Hope for “Dependents”

The life of a pastor in Uganda is an eye opener. We’ve been in Lira, northern Uganda.

We arrived to find the pastor hosting us in mourning. He just learned his 6 year old “daughter” died. She drowned. Digging deeper, we learned it was actually his brother’s daughter. Culturally, he considers his niece his own child. That’s important because his brother and his wife are both “sick” (meaning they have AIDS). The pastor embraces that their children will one day be with him in his home – his children.

We had only a short time with the pastor before he left to prepare for the burial ceremony. In that short time at his home, we found he now has 22 children he’s caring for. 7 are his biological children. The rest are “dependants.” These are orphans from relatives or nearby friends. The burden of care has fallen to the pastor, and they are family. He does all he can for them. This is the way – reality.

Hearing this, we surveyed other church leaders in the room. Each one cares for dependants in their homes. One man has no biological children with his wife. They have 5 dependants.

Here’s the problem…

There are too many dependants who have no one like the pastor or other leaders in the room. This extended family system is beyond saturated. Consequently, children suffer and die.

This is where you all come into play, GO family. We work with churches to expand their capacity to care for the children at the bottom – the ones with no support network. We don’t take the dependents from the pastor’s house. In this cultural fabric, they should be with him. Rather, we help the local church reach those who have no one to be dependent upon.

In Lira, the church has started its ministry to these hurting children. The first 20 girls arrived in care in June. Malnourished, sickly, scared, they arrived alive. Praise God. The local church body has poured love into these girls in a simple and safe environment. The children go to school, many for the first time. That’s not easy. For example, a 9 year old girl is enrolled in what we’d call kindergarten. It’s not easy. But it’s good.

Local church leaders are spending time with the children, each day. It’s not just the children and the mommas, alone. That’s the beauty of the local church. This is an extended family that has grown.

One church leader, Tomali Okao, is in her 60s. Her husband was murdered by the Amin regime, and she raised 7 of her own children and the dependents God placed in her care. Tomali now embraces these children as her own. She bought 20 small pine tree saplings and planted them with the children behind their homes to grow with them. Tomali has hope for the kids, offers great wisdom to them, and shows her love in practical ways. Tomali and many others now have more dependents, more family members. They just need a little help to carry this burden. GO family, you’re providing that modest help.

And look what can happen… Here are a couple of clips of the girls at Lira, just 2+ months since they arrived filthy, hurting, and malnourished.

Don’t get me wrong. There are and will be many challenges with these girls. But Jesus is much bigger than our circumstances, and He provides many, like Tomali, to stand lovingly in the gap.

Just take a minute to celebrate this scene. The girls just got home from school. They’re playing. They’re laughing.

God is good.

Faithfully yours,

Joe

Hello from Uganda.

Hello from Uganda.

What a great day yesterday. We started our day in Masaka with the first 30 children we brought into care in Uganda 2 years ago. It was the end of their school term. At the end of term, students have a program: singing, praise, thanksgiving. We were so fortunate to be here to see it.

I can hardly believe what 2 years of deep love can do for kids in the most difficult circumstances. I remember Day 1 for these little ones, most of whom lost their parents to AIDS. Grim. Yesterday, they were fully alive. In the program, they beamed with confidence in the love of Christ. There is a security there that they know cannot be moved or removed. That message lived out shook all of us on the team.

These kids have become pillars in their community. They’ve remained integrated in the community by serving others. Orphans serving and giving to others: how about that?

They are all from a nearby area called Mbira. Their pastor, JJ, and his wife, Harriet, have taken the lead in the care and nurturing of the children. JJ has planted a church in Mbira – a little wooden church that now overflows with 150+ members. JJ takes the kids there to serve others in this very poor community.

One person they serve is an 85 year old widow who can no longer tend her land. The kids farm her garden for her, so she has food to eat, and regularly tend to her care. That dear woman repaid this kindness by giving the church a large piece of family land. The kids farm that land and are producing maize. The church now operates a maize mill. Now the kids grow and the church processes their own staple food, from the land given by this widow.

Another person in Mbira sold 15+ acres to the church for $2500. Great land. Fertile. That site will now become a full blown children’s village around the bustling and growing Mbira church. The village will bring a school for 250 kids and homes for 100 orphans who are scuffling to survive. JJ and Hariet will move to the site and lead this effort. More homes will likely be needed. We’ll start with homes for 100. The surrounding villages (the people) will embrace this step to help their own children.

The first 30 kids from Masaka – the kids who came from Mbira – will move to the Mbira village. This is huge for them. The older kids especially are excited, as they view this as an opportunity to serve so many other kids like them in the same area where they once suffered. They now know what the love of Jesus Christ can bring – complete transformation of the heart, soul and mind. They’re not too little to understand. They’re living it.

