I have already written a brief biographical sketch of Jackson’s life from the mission’s perspective. However, there is an amazing story behind the story. This story is an incredible action suspense thriller.
To start, Jackson comes from an extremely wealthy family. His father had a lot of property and multiple cars (which are only owned by the super rich here in Kenya). Jackson was a driver and was well off himself. He was married with multiple children, but lived as a swinging single, his driving work putting him often away from home. He was happy-go-lucky and thought things were just fine the way they were. Well that all changed when his father died.
When his father died his uncles were determined to seize the opportunity to steal the inheritance from nephews. They immediately killed Jackson’s two older brothers and used witchcraft to render his younger brother insane. After they sold four of the five parcels of land formerly owned by Jackson’s father, Jackson took them to court. They threatened to kill him as well and he responded in extreme violence to terrorize them in return. They then used witchcraft to kill him causing a serious car accident which killed his passenger and left him hospitalized for over three years. The uncles then visited him in the hospital and organized for the doctors to kill him. Through a nurse’s intervention he was warned not to eat or drink anything or allow medicine from anyone at the hospital because doctors were paid to kill him and they accepted the payment. She gave him some of her personal money and he snuck out of the hospital with his serious leg wound (we earlier reported we suspected it was from a spider bite—apparently it started from a car accident wound) to a nearby city Eldoret. From Eldoret, he called his bed mate (people commonly share beds in Kenyan government hospitals) and his bed mate’s son answered and informed Jackson that his bed mate was killed. The nurse explained to Jackson that the doctors had accidentally killed the wrong man assuming it was him.
After some time, being totally abandoned and hopeless, he decided to visit two of his uncles in West Pokot. They rejected him and left him outside the gate. He decided to drink agricultural chemicals to end his life right outside their gate. He woke up in the morning with a bad stomach ache, but alive. His uncles chased him away and he went to a local pastor for assistance. That pastor gave him a little money and sent him to a safer place. He ended up in our village.
Here in our village he took the little money the pastor gave him and found a place to sleep for the night. When airing out his wound it wreaked terribly and neighbors let themselves in to give him soap to wash. They saw the wound and showed him compassion. They assisted him with a little food, a blanket and helped him find more permanent housing. He hopped with his walking stick to a nearby pharmacy and asked for boxes to sleep on and they assisted him. Later he sought the local government office for assistance and they gave him a little money immediately and a daily allotment to sustain him and get medicine for his wound. These many miraculous interventions were showing him that there truly was a God watching over his life.
With the money he was given he went to the pharmacy and there met Charlton and Silas. That was the beginning of our involvement. We raised funding and organized to amputate his leg. These were amazing impossible miracles to Jackson.
The next miracle went like this. He was hobbling on his one leg with his walking stick and his sandle broke. While sitting in his room he noticed a bicycle wheel spoke in the rafters. He knew that was what was used for making needles to repair shoes so he gave it a try. He successfully repaired his sandal. His neighbors noticed him repairing his sandal and asked if he could fix their broken shoes. By the end of the day he had fixed many pairs making a good day’s wage of under $2. Now as a driver he was making a huge wage of over $20 but it helped him little. Now this $2 seemed a fortune and assisted him immensely. Through these incredible circumstances God had given him his future business.
After KDM assisted him with building a new shop in a prominent location, government workers began disturbing him and trying to shut him down. Silas and Jackson visited the senior government official’s office and was welcomed by a man with one leg. The man asked him what his need was and Jackson informed him that local government officials were disturbing his business. This man is a big man in government…one phone call and Jackson is now permanently free to operate his business undisturbed.
We have already discussed the miracles of him being reunited with his family. Bit the story was incomplete. The last missing piece of the puzzle is this. Today two disciples taught Jackson’s wife the Gospel of the Kingdom. He has surrendered and has accepted to repent and be baptized on Sunday. Wow! What an awesome God we serve!