“The Word of God Means Everything” to a Kenyan Church Receiving Bibles for the First Time

An Urgent Message

When Joe Baran received the message, he knew he had to do something about it. Pastor Hesbon Arwasa had contacted Joe, hoping to find Bibles for his congregation. He shared with Joe that his greatest desire was to preach the Word faithfully to his congregation while they read it for themselves as well. Located in Kisii, Kenya, there are few means possible for believers to purchase personal copies of the Bible.

“One of the things that we first told him was to ‘look at the messages on our website. There are many messages that you can expand into full messages for your congregation,’” Joe shared. “But the more we spoke with him, we could see his love for the Lord and his knowledge of Scripture—it was pretty amazing.” Pastor Hesbon himself had a Bible, but he was finding it difficult to preach effectively since no one else in the congregation had one of their own; they were simply listening to what he said. They were taking him at his word without being able to see for themselves what God’s Word says.

Through the generosity of donors to Crossway’s One Million Bibles Initiative: Global South, Joe was able to respond to Pastor Hesbon’s desire to provide copies of God’s Word to his congregation. He longed to give men and women a way to read God’s transformative words for themselves. Their shared goal of seeing lives changed by reading the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ has created a bond between Joe and Pastor Hesbon that neither of them could have anticipated.

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Planting Seeds that Lead to Eternal Life

Joe came to faith in Jesus later in life. After living a life contrary to the gospel, he was all in when he received Jesus as his Savior. Not long after he was saved, a pastor friend preached a sermon that would change the remainder of Joe’s life. “He talked about a dangerous prayer, but warned us not to pray the prayer unless we were really serious about it,” Joe recalls. “And the prayer was that God would break my heart with what broke his. Several weeks after praying that prayer, it came upon my heart in the middle of the night that there are millions of people around the world who do not know Jesus. And how are they going to know Jesus unless someone shares the good news?”

Thus began his journey of In Messiah Ministries. Joe’s hope since the founding of the ministry has been to provide the message of the gospel to as many people as possible so that more would come to saving faith in Jesus. Through daily devotional messages, Joe shares the gospel using different Scripture passages. They’ve seen visitors to the website from China, the Middle East, all over Africa, and other hard-to-reach places with the gospel. The ministry is responding to a hunger among men and women all over the world who desire to know more about God but may not know where to start.

For Joe, this means channeling his passions for evangelism and writing. “I’m an evangelist. I want new people to read the gospels and find Jesus Christ for the first time. If our role is to plant the first seeds of the gospel, admittedly, we may never know on this side of Heaven if or how that seed grows, blossoms, or bears fruit. But the Lord knows, and we’re going to be faithful in planting that seed. And I think that’s really important. That’s In Messiah’s main goal.”

And though In Messiah is meeting the initial need of helping these people to learn about Jesus, at times, they get glimpses into an even greater need and have the opportunity to see these seeds grow and blossom, like Joe has had with Pastor Hesbon.

What’s heartbreaking is that I get a lot of requests for help from different places, especially in Africa. But because we’re a self-funded two-man ministry, we don’t have the financial means or bandwidth to respond to all of these requests. I speak with pastors, and I tell them about how they can use our website for informational purposes, but most of them just have a deep need for access to the Bible. In places like Kisii, Kenya, where Pastor Hesbon lives, that’s really difficult.

Through the provision of several cases of the ESV Global Study Bible given to Victory Worship Center (Pastor Hesbon’s church), Joe is seeing some of the seeds blossoming and bearing fruit beyond what he could have imagined.

A Chance to Read God's Word

For Pastor Hesbon, the change in his church has been remarkable. He can now look out over those in his congregation—who are sitting in plastic chairs seated in the hand-built metal building they use for services—and see every individual in their seats with an open Bible in their laps. “The Bible has helped me as a pastor in guiding and transforming my flock both morally and spiritually. I’ve seen remarkable spiritual growth and renewal in the minds of the believers. They see now for themselves that God’s Word holds the final authority and is the truth for guiding their lives.” These men and women, many for the first time, are reading the Word of God for themselves. Joe expounded on Pastor Hesbon’s statement by emphasizing that,

The Word of God is everything, and without it, Pastor Hesbon can speak all day long. But those men and women need to look in the Bible for themselves. As a believer who has a Bible knows, I can look at the same passage innumerable times, and I’ll still sometimes see something new that I’ve missed before. So until somebody has the ability to do that for themselves, it’s very difficult for them to know how to view and weather the things that are going on around them through the lens of Scripture.

Pastor Hesbon lives in a region where many tribal languages are spoken, but English is the common language among the congregation. This is what he uses to preach, but since it’s a secondary language, simple English is much easier to understand. Pastor Hesbon commented that the ESV translation, in comparison to some other translations he’s read, “is easier for my church members to master and to really understand the knowledge from the Bible. The Bible is the only instrument of power that a Christian or a believer may have, especially in my context.” God’s Word is being opened for many men and women for the first time in a way that they can understand and be transformed as a result.

We praise God for the living Word that continues to be distributed in countries throughout the Global South, including Kenya. The One Million Bibles Initiative: Global South will provide one million men and women with their own copy of the Bible—for some, like these men and women in Kisii, Kenya, their first Bible to read for themselves.

Pray for the Lord to equip Pastor Hesbon with spiritual strength to endure the challenges and difficulties that come.

Pray that God would continue to give Joe the strength he needs to continue doing the work God has called him to, and to give him God-honoring words as he writes.