Transcription

00:10

Emily: Welcome to the 4:18 Podcast. If you have listened before, you likely know that the name of this podcast comes from Luke 4:18. If you’re new here, Luke 4:18 is a verse in which Jesus announces his mission, and it reads, “The Spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind,

00:35

to set the oppressed free.”

This podcast shares untold stories of what God has done and is doing in Africa to bring good news to the poor. I’m Emily, and today I am sitting down with Ryan Bristol, one of our 2025 team members who went with us to Kenya. Ryan was great at soaking in everything we heard and truly engaging with the pastors. But before we dive into more about our time in Kenya,

01:02

Ryan, would you tell us a little bit about who you are–where you’re from, what you do for a living, and anything else you’d like to share? 

Ryan: I am the associate pastor at Living Faith Fellowship, a church in Kearney. And some of the responsibilities that I have as associate pastor include the youth ministry. I teach the high school and junior high students. And then my wife, Kelley, is primarily responsible for the younger kids.

01:29

And so that includes our Wednesday night ministry that we meet every Wednesday, and also VBS, and then we have various other events throughout the year. I also do a little bit of everything. Our church is a size, such that Paul and I don’t have clearly delineated responsibilities. We overlap a lot. So I teach Sunday school about every week. I fill the pulpit. One thing I enjoy most about pastoral ministry is preaching.

01:57

It’s one of my favorite things to do, and several other responsibilities.  But to put it shortly, I think Paul would be primarily the lead preacher and teacher of the congregation. And then I sort of fill in the blanks where needed. Yeah. And I mentioned Kelley, we have four kids together, Micah, Luke, Josh, and our one girl, Brooke. And one thing I’m really enjoying right now,

02:25

is coaching Micah’s youth football team, YMCA flag football. So he’s very fast. He does a very good job running the football. And it’s fun to watch as a dad. Not to go on and on, but as I told you, I had lunch with Peter and his wife, Faye, yesterday. And I almost texted you, but I didn’t because I didn’t want you to feel like I was telling you how to do your job.  But I think it would be a really cool segment on a podcast to do

02:53

the wife’s perspective while the husband’s in Africa. And if you happen to talk to Peter and Faye, I think she’d be a good one because I know he travels a lot. So she would know a lot about holding down the form. Yeah, Kelley certainly did an amazing job, and the church also was very kind. I think they made some meals while we were gone.

Emily: Oh, that’s awesome. That’s so sweet. And then what do you do when you’re not pastoring?  

Ryan: Yes. So I also help out on our family farm.

03:21

And my primary responsibility is the cattle. We have about 200 cows this year that we’ve calved out, and we’re pretty well done. I think I have a couple to tag today, but yeah, that’d be my primary responsibility. But we also have some row crop and some hay ground.

Emily: Very nice.  

Ryan: I enjoy farming very much also. 

Emily: Yeah. Yeah. I think having you on the trip was also

03:48

just really valuable to engage with the pastors there because it is… it’s not as common for pastors in America to do what you do, I feel like, to farm or do something else while they pastor a church. But in all of our African communities, that’s the norm, and that’s how they have to make a living is by having a business. So I think you were just a great asset to have that perspective and have conversations with people and engage with the pastors in that way. So yeah. 

Ryan: Yeah. And that’s one of the reasons I…

04:16

I really appreciate Possibilities Africa, specifically the Possibilities Africa pastors, because they do live sacrificially, they’re bivocational, and I admire that very much. Yeah.  

Emily: Yeah. Yeah, that’s great. So as we transition to the trip, what are one or two things that left a major impression on you? 

Ryan: Specifically, to the Possibilities churches was the commitment that…

04:45

each of the pastors that we heard talk had to having a theologically pure ministry and being very committed to Jesus Christ. And even the Word of God, I know we heard scriptures quoted by the pastors. Martin himself, I remember at one church, he said something to the effect of like, our ministry is not just about helping people have businesses, you know, and everyone seemed to be…

05:13

in agreement with his comment there. And that was really what was encouraging to me, to know that what we’re supporting and what they’re doing there in Africa is truly Jesus’ ministry that He’s actually doing by the power of the Holy Spirit. So that was what was really cool, I thought. Two things. 