Sorry to go on and on… It’s just amazing to see God’s work and creativity, and we want to share it with you. This work is about more than orphan care.

Today we are in Kabale in the mountains of SW Uganda. This new village recently welcomed the first 60 children. A women’s group led by Marsha Campbell funded this entire village. (Ladies, we’ll take lots of pics!)

Pure and faultless religion…

Wish you all were here with us.

Joe

Looking forward to it

We never presume upon God, but do you ever have the feeling that He is going to move in a big way? Not because He has to, but just because He does. That’s who He is: alive, one the move, and at work all around us.

I’m heading to Haiti today with fourteen others from six states and all four time zones. The youngest on the team is 17; the oldest in their 70’s. In fact, one us was born in every decade between the 1930s and the 1990s. Most have not been to Haiti. Most have not loved on orphans for a weekend or experienced the riches of God amidst great poverty. That’s about to change. God is on the move!

I have the same feeling around this year’s BIG Event on September 25th. God is on the move! He’s bringing the heart of Third World orphan care to hundreds at the Uptown Theater in KC. (Click here for more BIG Event info). Whether in Haiti, Uganda, or KC, you’re invited to do God’s work by caring for His kids. It’s a privilege, and we’re looking forward to it!

Kyotera kids

Here’s one more quick pic… Diton clowning with a bunch of the Kyotera kids. Thumbs up.

Tomorrow, we head to a new village to be in Mbira, and then on to Kabale in SW Uganda (60 new children in care there).

I’ll blog as I can.

Thanks for your hearts, GO family.

On the move in Africa!

Today, I’m in Uganda. I’m here with Adrien and the Long Hollow Church leadership. We arrived late last night, and drove to Masaka this morning. We spent the day at Kyotera Village, one of our children’s villages here.

Wow, what a day. We were all blown away by the great work of the local church at Kyotera.

Kyotera is in Rakai District, the epicenter of the African HIV/AIDS pandemic (the first discovered AIDS case in Africa was in Rakai). 2 years ago, there was a lifeless plot of land along a red dirt road here, with an empty building once intended to be a church plant. Enter Pastor Diton, a Ugandan pastor with a heart to serve the poor. Diton started a church 2 years ago in the empty building.

In the last 2 years, this church has come to life in a huge way under Diton’s leadership. The church now cares for 84 orphans (most of whom were on their own from AIDS impact in the family), and has become a growing community influence. As Diton said today, the Lord is transforming this community from “the bottom up” as the church brings the neediest children into family at the church. As an example, I’ll tell you about Stephen in a minute.

The church’s faithfulness is being rewarded. Long Hollow is going to take on the kids’ care, add several more homes, and fund a school for 250 children here. This work is exploding of life!

Here’s a pic of some of the cute little children’s homes at Kyotera. Thanks so much to the following for giving the 84 a shot: Enegren family, Moyes family, Heiniger family, Seyferth family, Breckon family, Bicknell family, and Church of the Resurrection.

Joe

Welcoming More Children

Pastor Moise Vaval, Live from Haiti:

This week, we welcome 20 more children into the village. All of them missing a mother or father; only three of them have parents but are among the neediest. They are coming from a very difficult area: Delmas. These children are very vulnerable; of course, some of them will stay here only for a period of time (while their families continue to rebuild their lives).

Connecting with Kids

Trace Thurlby, Live from Haiti

Meet Joseph Volcy. His father died when he was 10; his mother 5 years later. At 15, he lived by himself, worked, and went to school. He taught himself english by “having conversations with myself.”

He’s now 22 and serves as the GO Project’s Haiti Child Activities’ Director. I had heard he was gifted with kids. That description falls far short of what I saw today. I couldn’t stop smiling as Joseph led our kids in the Hokie Pokie, musical chairs, and quite possibly Haiti’s first head-basket-catching, water-balloon toss.

In truth, Joseph never lost the priceless ability to connect with kids. God has him in the perfect place. No doubt Joseph will bring smiles to thousands of children across Haiti. I’m grateful, once again, for the incredible partners God provides!

Joseph got married a week ago. I asked today how he was doing in his new role.

“Pretty good,” he said. We agree!

Hope in Haiti

Trace Thurlby, Live from Haiti

Can life change in six weeks? We know it can. Decisions become moments. Moments build into momentum, and life turns. We experience it personally. Haiti is experiencing it now.

It’s been six weeks since I’ve been back. When I stepped off the plane today, things were obviously better. From baggage claim to air quality, life is improving, but some things were still the same.

Rain still makes mud, and many people still endure in makeshift tents. With all the aid, this is especially mind-numbing and maddening. Yet, our team of 14 came with eyes wide open.

We’re from all four time zones and our ages span four decades. Despite our diversity, we all came to give and receive the love of a child. The joy of watching Hannah, my nine-year-old, play with her Haitian brothers and sisters in Christ far transcends my ability to describe it.

