Monday, June 16

Wow!  Today has been busy but amazing.  We started out early this morning with a devotional from Steve Wolcott and then headed off to dig dirt in the latrine.  These students are hard workers and never complain.  Several people mentioned that Khloe and Camille both worked with the strength of ten men.

Jon and I and Lauren and Debbie Wolcott went over to the orphanage this morning to meet with the director Mary and find out what their current needs are.  She explained that this past year they have changed a bit because the need for orphanages for small babies has diminished but the need to take in older kids has increased.  There are many children which live in orphanages and cannot be adopted for various reasons.  They are either in a court case due to abuse or may be orphans but have a grandparent or relative who may be currently unable to care for them but who will eventually come back for them.  In any case, because of the need to help older children, Springs of Hope is now an orphanage for girls ages 3-12 who have been through some kind of abuse or trauma.  There are three or four left that have been there since birth, but the majority of the 24 girls have been rescued from abusive situations.

Mary and her family sold off some of their own family land because she realized the need to have a school on the property for these girls, and has used her own money to build a temporary structure out back of the orphanage.  The kids from the orphanage had previously been sent to Machakos Academy, a good school in town, but she had to pay a large amount of school fees for them and the curriculum was the standard government curriculum.  She knew these girls needed intense healing and wanted them to have a Christian curriculum so that everything they hear is saturated with the love of Jesus, so she built her own school and hired a couple of good teachers to work with the kids.

The property they are now on is still a rental property, although they have purchased land for the children's home and already have a well,  a wall, and a foundation poured there.  At this point, the school was an immediate need and it was more cost effective to put it on the rental site where the girls already live and have functioning bathrooms, kitchen, sleeping quarters, etc.  The rental property is in serious need of repair so we are trying to help as much as possible.  The roof tiles are cracked and leaking into the house, the walls all need paint, and the beds, which are all cribs, are not really appropriate for these older, taller girls.

The precious Wright family hosted a garage sale for the orphanage last month and have enough from that to buy a few bunk beds.  We are trying to purchase those and have them delivered by Thursday.  The students will be working the next few days on painting three of the rooms to freshen it up.

The  NEATEST "God thing" is that Jon's cousin Debbie has been through a training process for the last year to help heal children who have been through trauma.  We had no idea the orphanage had these girls and also no idea that Debbie just happened to have brought all her materials with her.  So the orphanage is postponing school for the next three days and turning the whole place over to Debbie so that she can go through this program with all the girls.  Please pray for Debbie and these girls the next three days from 9-12 and again from 2-5 as they are taken through some emotional but healing processes which focus them on the love and restoration of Jesus.  Vicki Hall and I will be going along to assist her, and hold hands and pray with them.   This couldn't possibly be anything other than God's divine planning.

This afternoon, we started our VBS programs.  We were a little disappointed when only 30 or so were there in the beginning.  But word got out, because kids started running in from every direction and by the end, we must have had close to 200 in there,.  The students all did fabulous jobs leading skits, games, crafts, and singing.  I'm sorry I'm too tired to write more about that.

Tomorrow we will start painting at the orphanage, and working on the latrine more in the morning.  At 1 we are going to the School for Disabled, and at 4:30 back to Scott for day 2 of VBS!  Phew.  All are still doing well and just have such great, joyful, fun attitudes.  Seriously LOVE these kids.

That's all for tonight!

Sincerely,

Jenni for the group