When I heard that we were going to be working at an orphanage in Swaziland I couldn’t contain my excitement! I’ve always wondered what orphanages were like, if they kids are well taken care of, and if they have someone to love them.
At El Shaddai you’ll find kids running around barefoot, dirty as they can be, with the snottiest of noses.
You can’t help but love them.
At El Shaddai you’ll love on two brothers who had just come to the orphanage two weeks ago because they’d been found hanging from a tree by their feet with human bite marks all over their bodies.
You can’t help but want to take them home.
At El Shaddai you’ll hold a baby who has just been diagnosed with HIV.
You can’t help but cuddle her all day long.
My heart has been broken so many times this week when I hear the stories about these sweet, innocent children. Ministry this month might now look like sharing the gospel to broken people, but it does look like loving orphans who have been abandoned, neglected, and physically and sexually abused.
At El Shaddai there are 40 school-aged kids who are in grades 1 through 7. It just so happened that X squad, including our squad leaders, is made up of exactly 40 racers. Each person on X squad is paired with one school age child and they get to be “ours” for a month.
This is the little girl I’m paired with for the month. I’m not allowed to put her name in blogs, so for her protection I will call her Annie.
She is 9 years old. She is in grade 4.
Her spirit is so so sweet, but she’s very shy.
I am ready to learn more about her and how she got to El Shaddai.
Each of these kids have such unique stories and it is such a privilege that I get to invest in one of them all month long. My hope is that at the end of the month every child at this orphanage will feel so incredibly loved and so worthy of God’s love. Despite all of the mess that these children have been put through God is fighting for them. He is fighting for them so that they can have an abundant life through Him. Just because these kids are orphans and they have rough pasts doesn’t mean that they can’t have a full future.
El Shaddai is such special place and the presence of the Lord is so strong. I know God has HUGE plans for the kids here.
I couldn’t be happier with the placement of our squad at El Shaddai Children’s Home!
