Kwamba. This was the last feeding center we worked at on our mission trip. It supported the most kids- hands down, and definitely had the most need.We arrived sometime mid-morning, and for the time we were there, kids just kept coming. The entire center became filled with curious wide-eyed children, as well as adults who wanted in on what was going on. From looking at the images below, you can see that they sit very close to one another, shoulder to shoulder and knee to knee, barely room to move. It is unbelievable how many people (combined kids and adults) heard the good news that day! Praise God for getting us there to share the good news... and praise Him for bringing in listening ears. I can only pray that those listening ears HEARD. "He who has ears, let him hear." Matthew 13:43b
Just like the other centers we worked at, we did a medical mission- Dr. Butler saw the kids and Jenny saw the older people. Mary Beth was able to work with Dr. Butler, and Emily and one of our translators, Dyton, wrote workups of their current symptoms before they were seen, which made it easier and faster to get people in and out. The more people that could be seen, the better. There were so many physically hurting people. We presented a hygiene clinic and passed out soap, toothpaste and toothbrushes. Susan read scripture and prayed with the secondary age kids, and Jenny presented the VBS story. We also did the crafts that went along with the stories. It is truly amazing at how God provided all the craft supplies for this center. We were so worried that we wouldn't have enough of anything... medicine, craft supplies, soap, toothpaste and toothbrushes... with this being the last center, a chunk of everything had been used and/or given out already, and now we were presented with an ENORMOUS amount of people that we wanted to provide for. God provided for them; every child there went home with a tube of toothpaste, a toothbrush, and a bar of soap. And they were able to make kites that went along with one of the bible stories!!
Great is thy faithfulness! Great is thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see:
All I have needed thy hand hath provided
Great is thy faithfulness, Lord unto me.
To see God working is a beautiful thing! To see His hand in everything He set us out to do in this beautiful land, spreading His word and the truth of Jesus Christ to these beautiful people was glorious. And the glory be to Him! It took this mission trip for Him to show me how He works... in everything and through everything. I get so used to our routine here at home that I forget to look and see Him working, even in the smallest of things. He showed me on this trip that everything is in His time, that He alone provides, that He cares and loves us, everyone of us. His children. When Ryan and I arrived back home, we prayed together that the Lord would continue to use us for His glory. We have seen Him working in our lives and opening sooo many doors for us. It's exciting and terrifying at the same time. We will go wherever He takes us; we pray that we will obey. So, here we go, down the path God has prepared in advance for us. Where will He take us next?? And what will He have us do?? I can't wait to find out!
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Malawi 2008,
Ministry of Hope
I recently read a book by Hannah Hurnard called Hinds' Feet on High Places. It was one of the most encouraging books I have read, and it is now one of my all-time favorite books. It is an allegorical story to our Christian walk with the Lord. The main character's name is Much Afraid, and at one point on her walk with the Lord, He leads her down into the desert (Eygpt). There Much Afraid saw a woman pounding bread corn with heavy stones. She saw what a LONG process it was of pounding the bread corn by hand before a fine white powder was formed- which was the finished product and was now ready for use. In the book, the Shepherd says to her "though corn bread is bruised, no one threshes it for ever, only until the bruised and broken grain is ready for its highest use." This is exactly as the Lord does with us. We are shaped and formed through trials and tribulations. But through heartbreak and loss, bruises and threshes, through our tears, He is making us into who He wants us to be. And this continues through our entire life here.As I was reading this section of the book, I immediately thought of the maize mills in Malawi. I photographed one maize mill at the Selengo MOH center. They had just installed a generator not long before we arrived, and this took so much of the work off of them. Previous to the generator, the grinding of the maize was ALL done by hand!! The generator was such a blessing to the fact that the fine white powder they used to make their staple, Nsima, was ground at a much faster rate and in much larger quantities. Here are some images from the maize mill:
Much Afraid at first didn't want to go down into the desert, as the path lead away from the high places. But look at what the Lord showed her, what He taught her. Later, Much Afraid says "You are my Shepherd whose voice I love to hear and obey, and that it is my joy to follow you. You choose, my Lord, and I will obey."
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Selengo was my favorite feeding center. This center fed the orphans of close to 100 surrounding villages!! Yet, it seemed the cleanest, most well-kept and organized. I've mentioned this before, but, I'll mention it again- one of the biggest blessing about this mission trip was the kids. Reading the Gospel to them, talking to them, holding them, playing all kinds of games with them- soccer being one of them- was such a tremendous encouragement to them, and such a tremendous experience for all of us who went. I have never met kids like these. They are beautiful little souls who help to take care of each other, especially their siblings, who will sit and listen attentively, who eat with their hands, who play soccer with a ball made out of wrapped up plastic bags. I drew pictures on a pad of paper for a crowd of kids and they told me how to say the things I drew in their native tongue, Chichewa. They laughed at my sorry little drawings. God has given me a passion for photography, but free-hand drawing is not a talent I posses. I laughed with them. The fellowship with peoples from another land, another culture, another 'time' was touching to my soul. I want to go back to tell them more about Jesus. For it is not us (the missionaries) who convert when telling others about the redeeming blood of Jesus Christ, it is the work of the Holy Spirit. Praise God for this. How scary it would be if it were completely up to us. God works in all things and through all things. In John 14:15-18, Jesus says "If you love me, you will obey what I command. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever- the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans, I will come to you." How awesome to know that He is always with us. He works through us for His glory and His will!
