After driving miles on unpaved roads our family pulled into an elementary school sitting at the top of a small hill outside of Nairobi, Kenya. At the bottom of the hill was a dirty pond where livestock lapped water and people from the community were filling jerry cans with water to use for cooking and washing.
Minutes later, a light blue tanker truck pulled in behind us with “Speed the Light” painted in large white letters along each side. The driver, a Kenyan woman, hopped out and attached a hose from the truck that pumped clean water into a storage tank outside the school. This weekly delivery is essential to the school and community who would otherwise gather filthy water to drink from the pond below.
The truck was purchased with funds raised by Minnesota students through Speed the Light (STL). In recent years, STL has partnered with WorldServe International to provide clean water to communities in multiple African nations. These trucks transport clean water temporarily to communities that are on a growing list of places where a well will later be dug.
WorldServe has also expanded their partnerships; in 2020 they launched a series of videos from Tanzania to connect their initiatives with BGMC. They invited us to Kenya in September to film the second installment of this “Jerry Can” series, featuring our kids.
They have also branched out to manufacture and distribute feminine hygiene products to women who otherwise would have no such resource. Bridging the Gap is sponsoring one of those projects to be launched at the Thrive Conference.
We are thrilled to continue to partner with ministries like WorldServe who use necessities like clean water to share the Living Water of Jesus.
