wordless Book, the EvangeCube and the four spiritual laws, we taught the Samburu, who believed in African traditional religion, how to have faith in Christ. Focusing on Acts 2:42, we prepared them for baptism. [The EvangeCube is made of eight connected blocks which, through a series of six maneuvers, reveal seven picture panels illustrating God's plan for salvation.]

Some clergy spend their whole lifetime in ministry and baptize 200 people. Here, with this receptive group, it was done in one day. Over the past year, I have had the opportunity to baptize more than 500 new Christians in northern Kenya, and thousands have come to faith.

Some people ask me how we do this. The grace of God is already moving in the lives of the people. We just come and make the connection.

-- Bishop Todd McGregor, long-time appointed missionary of the Episcopal Church in Madagascar and more recently in Kenya, wrote this letter last fall before his consecration. McGregor has served in Africa with his wife Patricia Cox McGregor and their daughters Corban and Charese since 1991. They are from the Diocese of Southeast Florida. He says he is completed healed from that scorpion bite.

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