The team read the Bible stories and crafts with this center, as well as the medical mission and hygiene clinic. I got to read scripture and pray with the older kids! (the picture of my group is the very last image in this post) Ryan and Andy got to meet up with us at the end of the day, as they stayed at Katondo every day to work on the chicken house, but they joined us in playing with the kids, and of course, playing soccer, until it was time to go. Nobody ever wanted to leave. Leaving was the hardest part.
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The MOH feeding center of Katondo was where most of the work was done by our 2008 team. This is the site where we built the second chicken house. All of the team members got to work on it, but Ryan, Andy and Greg stayed here for the entire duration of our stay to try and get a majority of it done before we left. I have honestly never met harder workers than those that we met in Africa. The women even more so than the men. They had their babies strapped on and even breastfeeding while shoveling, scooping and carrying enormous loads of fill dirt over to the foundation. Kids helped by transporting large rocks on their heads from the feeding center area over to the work area - pics are in the slideshow.
Also in Katondo, we gave a VBS story and craft to the kids. Jenny talked about salvation the first day, and the kids made salvation bracelets as their craft; the second day, the story was about how God is always there, even though you can't see Him. The kids made kites that day out of brown lunch bags and string, symbolic of how the air that we can't see fills the bags and enables the kites to fly. Just as the air is invisible, God also is naked to the eye, but when He calls us to Him, He fills us up and we become free through His Son. "It is freedom that Christ has set us free." Galatians 5:1a "We live by faith, not by sight." 2 Corinthians 5:7 We brought crayons and stickers for them to decorate with. There was so much joy in the kite craft. The kids were running around flying their kites, following Beth and laughing and smiling seeing just how fast they could go!! What a joy it was to see such happiness come out of something so simple to make, and the illustration was just perfect! Beth and Emily were great with the kids, playing "duck, duck goose" and hand games with them. The kids also got a kick out of blowing up medical latex gloves and keeping them up into the air, not letting them touch the ground.
I was in charge of the hygiene clinic. I showed the kids how to wash their hands well with soap and water, and also how to brush their teeth. We were able to hand out toothbrushes and toothpaste and bar soap that was donated to all the kids there!
Susan read scripture with the older kids, and passed out small Bibles for them to keep. The older kids read English fairly well, so they were able to take turns reading and they got to talk about what those passages meant to them. How awesome!
We also held a medical mission there at Katondo. Dr. Butler is a pediatrician so he saw many kids with a wide range of symptoms and diseases. Medicine such as antibiotics, children's cough syrup, de-worming pills, ibuprophin, and tylenol were provided for us to give to the kids- and to the adults we saw- in need. There was also a physician's assistant named Mwawi that worked in one of MOH's crisis nursery's that traveled with us to a couple centers. She was able to help in seeing and diagnosing the huge turnout of patients. It was truly amazing at how the Lord equipped us with specific people to help us do His work. This happened more than once. "Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven." Matthew 6:9b-10
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Chimwangombe is the feeding center/village the 2007 team worked at for the entire 2 weeks they were there. One of their main projects was to construct a goat house, and our 2008 team was able to see how God was using that goat house to bless the village. First, the villagers ended up using the building as a chicken house.... but from selling the eggs, the village had raised enough money to send 2 kids to secondary school (which is high-school over here, and is not free over there), they bought a plot of land which they had cultivated and were growing vegetables on, and they were able to purchase the necessary medicine for a couple of kids who had HIV/AIDS! Wow! What an incredible blessing. This chicken house was named 'House of Many Hands'. The chicken house our team constructed was at a different village- Katondo-, which will be the next post I will publish.
Immediately upon arrival, the village kids ran up to our taxi bus. They all seemed so happy and excited about something 'new' going on in their village. We gave the kids here a VBS story and craft, sang songs, played games, gave out toothbushes and toothpaste, and YES, I had the privilege of showing them how to brush their teeth!! They all had seen toothbrushes before, but brushing teeth was not a daily hygienic routine like it is here- there is not a nearby store to walk to that sells it, and even if there were, they would most likely not have the money to buy those items. Money goes toward food.
We also had time to just hang out with them, talk with them, and encourage them. Most know some English, and many could speak English well enough to have a conversation. We did have 4 translators from the African Bible College (ABC) with us, and they were able to communicate for us to the ones who knew little or no English, and this was extremely helpful with the medical mission at the 3 other centers we worked at.
It was humbling to see their living situations, their lack of comfort and lack of food, kids orphaned because of HIV/AIDS, dirty clothes with holes, no shoes, obvious health problems... but through it all, every one of those kids we saw (and adults too) were smiling. They had such a peace about the life God has given them. Why can't we Americans be like that? Why can't I be like that? With all that we have over here, we still want more. We complain about the things we have; they didn't complain about the things they didn't have. Well, the Malawians ended up teaching me a few things. Maybe that is one reason God sent me.
"Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation in which you shine like stars in the universe as you hold out the word of life" Philippians 2:14-16
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