From Rwanda to Ethiopia

The Team left Rwanda on the 4th of July, leaving behind the lush green shades of the land they had come to love and flying into Addis Ababa, the capitol of Ethiopia, where the weather is soggy from the rainy season.  Travel and checking into their new living quarters filled this day but tomorrow would once again change their lives forever.

July 5th brought the Team to Korah, Ethiopia where they were scheduled to work
with Project 61.  This ministry works with the kids who live in the city dump, scavenging for food to survive.  The community of Korah started as a place where lepers lived.  Lepers exiled from the rest of society much like in Biblical days.  Today Korah is an area for lepers, for people with HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis but also an area for the poorest of the poor.  All are outcasts, living in tin paneled, hole-filled homes smaller than one of our outside storage buildings or smaller than a walk-in closet.  Without roads, mud was everywhere, deep, oozing mud 5 inches deep.

The Team was assigned jobs, women painting tin buildings to be used by Project 61 and the men pouring concrete. 









Other Team members worked with children who came from nowhere and everywhere clamoring for attention and food.  As in Rwanda, immediately the Team began to bond with the children who wanted to be touched and drawn close.  Open hearts looking to the Team for help and love.  Lindsay Allen writes "...I went from a nervous girl holding back when we first got there, to the girl with 8 children hanging all over me, kissing their little heads and wiping their snot. ...God showed me that these people might be outcasts from society, but they are still loved by a great God.  They are not gross or weird or evil.  They are beautiful and kind."

Later some of us visited a home in Korah where team leaders, Laura and Tymm Hoffman, sponsor one of the daughters providing her with boarding school education.  The home was tiny, divided into two sections with cooking outside. 

        

                                                        

As believers we are commanded to be hospitable and in this place were they have next to nothing, we were welcomed with open arms.  Out of their little, we were given seats while the family stood.  We were served Ethiopian coffee and sweetened popcorn.  They offered to wash our feet as we came inside covered with the mud from the pouring rain. 

They asked us to pray for them and we did.  Hands holding hands, heads bent in reverence to the Father seeking His blessing on these precious people. We will never forget the home visits, the loving hearts of the people of Korah and the generosity of the people.  In their poverty, they served us who have so much.  It shames the deepest part of our hearts.

July 6th was a day no Team member will ever forget.  So many children coming from every direction.  Children who had great need for food, for clothes, for shelter, for love.  Needs more than we had ever seen before.  They surged around us wanting candy or gum or someone to play with them or hold them.  Too many to help.  Too many to hold.  Too many.

Goats for sale

The Team put their money together and purchased 2 goats which were slaughtered and cooked.  The meal of goat meat and Ethiopian bread was to be served to the Project 61 kids in the Church made up of a tent.  The Team did not at first understand they were only feeding the sponsored kids of Project 61.  Soon it became apparent that there were hundreds and hundreds of starving people crying out and screaming for food.  Lindsey wrote "Have you ever seen a really really hungry person?  I know I'm always saying, 'I'm starving!' but before today, I didn't really know what starving looked like."   The crowd knew there was food.  They knew there was meat.  The mass of people pushed forward, shoving smaller ones out of their way as they grabbed for food.  Small children were knocked down, walked on and trampled in the mud in a desperate attempt to eat.  Again Lindsey wrote "I felt so helpless.  I felt horrified.  I felt scared.  I wanted to throw up....Now I know what starving looks like."

With only a short time left in Ethiopia, we had so much to do and so much to learn.  We met with Jerry Shannon and his family of Embracing Hope Ethiopia.  This ministry is also in Korah but they work hard, keeping children out of orphanages and off the streets.  Day care is provided for dozens of children while mothers seek some kind of employment, scavenge the dump or even beg to support their families.  The Team presented EHE with a gift from the ladies of First Christian Church.  This gift will be pictured in the next blog post. 

The Team visited the grave of little Brighton, the tiny son of Laura and Tymm Hoffman who passed away before they could travel to bring him home.  Broken hearted by their loss, "Brighton Their World" was established to send life sustaining baby formula to the poorest orphanages especially in Ethiopia.  Just barely 2 months old, Brighton's short life has influenced the lives of many, resulting in mission trips and tons of formula feeding the tiniest of orphans.

