In 2016, I heard the command of God for me to move into full-time unpaid missionary work at CLC Kenya. It took me about eight months to accept this call. When I say ‘accept this call’ I don’t mean I willingly surrendered. Nah! Like Jacob, I was not going down without a fight. I felt God cornered me into it and I was upset with Him for a while. Looking back, now I am grateful He cornered me – perhaps a testament of Hebrews 12:11 – Now, no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby. If God is chastening you, accept the process because His plan is better than ten of yours.
So, I left a thriving business with a steady income to work for non-monetary remuneration. At the peak of my success and financial breakthrough, the voice to join my husband in ministry work was loud and clear. I remember laughing loudly one day and telling the Holy Spirit how I saw myself getting broke and struggling.
My husband, Patrick Omukhango did not have a steady income even though he was on a full-time contract at CLC Christian Literature Communications – CLC Kenya which was going through a transition of its own. I could not see how we would manage to live in Nairobi, an unforgiving capital city that is merciless to those without financial power. This call could probably have worked in the rural setting – get a low rental house, have a small kitchen garden, plant a few vegetables, and survive on that as you wait on the Lord month after month.
When I joined CLC Kenya again on full-time basis after a couple of years’ break, I remember going from one month to another without lacking and the Lord sending ravens (not literal) to feed us. It was a life on the edge, and it was full of miracles, signs, and wonders. For a year, we lived beyond any money we could envision making.
Our bills were paid on time (for the most part), our children stayed in school with all their needs provided for (well, almost all their needs), and our table never lacked nutritious meals (though not always the choicest of meals).
I had the most confidence in everything I did. I could not do more or less than what the Lord had asked me to do at CLC Kenya, the missions organisation He sent me to.
There was neither an incentive to work better nor discouragement to do less because CLC Kenya was not paying me. My sole focus was on hearing what God wanted me to do and then doing it with all diligence and to the best of my ability at the time. God was my employer, literally speaking, and I would ask Him for stuff – material things and payments for the work I was doing for Him (Matthew 6:4).
All that was me digressing. This post is about one of the very first books I published earlier in my publishing career at CLC Kenya.
It is in the second year of returning (2017) that our first born daughter, Adnah McKenna got an opportunity to publish her first book, Conceive Achieve for Teens, co-authoring with Julius Mugambi. At 14, the girl had seen some fruits of allowing mentors to guide her life. She had been a contrinutor for a local magazine; interned with a local multi-outlet business and a few more jobs. It was easy to mentor her into authorship. My principle, taught to me by my pastor Vincent Odhiambo Vincent Frankline is if your service is too good, then start by consuming it yourself.
It’s been six years from the time Adnah McKenna launched her book and tracker journal for teens. She has won a leadership award from Josiah Kids, USA; she has started and graduated a mentorship program for other teens; she has sold hundreds of copies and received many testimonies of how the book is shaping the lives of teenagers. She has plans to get into schools and all… What an honour to have participated in enabling her to dream.
Now she is an adult and thinks for herself. While I am less in the picture as pertains to these dreams, I am happy to have been an initiator – a mid wife.
When she submitted her book and journal for African Christian Authors Book Award – ACABA in 2021, she received very actionable feedback from the judges. Further proofreading was needed and chapter pacing needed to be consistent. You should not have one chapter having 10 pages and the next having 50 pages in the same book – now we all know better!
So, we got to work to implement these changes. I am happy that the content is better and well paced. Staying true to the spirit of the ACABA program – the judges feedback is not meant to discourage the author but to help them improve their books to international standards.
We now have new books and the excitement is here again to see this 6-year-old baby (book) graduate from primary school, perhaps, to high school. One book has birthed four books and an additional two books co-authored with Nelly Kagoru Nelly Kagoru and Washington Blessing.
The baby (book) is now even doing an exchange program It will be available in 2024/2025 in French for the teenagers in France to be impacted towards their purpose courtesy of CLC France. Now, that’s something right?
If you have read this far, then you are with me Thank you. Help me celebrate this wonderful girl, tread-setting and leading in her generation.
She has her developing website up https://abiahexpressions.org/
With Christian Literature Communications – CLC Kenya / African Christian Authors Book Award – ACABA / CLC Kids & Teens / Adnah McKenna
Yours Truly,
Muthoni Omukhango
