African Adventures With Sarah!

Man, I don’t remember the last time I’ve written a newsletter! Maybe it hasn’t been so long ago but it feels like it.
Perhaps because we’ve moved house just three weeks ago I feel like so much has happened. I am very happy in our new home (just a six minute WALK for Mark to the school instead of a 45 minute drive one way in nasty dangerous traffic). God provided us with a big, cheaper, farm style home that our children love and I am getting used to. At the end of every day we are all filthy dirty with country dirt and it reminds me of my childhood growing up on a farm in Minnesota. We feel very blessed to be here and are thankful for God’s provision.
It’s been strange… I very much did not want to move from where we were. Mostly because of our large circle of friends there who kept me and the kids from being lonely and bored with the mundane. Our friendships with families of children our kids’ ages in the past two years have blossomed into encouraging, stimulating, real fun! It’s been such a blessing. So a 45 minute move down a crazy road that doesn’t invite travel felt like loneliness coming on. But God is amazing… after we decided to move there was a shift in my heart and I felt very settled and even more ready than before to stay in Uganda as long as God wills.
In fact I have been inspired in the past year and a half by a life changing experience that has made me wonder exactly what God is thinking. I don’t remember how much I’ve shared with you about this because it has been a bit dangerous but August 2009 God appointed me, with the support of Mark to take a 14 year old girl out of a deadly situation. This young girl, Hope (whose name has been changed to protect her identity) has since then delivered and is raising a healthy baby boy who is about to make one year old. She has absolutely zero family support as she was abducted into this country by her step sister and her husband as a child slave at the age of ten. So obviously I have felt the weight of her future very heavily since feeling called to intervene for her. (The story about that is amazing, by the way…I can tell you, God has a plan for this girl and her baby, no doubt!!)
Throughout the legal processes and hours of thought and prayer and networking that I’ve been doing with others about this girl’s future, I have discovered that there is nothing within Uganda to offer this girl as far as education or a training program that will equip her, as a teen age mother, to eventually get a job and at the same time, support her and teach her how to raise her child. This would include offering child care since she has no family support. Her options are staggeringly hopeless. The chances that she and her son would be any more than beggars and abused are slim to none. Amidst my research and new-found awareness, I’ve learned that there are vast numbers of such girls in very similar situations within Kampala (most of them from Congo and mothers because of rape - at the moment these girls are on the street).
Anyway, through all of this networking, God has put in my path some highly motivated individuals with the right connections to do something about it. The timing of some of these encounters that I’ve had with caring, equipped individuals is partly what has made me take notice.
Along the way another friend and I have managed to put together the outline of a program that would meet the needs of these girls and their babies. I also bumped into a woman who can access a national alternative education program from the UK for un-wed mothers dropping out of high school. The directors of this program have agreed to release it to us here in Uganda to be tailored for the needs of the girls in Africa and they would actually redesign their materials with our help with the aim of making it available to all of Africa! All they’ve requested is that we find the funding. This is amazing!!!!!
Something in me believes that these individuals have been put together for a purpose that is now. And the core of my passion about this comes from knowing one situation very intimately… looking in Hope’s huge terrified eyes, as she was hiding from her abusers promising her that I would do everything I could to keep her safe and that I knew God had a plan for her.
I don’t know what will be the outcome or timing of this, but I’m telling you all of this so you can pray with us about it. Along the way Mark has been listening to my fiery ‘sermons’ and outrage about the way things are and has listened as I’ve gotten carried away with the possibilities of what God might be doing through all the people I’ve met with passion for this like I have. And mostly he just nods. But recently he’s been asking me how serious I am about this and has been wondering out loud if God wants us to do something about this…. To actually spearhead a mission to give opportunity to young girls whose lives have been desperately sad up till now and are on course to get worse.
If you have any comments or feedback on this can you please send it our way? We’re really asking God if this is something we should do. And if we were to do it, we’d have to have people from ‘outside’ behind it. We have small ways to generate income here, but it’s not enough to kick off and sustain something like this. Sometimes I think, ‘Oh great. Just what Africa needs... another bunch of do-gooders pouring money into a hole that never gets full.’ But I tell you, I know of these girls now… I’ve seen the ‘yucky’ of their lives. It’s miserable. I can’t let this go by without stepping forward and saying, ‘God, here I am. What do you want me to do?’ If He wants to do something with this He WILL! And He will use lots of us to do it. Thoughts please!!??
That’s about all I have room for in this letter. Sorry I’ve not brought much news from the kids. They are in heaven here on the ‘farm’. After our furlough I’m pretty sure we’ll be adding some animals to the area so the kids can learn about chores, gathering eggs, and such.
We plan to see as many of you as possible when we’re home! And my good husband has promised proper internet when we get back to Uganda… it’s now available in new, more reliable forms!!! So I’m looking forward to re-connecting with you and staying a little better connected!
Lots of love, Sarah