Yes, the battle still rages – hope and heartache in Haiti – but in the hearts of children we see that God can make all things new…and we are more than grateful. Nos Remen Ou! (We love you!)

April Newsletter

Global Update from Joe Knittig

God continues to move here and there to rouse us to action; to move His local church around the world to care for the neediest children. Let us give you a quick rundown of some of the activity you’ve launched through GO Project around the world.

Haiti:

In May, we will send out our next update on our Relief and Redevelopment effort. The hard work continues on that front. Today, we have 2,317 children in care in 85 homes in 26 villages throughout the country. And, we are growing. Our Relief and Redevelopment plan to launch 10 new villages in 2010 is looking like we may have undershot the Lord. 10 villages is beginning to look like 12-14 new villages. The situation and work in Haiti is dynamic; the God stories there coming daily. Please stay tuned to our blog.

Uganda:

This is an exciting time for our work in Uganda. In May, we expect to add 48 new children in Kyotera – the homes are done, outfitted, and ready to go to life. These children will have 48 new mates very soon! Here are some of the kids, the biggest kid being our own Mike Fox.

In Lira and Kabale, the unenviable job of canvassing communities to “select” those children of greatest need has been complete. Our first homes are now done, and the children will be moving in as early as tomorrow!!!

Here are some Lira and Kabale pics from March, as these villages stir to life.

We hammer home that GO Project catalyzes “local-church based care” for orphaned and abandoned children. Truly, that is a term of art. We’d love you to see how our local church partner in Uganda applies this vision, and disciples its leaders and church members into what this means and the unique nature of this model. Click here for the opening section of one of our local church partner’s training manual.

Please pray for the children coming into their new homes. The Lord is transforming their little lives.

Malawi:

One of our key partners on the Pothawira project is Colonial Presbyterian Church. Colonial is sponsoring this village, and recently sent church leadership to visit the site – and, more importantly, to encourage and thank Peter and Emma Maseko for their commitment and sacrifice in leading this project.

We’d like to share some photos from Colonial’s March visit…

This is a photo from inside the nearly complete church/school. The church sanctuary is 10,000 square feet. The school wrapped around the sanctuary is large enough to scale to 1,000 students!

The next photo shows the children’s homes raising from the ground at Pothawira. This is a duplex – 2 homes. Each of these wonderful homes costs just $5,000, and will house 10 children and a momma.

Of course, these works don’t just fall into place and happen. People make them happen; people there on the ground who

fight against the evil of poverty’s perverted tide; people with dreams bigger than themselves, hearts courageous enough to follow them, bodies rough enough to withstand the pain, and vision clear enough to see God’s Hand and smile in His peace. It’s the people who matter most. Them. And you.

All is on schedule for the dedication of the church and children’s village the first week in June. Join us in praying for a glorious new beginning for many in Malawi – from the bottom up.

Our Leaders - Peter Emma and Alpha Maseko

Working Hard in Malawi

Philippines:

We love to see new wine poured into new wineskins. And here we see it in Asia.

Mark and Mimi Comfort own Cruise Holidays in KC (www.cruiseholidayskc.com). They take great personal joy in bringing joy to others through travel and adventure. If you know them, you know they work from love and not the almighty dollar. The Comforts tied this joy and their business to another passion: kids. They’ve used their business to fund our first 3 children’s homes in Malaybalay, Mindinao, Philippines. A family – the Drayer family – joined in to fund #4. God blessed this work in a mighty way.

Thanks for taking a risk for children and establishing a GO Project beachhead in the Philippines. Let’s see where God takes this!

GO Family, God is using you to bring transformation around the world – in the lives of children and in your own lives. Thank you.

Linked-In Thru Him

Yesterday, Adrien and I went to Lincoln, Nebraska to meet with some of our die hard GO Project friends. The Lord rattled me pretty good.

Listen to this…

In 2008, I got a random call from a woman in Lincoln, Nebraska – Susan Browne. Susan heard of C3 through someone who heard from someone else, etc… The Brownes, adoptive parents, have a heart for orphans. Susan said that her family and some friends wanted to get involved in C3. After a couple of conversations, I agreed to come to Lincoln for an intro meeting with Susan and several other ladies. Fox and I drove up. I remember that we made that trip about a week after going to Gonaives, Haiti.

We met at Susan’s church, Lincoln Berean; walked into a conference room; and greeted a group of ladies. One of the women, Kristin Heaton, had a balled-up Kleenex in her hand and puffy red eyes. The whole crew had been crying before we arrived.

Mike and I got to talking; Kristin got to crying. We’d stop. Start again. More tears. (Fox has been known to make women cry, but for me, this was highly unusual.) We really couldn’t get into the meat of what we wanted to say. So we stopped the group and turned to Kristin.