 

After vising the cemetery, the Team visited the largest of the state orphanages in Addis Ababa where tons of formula has been donated by Brighton Their World.  Donations from First Christian Church along with many others provided the means for the Team to be present when a huge gift of formula and diapers was delivered by the Hoffmans.  No pictures were allowed in this orphanage but I have been there and it is filled to overflowing with kids of every age from the newborn to the teen.  When I left there I wanted to put every single child on the plane with me.  I wanted to group them on the stage of First Christian Church and say "These children need parents.  Who will accept the call to be their mother and to be their father?"  In my heart I knew the stage would soon be empty of children, all of them on their way to their new home with their forever families.

At the end of a mission trip, when the Lord has pierced your heart with the reality of how much we have and how little others have, it is time to take responsibility. Time to make a change.  I went to Ethiopia feeling like a lower middle class American and came home understanding that I am wealthy beyond measure.  Why are we so blessed when others are starving, hardly living, needing medical care?  Why?  Because the Lord is telling US to be His hands, His feet, His love on this earth.  At the end of our days, each of us will stand before Him, look Him in the eye when He asks "What did you do with what I gave you?"  

I have seen and I am responsible.  Through this blog I hope you, too, have seen and you, too, will serve according to His Will.

"Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring

for widows and orphans in their distress and refusing to let

the world corrupt you."  James 1:27

Mission Trip to Rwanda

James 1:27 says "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world."

About a year and a half ago I returned from Ethiopia pleading with the Lord to show me what to do with all I saw.  After a short time, I could not ignore the urging in my spirit that the Lord wanted others to go, to see and to do.  The Orphan Care Ministry of First Christian Church was born and it was not long until Laura and Tymm Hoffman became team leaders for a trip to Rwanda and to Ethiopia.  I ached for people from FCCM to go and I was able to almost sit back and watch the Lord as He chose who He wanted to care for orphans on this trip.  Personally I have rarely seen such interest and cooperation from any congregation as people stepped up to help send those who wanted to go.  Brothers and sisters in Christ and family members, friends and co-workers offered donations to help pay for the trip.  Then came the Single Sisters who made hundreds of bracelets and donated every penny to the travelers.  People donated sheet sets, handmade dresses, sports equipment, craft items by the ton and too many other things to list. (There will be a separate post about the baby dolls sent with the team to Embracing Hope Ethiopia.) 

I thank each and every person who helped make this trip possible and I especially thank those who went to love on orphans.  Their lives have been turned upside down with newly learned Truths from the Heavenly Father.  This is part one sharing the tiniest bit of their story.

Our Team

This is the team who represented First Christian Church and the Orphan Care Ministry.  Front row: Carla Decoskey, Jenny Guyer and Kelly Brock who is a friend of Carla Decoskey.  Back row:  Gretchen Bennett, Terry (T.J.) Ford, Judy Chance and April and Joe Fjeld.

On Friday, June 29 the team flew first to Washington, D.C. to meet up with the rest of the Visiting Orphans team led by Laura and Tymm Hoffman.  They then flew to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia before flying on to Rwanda.  Their first stop was Kigali, Rwanda where they met the Best Family who survived the genocide and now minister to others who survived the same horrific event.  The team then visited the Genocide Memorial Museum which is an amazing memorial to the thousands who were killed.  Rwanda is a fine example of how a people can come together in forgiveness even after something as dreadful as genocide.

Peace in a place set aside to honor the dead.

Soon it was time to settle into the work the team had set out to do.  First stop was Noel Orphanage which is home to over 600 kids.  Let me quote Lindsay Allen, a team member from Alabama, as she describes their arrival at Noel.  "We drove up to the orphanage in our bus, and there are children standing at the gate.  I don't know how many.  Lots.  And then some more.  They were all jumping and screaming and pointing and waving...and smiling.  Oh man were they smiling.  We drove into the gate and they rushed the van.....Children immediately grabbed your hand as you stepped off the bus....we began saying "my kid".  My kid's name is Nirere (age 12).  He took my hand as I got off the bus.  I hugged him and he said "I love you.  I have been waiting for you".  I mean talk about a way to start the day."

