A 30 year long journey that begun in a crusade
My name is Emmanuel Alambo Ayiro. A.k.a Mr. Alamba,Emmanzo and Baba Arianna. I got saved when I was in class 3 in a crusade; It was such an awesome day and I couldn’t wait to get home to inform my parents about my decision. I have been a devoted Christian since then, what an amazing journey! Incidentally, this year in August it will be marking 30 years since I accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as my personal Saviour.
My writing journey prophesied at a tender age
About the journey, reading, and writing, My story may not be likened to someone who would get the highest marks in English composition and Swahili Insha but I just had a passion for writing. Contrary to that, all through primary, I had convinced in mind that I am not able to read any book without pictures apart from the bible. Even the bible at my tender age, my parents had found a way to get for me the illustrated bibles and Christian comics – David, Moses, Daniel, etc. And I soaked them like a dry sponge ( for those doing children’s books, please keeping doing, you have no idea how many you are building). If a book didn’t have pictures, I only read it because it was a requirement- set books in high school. It wasn’t until campus that light struck on my head and I was “Wait a minute- I can read books without pictures”.
Until one day I was sharing my new revelation with my parents that they told me when I was being dedicated as a baby by the late Apostle Harry Das, he had prophesied that I would love reading, a lesson from it; first, our children must be dedicated to the Lord, and secondly, though a word may tarry, it will come to pass. I started challenging myself to read one book in a month and the story goes on to this extent whereby I focus on reading one book a week. I also target to do at least 50 books a year, buy at least one book a month, and at least 10% of the books I read should be Swahili books. It is just so fascinating that I look forward to getting the books of the African Christian Authors to add to build my library for the sake of a future generation.
I Sayed ‘yes’ to call from God
After campus, God calls me to work in Kakuma Refugee Camp and later to Dadaab Refugee camp. While at the latter, God called me out, The year was 2010 December to go to a land that He will show me. I thus resigned from my job to follow him, and he called me to establish BushCulture which entails a lot. Below is just a bit of it:
VISION
BushCulture is a faith-based initiative that seeks to nurture the young at heart and age to identify and fulfill their God-given purpose in life. This is by facilitating a change of attitude and a reformed worldview through the greater insight of God and experiential learning. Therefore, “Securing The Future Generation.”
MISSION
BushCulture seeks to nurture people into creative, confident, self-motivated individuals through various activities, which include but are not limited to camps, team building, and generational change sessions.
CORE VALUES
1. A God-Centered life.
2. Journey mentality.
3. Sacrificial living.
4. Personal initiative.
5. Servant leadership.
OBJECTIVES
BushCulture strives to underline and emphasize the importance of the following:
1. The value and the place of God in an individual’s life.
2. The value and importance of community and teamwork.
3. The value and importance of honest hard work.
4. The development of character- honesty, respect, obedience, responsibility, discipline, love, forgiveness, faithfulness, appreciation, personal initiative, time management.
In that space, as I continued to do the devotion that God challenged me, the difficulty was to come up with a plan that young people can have their devotions. A guide? I was resistant a bit because I would say there are already daily guides, daily bread books, the devotional material, and most of all, I am not a writer. However, that urge got stronger and so the first thing that came to mind was to have a sample that I can share with young people because any time I met them that was one of the major points that stood out. The point that they didn’t know how to read the word and track God, and I for one, know and believe without a shadow of a doubt that we don’t know how to live until we read the word of God.
It was time to have a book
Since I had been writing my summary notes as I did my devotion, that is what I started with. I said I would just compile my notes- Genesis to Revelation, photocopy and bind them and distribute. Nevertheless, as I talked to my real-life hero, my father Pastor Ayiro, he told me “you have done too much work, you cant just bind it, look at how it can be made into a book.” The Father speaks and I heed. I went downtown and a friend of mine helped me in printing and compiled all my notes to 3 booklets. We covered Genesis to Malachi to start off;
They were titled- Bushman Devotions
1. A journey Through Genesis to Job.
2. A Journey Through Psalms & Proverbs.
3. A Journey through Ecclesiastes to Malachi.
We were to do the New Testament but God decided otherwise and it was fine with me. The year was 2012 but God was like, “ we are just but beginning”, he had bigger plans in store. God reminded me that He wanted us to do a devotion guide that would help believers and especially young people to be able to read their bible chronologically from Genesis to Revelation. I thought that message was for my dad since He had written some books. I went to him and he told me that it was a brilliant idea to go ahead “Get your brothers and sisters in the faith and do the job, I will pray for you and commission you”, and that is exactly what he did.
Armed with the commissioning we embarked on the job – That is in 2018. At this point, I give props to the team who took it to the next level and made the book that I have been nominated for a real award.
https:“WE DON’T KNOW HOW TO LIVE UNTIL WE READ THE WORD OF GOD”.