Emily: Yeah. Are there any specific names or faces that stick out in your memory? Yeah. Harrison, one for sure. He’s on Possibilities Africa staff. He was a good…

05:42

workout partner and singing together was fun.  It was very helpful too to be able to talk to people that knew many of the churches, so he was an asset in that way.  Also Wilson, I think I met him at the first place that we went.  But yeah, he had quite a story. He had been an alcoholic and came to Christ and was able to overcome that sort of life-dominating sin, which I think is…

06:11

significant, considering the resources that they have access to would be very limited.  That church was in one of the poorest communities we went to, and he has since turned his life around. He has a business now selling fish and fruit, and he was one that sticks out. Also, I believe his name was Willie, or at least that would be the American version. He had a dairy cow and we used to have dairy cows so I remember him also.

06:40

Emily: So now that we’ve returned and you’re in Nebraska, how do you want to live differently? 

Ryan: Yeah, so I think for me, and really, I had a lot of time to sort of contemplate this in my mind before we went on the trip, in part because of my eagerness and commitment to go on that trip that got canceled. I had been studying the book of Ecclesiastes and actually reading through a commentary there. In 2023 when

07:10

we had committed to go on that. And I just had been really convicted after reading that to  steward well all the resources in my life that God has given me, more than just the financial gifts that God’s given me, my time, my gifts, my family. And, you know, that trip really just, I think,

07:34

put that concept in stone for me, so that now that I have returned to really make the most of all of my time and do the things that honor God the most. 

Emily: That’s so good. Do you have any funny stories from the trip? 

Ryan: Yes, I do. I do. And I’ve been waiting to share this one. 

Emily: That’s great.

Ryan: I have a few funny stories, but none of them… 

Emily: Oh, you can share multiple. That’s good.

Ryan: Well, I’ll just share the best for sure. 

Emily: Okay. 

Ryan: So when we were at our last location,

08:04

I was packing up my bag for the last time.  And as you know, we stayed at a few different places, so packing up our bag became sort of a routine thing. But this was the last time. At this particular place we were staying, they instructed us to always lock our doors when we go through them. In fact, the doors had no doorknobs. They only had locks to keep them shut.  And I was simply going in, I had one thing to put in my bag, and then I was going to leave to go home with my bags. You guys were staying.

08:34

But as I was putting that last thing in my bag, I didn’t lock my door. I just closed it, but not latched. And I heard my door gently open. And it was strange because it opened as if a human pushed my door open. And so I turned to look to the doorway, expecting to see Doug. And  I had to move my eyes much lower because sitting in the doorway was a baboon. And

09:02

I knew we had been warned about the baboons and monkeys, and I was afraid that he was gonna claw me or charge me or something. So I took my laundry bag, my dirty laundry bag, and chucked it at the baboon.  He dodged out of the way, and I thought I had success until I saw him come back to reach for my laundry bag, and he wanted to take it. And then I went in just like cattle instinct mode, and I started saying, “Yah, yah,” and waving my arms, and he ran away.

09:31

Emily: I did not know that. 

Ryan: Yeah, and I got my laundry back. It was a very funny, also somewhat scary experience. I told my sister, I said, sort of expected him to look at me and say something like, “Follow Rafiki, you know, I know the way,” but he did not speak English. 

Emily: That’s so funny. I love that you went into cattle mode. 

Ryan: Yeah. 

Emily: Lesson learned, lock the doors in Kenya.

Ryan: Yeah, keep the doors locked and…

10:01

stay away from baboons. 

Emily: Yeah. Man, that’s good. Well, is there anything else that you’d like to share? Anything that sticks out from your time in Kenya? 

Ryan: I think I just would say in conclusion, one thing we haven’t touched on was it was an incredible blessing to go and be able to worship with people who we really have very little in common with. This, you know, this calving barn would be similar to some of their churches. That might be one thing in common. Yeah. But other than that, culturally,

10:30

we have very little in common with, I would, with those people. And yet you could sense and participate in worship together, knowing the common fellowship we have, having been purchased and saved by the blood of Jesus Christ. And then to also do that with some of the American brothers that went on the trip and to have that shared experience and enjoy the presence and fellowship of God together and worship Him, to me, really was like a foretaste of what we’ll do

11:00

in the eternal state after Christ has returned and recreates the earth, and peoples from every tribe and tongue, and nation will worship Christ together. I don’t know, I think in a lot of ways it was sort of a foretaste of that. And that was very meaningful to me. That was part of the reason I’d always wanted to make a trip to Africa. So that was very good. 