                                                 Gretchen Bennett and her buddies.

All 28 members of the team including the NC 8, were divided into smaller teams with planned activities.  There was the Sports Team, the VBS Team, the Music Team and the Craft Team which was headed up by April Fjeld.  Our congregations in Kernersville and in High Point donated tons of items from sheets for Noel, clothes and underwear and socks, paddle balls, jump ropes and lots of other things.  The Orphan Care Ministry and the Single Sisters packed 600 cross necklace kits for the children in Noel to make and keep.  Here are some pictures of the team and their necklace making.                              

                                                                              Jenny Guyer and friend making a necklace.

                                            Joe Fjeld helping little people make necklaces.

T.J. Ford making necklaces with one of his new buddies.

It was by no means all necklace making that first day at Noel.  They toured the facility, ached at the smells especially in the infant rooms due to lack of diapers, played soccer, played basketball, blew up balloons, face painted, did more crafts, blew bubbles and so much more.  They sang and were sung to and even asked if they knew Justin Bieber!  Here are some pictures of the team loving on kids in the name of Jesus and in our place.

April Fjeld smiling at the efforts of this little one.

                                                                         Carla Decoskey enjoying her time with the kids.

Judy Chance playing with a little boy with stickers.

April Fjeld already with two new friends as soon as she arrived at Noel.
Husband, Joe, is right behind.  What an incredible blessing for
a married couple to share.

The team had lunch and time to shop at No. 41 ministry where women make bags to sell.  Each sold bag feeds one child, one meal for one year.  The team, overwhelmed by the enormous good that comes from this ministry, bought every single bag they had and Tymm had to go back the next day for more.

To be honest, I am not exactly sure when the following event took place but this seems to be a great time to tell you about it.  The team had a meal made by a lady named Florence who was trying to make a living cooking meals.  She was really struggling financially.  The team went to Africa knowing there would be many times the Lord would speak to their hearts about helping special individuals and ministries.  They took spending money, Joe and April took t-shirt money, and our NC 8 had some Orphan Care Ministry funds donated to use as they saw fit and as led by the Lord.  The team put their heads and hearts together and decided to help Florence.  When told of her financial gift from the team, she fell to her knees praising the Father who had provided the blessing.  Immediately Laura Hoffman fell to her knees with Florence in praise and worship.

                                                                Laura and Florence

One of the most exciting projects of this trip was their plan to share the Word of God.   Tymm and Laura worked with Visiting Orphans and thanks to a generous donation from a FCCM family, Bibles were given to each team member.  Bibles written in the native language.  The team members were to find a person to witness to, one on one, and share Scripture with them.  Each team member was then to give that Bible to the person they were witnessing to.  Bibles were marked with favorite passages and prayers were said asking for seeds of faith to be sown in Rwanda.

Jenny Guyer sharing the Word of God.

The team spent 2 days at Noel and before they left, once again they felt led to bless the orphanage.  Laura said the team responded often and generously when someone felt led to assist.  This time they bought food for Noel.  Bags and bags of food that are seen in the lower right of this picture.

Once again I want to quote Lindsay Allen's  words as they left Noel for the last time...at least the last time on this mission trip.  "...I had to say goodbye to all my new little friends.  One said "I will nevah fohget you Linsee" and hugged me.  Seriously?  Seriously?  I mean, this is the same child who grabbed me when I got off the bus the first day and said "I love you.  I have been waiting for you."  It's like she knows exactly what to say to just break my heart.  I hugged lots of necks and gave high fives and then we had a very emotional send off.  All the team members were crying and the kids were running after the bus waving.  It was such an emotional day.  So much joy, so much sadness about leaving, so much love.  And even though I left there with baby urine on my jeans and bird poop on my arms and cow poop on my shoes, I have never felt more blessed."

The Lord knows when we have reached our emotional limits and Visiting Orphans is extremely good at inserting a time that is sweet fellowship and spiritually refreshing.  The last night in Rwanda was an incredible dinner together at Lake Kivu.

                     Watch for the next blog post.....Mission Trip to Ethiopia....coming soon.