In the land of a thousand
hills there are so many things that I have seen and experienced during my time
here. Some of these things I can easily
describe and put into words, others I simply can’t. I am having a hard time wrapping my mind
around it all. The brown eyes in this
country are so inviting yet some of these eyes are empty and hollow while
others are full of joy and clarity.
Our first stop today was
at a special needs day care. These are
the absolute outcast of the community.
They are often abandoned if not killed or left to die. One special woman gave birth to a son who was
mentally handicapped and from her decision to treat him like a true child of
the kingdom a ministry was birthed where parents could bring these special
needs children. They have a few teachers
and even have a therapist that can come during the week. The parents are responsible to bring their
children and the food they will need for that day and depending of the severity
of the condition some parents stay all day.
My heart was gripped by this 30 year old father who brought his 2 year
old daughter with hydrocephalous. The 27
year old mother was sick that day but he did not want his daughter to miss her
therapy. This father delighted that we would want to hold his sweet daughter and he even asked us to take her picture with her wearing the bracelet that we made for her. The story of this family and
this ministry is much large than I have time to write about but the bottom line
here is one woman is giving her all and she has invited others in her community
to join her. They use an old church
building to meet in and have curtains to divide the classroom. The government has given them a plot of land
to build a school on and if they can build the school the government will send
teachers and therapist to work there.
The time is limited. If they
don’t begin building in a certain amount of time the land will be taken
away. They need $20,000 to get started
and probably $80,000 to complete it. It
would be 3 classrooms, an office and a therapy room. The children in this current facility are the
most affectionate children (except the one little boy who thought that we were
going to eat him, he finally held someone’s hand as we were walking out). What can I (we) do? Not sure yet but I am certainly praying about
this one.
Our next stop was to SPAG,
a ministry for street children. One
woman has been serving for over 10 years as the house mother. This is a place where 34 boys take residency,
get educated and then learn vocational skills.
They are go on the streets to help other children get into school and to
get them fed. They have man success
stories of children exiting their program.
Many are not able to go onto the university due to finical reason. They currently do not have sponsorship
program but it would cost about $750 per year (plus books) for the kids to move
onto the college level.
I find myself wanting to
bring anyone interested in learning more about these places back here. You just can’t fully understand until you are
here and walk into these places, look into these children’s eyes and talk to
those that have given all (sacrificed everything) so others could have a chance. This is even true for the doctors serving at
the hospital.
It has been an interesting
time of learning for the group that is here.
We are bringing an upper class group of people who have everything in
the world that they need and not enough time to complete everything they want
to do into a culture that has nothing but all the time in the world. The people we have served want also to serve
us. They are not interested in 14 hours
of labor a day. They want you to come
along side, help a little and then eat and talk and hug and fellowship
together. They want relationship and the
times we sit and communicate, as difficult as it is, they feel the hope and
love of the Lord in a way they have not experienced it before. We cared enough to come and they see it as a
sacrifice on our part to fly half way around the world into a land of poverty.
I am so thankful for
Legacy Mission Village and I really look forward to partnering with them more
in the future. You can read about what
they do but to come and experience this is totally different. All of the ministries we have served in are a
part of the Presbyterian church of Rwanda, even the hospital. The churches start the schools around here,
no separation of church and state in Rwanda, that’s an American thing.
In the afternoon we took a
3 hour drive to Lake Kivu, a paradise in Rwanda. It borders 4 countries. We enjoyed the lakeside, had a nice dinner
and then sang and shared together about what we have seen and about where we
have seen the Lord during our time here.
This has been an
incredible trip where I have been stretched and have grown and have processed
life as we know it in the US.
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