“Are you okay?”

“No. My heart is broken right now and I just can’t stop crying.” Kristin explained why. She and her husband were in the 2nd year of the adoption process for a little girl, Bettania, and it was going nowhere. Even more painful in the moment, they had another young girl, Dieunette, at their home on a medical visa – they sponsored her so she could have brain surgery. All had gone well. God had knitted this little one into the Heaton family. Here’s the problem: their time had seemingly come to an end. The next week, the Heatons had to part ways with Dieunette and their hearts ached at the thought. As we started to talk of the global orphan pandemic, Kristin had specific little ones wrenching her emotions. She couldn’t see past the pain. None of us could after we heard.

We asked Kristin, “Where is this child from?” “Haiti.” “Haiti? Are you kidding?” (Kristin didn’t know of our work in Haiti.) I pressed, “Where in Haiti?” “It’s not a place most people have heard of.” “Where?” “Gonaives,” she replied.

“Gonaives? (I can’t believe this!!!) What if I told you Mike and I were just there last week?”

You could have heard a pin drop. This was one of those God-orchestrated moments where everyone knew to just chill out and soak it in. God is at work in and around us, all the time – and sometimes he shouts a real-time reminder.

Well, the Heatons courageously shepherded Dieunette to Haiti and kissed her “goodbye.”

Over time, Dieunette’s mother couldn’t care for the child. Dieunette was in danger. Upon referral to social services, Dieunette was placed in an orphanage. The Heatons, still embroiled in Adoption #1, began to fight through Adoption #2 – both long shots. The Heatons also joined with gusto what has become a growing and passionate group in Lincoln – The Nebraska Global Orphan Project – battling with us to bring more children into care.

The struggle to adopt Bettania and Dieunette raged on for 2 more years. Nothing. The girls were in an orphanage in Port au Prince, with no end to the adoption in sight.

On January 9, Kristin sent some family and friends an update that the adoptions were going nowhere. She and Scott were losing hope. Here were Kristin’s closing words: “I have to figure out how to live with all of this which I’m not doing very well with at the moment. Hope it get’s easier but I just don’t know how it can. For now I will peel myself off of the floor put one foot in front of the other and try and find joy in each day.”

On January 12, Haiti shook.

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One facet of GO Project’s relief effort in Haiti has been to deliver food, water, and supplies to other orphanages in Haiti that collapsed during the quake and had no resource pipeline. There are so, so many in this category. We’ve gotten to the ones that the Lord put in our path.

In the immediate aftermath of the quake, we got an email from Dan Southerland, a pastor and friend in Kansas City. CNN ran a report of a collapsed orphanage in PaP with scant and soon-to-be gone food and water for 151 children. A friend of Dan’s let him know, and Dan, in turn, let us know. Dan was able to track down contact information for the orphanage, and Moise got the address: Publin 4 (behind the local of djoumbala), Rue Lamothe, impasse Petion 2. Moise and I had phone numbers for 3 ladies at the location: Jamie, Ali, and Margarette St. Fleur. We got hold of Margarette. She confirmed the problem. She had some food, but no water. Margaret believed this was a short term problem, but needed water, especially, right away. So we delivered water and supplies to Margarette at the orphanage, and encouraged her. We left and moved on to the next location.

That was that.

Honestly, I haven’t given that place, Bresma Orphanage, another thought. Until yesterday…

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Back to yesterday in Lincoln. Like I said, we met our GO Project friends there for a meeting. But no Kristin and Scott. I asked Susan about them. Susan: “Haven’t you heard about the girls?”

Kristin and Scott are rather busy these days. The girls are home with them! Susan went on to explain God’s amazing provision. After the quake, the Heatons had no idea what happened to the girls or the orphanage they were in. They stayed glued to CNN to follow every detail of coverage, hoping to glean some information about the state of Port au Prince and all there. To their shock and amazement, they learned the fate of the girls through a CNN story of a ruined orphanage with a dwindling food and water supply and no help. While the orphanage was down, the kids were alive. Susan explained the miracles… The Heatons learned the girls survived from a CNN story. Unknown people in PaP responded with food and water. Many of the children were flown to the United States. Adoptions pending for years were completed. Bettania and Dieunette – home.

I heard this and thought, “Hey, I know this story.” “Susan, what was the name of that orphanage?” “Bresma. It’s run by a couple of young ladies named Jamie and Ali.” Yep, I know this story!

God allowed me to share with Susan and the group our little slice of this story – we had the privilege of being some of the unknown others.

God gave us another moment – another reminder.

Scott and Kristin, the Lord’s got His hand on you all. He always has. And GO Family, we’re more connected by God than we can possibly imagine.

Lord, You are trustworthy – no matter what.

Faithfully yours,

Joe

P.S.: I’d love to have a statistician run the odds on these circumstances and call it chance.

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