Emily: That’s so cool. When you said that you’d always wanted to go to Africa in specific, was that a certain age that that started or just over time? 

11:30

Ryan: Yeah, you know, I think because of my occupation for so long,  just kind of being tied to cows and the farm, I kind of had written it off like, like not something I thought would ever happen. But my pastor throughout childhood, he was a missionary kid in Congo. And so I had heard so many stories about Africa and what it was like and things like that. So I just kind of had in the back of my mind if I ever had the opportunity,

12:00

I would love to take a trip like that. So, yeah, dream come true. Yeah.  

Emily: That’s awesome. Yeah. And do you want to tell us why you said the barn is a place to record this in today? 

Ryan: Yeah. So, so we’re sitting in my calving barn, and it’s made out of corrugated tin and it has some wood posts and wood rafters. It’s not insulated or finished or anything like that. And I thought it would be good for one for recording because of the straw bales to absorb some of the sound.

12:29

And so I hope that the sound quality is good enough for you folks. But yeah, I think it sort of maybe helped jog the memory as well. I don’t know. So that’s kind of what I had in mind when I was doing chores this morning, and I thought, you know what, we should just record out here. And so I don’t know, do you think it worked out, Emily? 

Emily: I think it works great. Yeah. 

Ryan: Well, you’re welcome to use it anytime. 

Emily: Thanks so much. 

Ryan: Yeah. The rent is very cheap. 

Emily: That’s good to know.

12:56

I do think though, yeah, I’m just sitting here looking at the walls and I think that so often, I grew up on a farm as well in Nebraska and being in Africa, you know, a lot of their churches look just like this and it’s a gathering place to worship God and from American standards, you know, this is what we often put livestock in. But something that is so powerful is the fact that it doesn’t limit their worship at all. I just think we have so much to learn from them, and the way that they worship and the way that

13:23

the Spirit of God moves through them in those spaces. And yeah, they’re not confined to a building, neither are we, you know? It’s like love is in their being, and they don’t need a nice building to have all the gifts of Jesus. So I think it’s a reality of obviously the difficulty of poverty to like paint that picture, but also the beauty of life with Jesus because it’s just so not of this world, you know? 

Ryan: I like what you say. Their building…

13:52

for sure, each place that we went did not affect the exuberance of their worship at all.  So that is one fun aspect of African culture, especially. 

Emily: Exuberance is a good word. 

Ryan: Yeah, it is. They are very exuberant. It’s hard to not get sucked in to that. You want to sing loud and clap. You know, I know we talked on the trip one thing, like what things would we bring home? And…

14:18

First Sunday I was back, I found myself swaying a little bit. 

Emily: Oh yeah. 

Ryan: While we were singing, I was probably getting looked at, and people were like, what happened to Ryan? 

Emily: That’s not the style at your church?

Ryan: Our church is probably not so exuberant of style. Yeah, yeah. 

Emily: What happened to Ryan? Ryan went to Kenya, that’s what happened. 

Ryan: And now he’s charismatic. 

Emily: That’s so funny. That’s great. That’s awesome. Well, it’s great to sit down and chat with you. Any other final words or themes from the trip this year? Anything else about Possibilities Africa?

14:47

Ryan: Yeah, I don’t think I have anything except I would just say, yeah,  it’s a great organization. Martin is doing a very good job leading things and setting things up so that the ministry will continue on for much time in the future. And also, Doug, and we had some conversations even after we came home about how they’re putting things in place so that this thing will be going for the long term, which I think is really important in ministry.

15:17

It was a great experience, great to learn all about it. 

Emily: Yeah, I think that’s a wrap. 

Ryan: Great. 

Emily: Thanks so much for your time. 

Ryan: I’m out of words. 

Emily: That’s good. That means we did our job.

Thank you for being here. We appreciate your partnership in prayer and in giving. If you’re interested in partnering financially, be sure to head to usa.possibilitiesafrica.org and hit the donate button.

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