So often missionaries speak only of the poverty and struggles of the field. Rather than merely showing pictures of people in need, I want to highlight the gems of Africa.
T.I.A. = This is Africa
Often this phrase is derogatory, but here is the truth.
Africa is Rising!
One area Africa excels in is coffee. Some of the best coffee in the world comes from Africa. Today, I would like to talk about God, coffee, and Africa with Kifu Coffee’s Jeremy Spainhour. And of course we are going to give away some coffee a bit later!
NoSuperheros: Hi, Jeremy, Welcome to NoSuperHeroes.
Jeremy: Thanks for having me. Glad to be here.
Give us a bit of your background.
Well I grew up in the farm country of Indiana, USA. My father was the pastor of a small church and mom was a nurse. The early years were quite pleasant. But, as it goes in a fallen world, churches and families often fall apart. This was the unfortunate path my story took. So from the age of 10 to 22 I lived in opposition to anything and everything that smelled of Christianity and its God. It wasn’t until I had landed myself in crippling despair, the point where I had nothing to show for my life other than a criminal record, a drug addiction, the legacy of a high school dropout, and a trail of broken relationships, that I saw all of God for the first time in Jesus Christ.
It wasn’t until the point when I had nothing to offer God that he offered all of himself to me. Six months later I was on a plane to Australia to attend a Discipleship Training School with Youth With A Mission. In the amazing grace of God, as I was pursuing the life of God, I would find the love of my life, Keldy. Keldy and I did the long-distance thing for two and a half years while I completed a School of Biblical Studies in Montana and participated in a teaching ministry called Titus Project in Uganda.
While teaching pastors inductive Bible study in Uganda, I sensed for the first time that I was actually doing what God created me to do. So I came home from Africa, proposed to Keldy, got married, finished high school, went to college, went to seminary, and all along the way I saw God opening doors that should have been permanently shut for a high school dropout with a criminal record. Keldy and I experienced the unspeakable joy of having our first son, Kezek, and I am now working as a bi-vocational pastor in the Christian and Missionary Alliance. My other vocation? I roast the world’s best coffee!
So after studying theology, how did you get interested in roasting coffee?
It actually began when Keldy and I held a missions conference at our church back in 2008. Instead of the typical missions offering that is usually collected during such a conference, we talked the missions’ committee into giving us money to offer the congregants. The idea was to show them that the mission of God is not something that only exists overseas. Indeed, all Christians are part of that mission. So they had two options: (1) they could use the money to bless someone and they did not have to pay it back; (2) or, having spoken on the parable of the talents, they could invest their money over a period of six months, make it grow, come back, and the whole church would pool the money together to give it to the missionaries our church supported.
So we took our $20, bought an air popcorn popper, and began roasting coffee in it! We called ourselves Kifu Coffee Roasters. “Kifu” is Swahili for ‘they satisfy’…in its verbal form.
We started by selling to friends and family, but then strangers began to contact us. We saw God turn our $20 into over $1,000 dollars during that six-month period, so we decided to keep doing it as a not-for-profit business, donating all of our proceeds to missions, and did so until 2011. Our machinery began to evolve over the years. Our air popcorn popper turned into a small, toaster oven sized coffee roaster, and then that evolved into four similar sized roasters. But after graduating from seminary, in the summer of 2011, we decided to actually start making a living from Kifu.
How does supporting Kifu benefit Africa?
This business allows us to participate in God’s mission on the streets. One of the ways we do this is by using our business to support a community development and church planting ministry in South Africa called Bridge for Hope Another way Kifu benefits Africa is through our Cows for Communities project For every 5,000 lbs. of coffee we sell, we donate a cow to a community in need in Africa through World Vision International.
Coffee is not your true love; tell us about your future plans.
Currently, Keldy is finishing up a nursing degree and I am in the ordination process with the Christian and Missionary Alliance. At some point we plan on moving to South Africa to join the vision that Bridge for Hope has begun to live out in the Cape Flats of South Africa. My “true love” is teaching the Bible and Keldy’s “true love” is helping to meet the immediate needs of those in need of medical care. Bridge for Hope seeks to do both in a place where it is sorely needed.
If someone wants to purchase from Kifu, how would they go about it?
It’s pretty simple. Just go to www.KifuBeans.com and, using your PayPal account, place your order. If you do not have PayPal, we can do checks as well!
Thanks for visiting with us Jeremy. For more info on Kifu and their African projects, go to their website or follow Kifu on Facebook. Follow Bridge for Hope on Facebook HERE
And the part you’ve all been waiting for! FREE COFFEE
Together, Kifu and NoSuperHeroes will be giving away 1 pound of either Kenyan or Ethiopian origin coffee (your choice) to 5 different people! FREE to those with a US shipping address!
How do you win?
To enter you must do one or more of the following: (Max 5 entries per person)
Have NoSuperheroes.com post delivered to your inbox (2 entries)
Tweet this post or share it on Facebook(1 entry)(see sample below)
Follow Chris on Twitter (1 entry)
Like NoSuperheroes Facebook page (1 entry)
For a sample tweet or Facebook share, Cut and paste this:
Winners will be contacted via the social media they signed up with (email, twitter, or Facebook). They must provide a US address to ship to. (for my overseas friends, you are welcome to give the coffee as a gift). Entries close in one week at midnight on July 27th.
And remember…
This is Africa and she is Rising!