Went out to Kabanana today.
Life is once again put back in perspective.
I’m happy (-ier)
Come to think of it now I prayed asking God that I would have joy today.
On the dusty roads of kabanana driving past the medical clinic, past countless kids running and playing and carrying jugs of water, kids not in school, in ragged clothes near trash heaps; I found joy.
The last 3 months have been tiring and stressful with work, and emotional and wearisome with home life. As we were preparing to send off our first born back to the USA for college we had lots of things we wanted to do one last time in Zambia and many things to do upon arriving in the States.
She arrived with 2 suitcases of all of her belongings and then we shopped and shopped every day for about a week. Shoes, clothes, everything for her dorm and her new life on her own. Then we had orientation and getting acquainted with her university.
She settled in and then I shopped and shopped some more for the next week for everyone else in the family. Over the last 6 years many more things, clothes, etc are found at the stores here, but the quality on many items are not that good and the good quality items that are here are much more costly then things in the States. But either way, its nice to get new things from America. So every trip home includes shopping till we drop as my Dad says. My mom was a good shopping buddy when Sarah moved into the dorm.
Jet lag hit me much harder this time around taking about 2 weeks on each end to get over it. I did the long nonstop 17 hour flight straight from Johannesburg to Atlanta. I think that made the difference, Im sure it has nothing to do with age. :)
A few weeks before I was to leave the Cakery in the capable hands of my manager I found out he was lying and stealing from me. Taking stock but also stealing invoices to be writing receipts for customers and pocketing the money. I was quite upset and distraught, and I can’t forget...CLEARLY mad at him.
I had been training another qualified guy that has been working part time for me this whole year and had anticipated him coming on board full time, and could essentially take on the management role. Unfortunately he was not able to commit full time and so I was leaving work for a month not able to trust anyone there. That was stressful.
Thankfully the kids were on school break and I gave a crash course to Ian (seriously crash...like threw all the info at him over a period of just 2 days ) and between him and the other guy working part time it survived while I was gone and even had a better month of sales with me away! I was impressed.
The kids are back to school now so I am still needing to find someone to manage because I have too much to do for life to be tied to a 7am-4pm job every day~~~ that thought and reality; that stresses me.
How can I run a business AND be the manager of that business AND raise 5 kids now (sniff sniff..tear drop!) AND try to be supportive to my husband who is also running a business AND run an orphan ministry AND try to do all of that while being cheerful and joyful?!?!
BUT, as I digress I am becoming more stressed and less joyful, so back to Kabanana...
We’ve been making a transition the last few months and throughout the end of this year with the kids we are helping. We started HOPE Kabanana and partnered with a small church planting work (Faith Baptist Church) in Kabanana that had no building and no program and developed for them a complete orphan care program. Through the donations and organization of the LION of Zambia supported by churches in America we built buildings and facilities, a resource room with tables and chairs, etc for the kids to use as well as a kitchen and outfitted it with all the appliances and cabinets and counters needed to begin our feeding program. Once HOPE Kabanana became a registered NGO charity and no longer affiliated with a specific church we continued the work with the kids in Kabanana.
Over the past year, we have had opportunities to help another church Living Gospel World Mission (LGWM) that has for several years now been taking care of orphans on their own without any outside help. They are already trying to feed the kids and give them an education. However humanly speaking they have nothing. The pastor has no real salary because only 2 of the church members have employment. The building they have been using is literally falling down with the rainy season. They built the building with every church member bringing a brick with them each sunday. They have no funds for books or teachers or pencils or uniforms etc. There is no monthly income to fund any of this but the Pastor is living by faith. Reminds me of George Muller. ( If you don’t know who he is read his biography...definitely had a heart for helping the children and vulnerable people!)
So we want to see their orphan care program develop and get established and grow just as we did with the one in Kabanana. We have moved now to caring just for the secondary school kids in Kabanana so that we can free up some time and funds to begin helping the LGWM. Our support for the orphan ministry program has reduced over the years and so we wanted to make the most impact with the funds that we have available. It was a decision we thought through and prayed through and felt that the timing was right to make the transition.
However in doing so, we didn’t know exactly what would happen with the other half of the kids we were no longer continuing with in our HOPEKabanana program. We were hopeful that Faith Baptist Church, no longer a plant but a solid church standing on its own with buildings as well as contacts outside of Lusaka, would be able to care for the remaining children. They run the school that the elementary kids attend and so it would naturally be a place of opportunity to minister to them.
The kids have gotten quite used to the daily meals that were provided through HOPEKabanana and I have been concerned wether or not they would continue to receive a good meal every day. So, when I was meeting with Maureen ( the one remaining staff member for our NGO) I heard the news that those kids had been sponsored for the meal program and donations from a different NGO that runs a feeding program have been secured by Faith Baptist Church for up to one year!
The kids are currently still attending the church school and they are being fed.
My heart rejoiced!
God moves upon hearts. He starts things, projects and programs based upon desires of our hearts and being open to the needs around us and then He also redirects things as time goes on. Changing focus, changing the scope, moving on to help others who are more in need at the time or maybe even just others who have a different need.
And we can put our hands in, to play a part in helping others.
That truly does bring joy. Not necessarily happiness, that seems based more on our circumstances - and that often doesn’t feel happy.
But Joy I find comes from the heart most easily when you are helping others in need.
SO are you feeling discouraged, cynical, overworked, overstressed, blah in life?
Go and help someone in need!
*PS
I marvel at the Lord’s timing just now as I write this.
This morning, Monday morning I hugged James and trudged off to drop the kids at school and said downcast, ‘I’m not even sure what I’m doing with my life.’ Just a discouraged statement. Not that I truly have no clue what I am doing with life, but just feeling blah on a Monday morning.
Then I found some joy. :)
No comments:
Post a Comment