Dear “L,”
I am honored that you have chosen me to be a place of safety. That you felt safe enough to fall asleep on my lap the first day we met each other. I hope you feel Jesus’ peace when you’re around me, and that is why you felt so comfortable in my presence.
As I look down at you, I hope that your dreams are a small escape from your reality, which I am sure is more difficult than I can ever imagine. More importantly, I hope the Father is meeting you in your dreams, playing with you in a field of flowers, telling you how much he loves his precious daughter. I pray that you would know that you are loved by him, and that you are worthy of that love because of your child-like faith in him. I hope that the small interactions my team and I are having with you are revealing that love to you.
I pray that you would come to know Jesus as your personal savior. That you would fully understand the gospel and do a great work in his kingdom by inviting more people into it. You have a strong spirit & you will move mountains one day. I just know it.
You are His workmanship. Your kind eyes invite people in. As I look down at your long eyelashes as you are deep in sleep, I can’t help but wonder what goes on in that beautiful mind of yours.
My heart breaks knowing that I’ll have to leave you. It breaks not knowing what your future holds—whether or not you will be safe. I want to scoop you up & take you home with me. I’ve never felt an ache quite like this before.
Jesus, protect this sweet child. When I leave Swaziland, give me peace that I am leaving her in your loving hands. Allow me to trust that you have big plans for her life. Continue to provide for her in all circumstances. I am handing her to you, just as I handed my family & friends to you when I decided to start this journey almost 7 months ago. I hope to see her again one day, whether it be here on earth or on the other side of heaven.
These are the type of prayers I have been praying over every single one of the children I have the honor to be around this month. This specific one is for a sweet little girl, “L,” who is about four years old. The first few days of ministry, she sleepily stumbled over to me before falling asleep on my lap for a few hours.
We have been here in Swaziland, now called eSwatini, for almost two weeks & let me tell ya—it’s been incredible, yet incredibly heartbreaking. The statistics are enough to make you nauseous. To preface, these facts are the reality of people halfway across the world, but they are also extremely graphic.
We have been at the Adventures in Missions (AIM) base here in the rural area of Nsoko, eSwatini. Our main ministry is working with different care points, which are safe places where children in the community can go to get a hot meal (sometimes the only meal they have all day), play, & even go to preschool. Typically, there is a playground and a small building where they can have a preschool and cook the meals. There are 44 total care points in Swaziland that AIM partners with. The organizations I’ve seen that are directly involved with these care points are Children’s Hope Chest, AIM, World Vision, & Feed My Starving Children. We go and help the gogos (grandmas) cook, play with children, clean the preschool area, and even teach the preschool, primary, & secondary school kids about Jesus.
Our main focus is loving on these kiddos like Jesus would. Sometimes that looks like holding a sleeping child that has no pants on, giving them a safe place to sleep for a few hours. It looks like being a human jungle gym, playing peek-a-boo, teaching children what it means to have a “gentle touch” instead of hitting their peers…all with a language barrier. The older ones typically know English, but the younger ones solely know Swati, the local language. It’s giving these children positive physical touch- something that most of them lack at home. It’s talking to the older kids, and giving them a safe place to speak– to have a voice. To have someone listen to them and speak truth into their lives.
The country of eSwatini has the highest HIV/AIDS prevalence rate in the world. Out of approximately 500,000 children, about 350,000 are orphans because their parents have died from AIDS. That’s about 70% of the children here. It’s hard to wrap your mind around it. There is almost an entire generation missing here because of this disease. Grandparents are raising grandchildren, and it is even common for siblings to be raising each other.
Witchcraft is also prevalent here. When hopeful nominees run for political office, some visit a witch doctor, who then instruct them to retrieve human body parts in order to win the election. Children, who are already vulnerable, are taken and sacrificed for this purpose. Unfortunately, a lot of the victims are orphans who are walking alongside the road by themselves. Last year alone, 2,000 children went missing, and it is thought that most of them were gone because of this practice. We are very close to the South African border—about 20 minutes. This also poses a danger of trafficking for these children.
The Swazi people are also recovering from a drought. In 2015, there was absolutely no rain. It was devastating for people not only who rely on farming to eat, but also for their livelihood. They are still recovering from all of the food they lost, and are slowly working back up to the amount of crops they had before.
All of these things contribute to the hopelessness that plagues the area. One of the first few days of ministry, a 13 year old came up to one of my teammates and said she wants to move to the United States because she doesn’t want her children to suffer the same way she has suffered. Then she cried. A 13 year old.
What do you say to that?
Each day at the care point, I am on the verge of tears. I look around at these precious children and become overwhelmed at their needs. I am overwhelmed at the needs of all of the people in this country. In fact, the other day, while two little ones were on my lap, one of them accidentally smacked their head directly into my {broken} nose. My eyes started to water as anyone’s would after getting hit in the nose, but then it turned into a full on cry because of my emotional state. I am thankful the father is allowing my heart to break for what breaks his, but that doesn’t make it any easier.
I have seen a lot of difficult things on the race– like I knew I would. But experiencing a sliver of their reality is a lot more difficult to swallow than the statistics and internet searches alone. I’ve had a lot of conversations with my teammates about how difficult this month has been for me so far. I have seen extreme poverty in places such as the slums of Nicaragua, indigenous villages in Panama, and villages in Malawi & Zambia. We have seen people who have next to nothing– but they still have each other. That doesn’t negate their need, but to me it is easier than being in an environment with so many vulnerable children that are without parents or having their basic needs met. You see toddlers walking by themselves to their care points, sometimes carrying younger siblings. You see children shoving dirty objects from the ground into their mouths because they’re hungry, and you have to gather your thoughts before you have them take it out.
What can I do? What can you do?
We can pray.
Throughout the race, the Lord has been teaching me more and more about the power of prayer. While we sometimes view it as a last resort when we can no longer do anything in our own power, it is actually the most powerful thing we can do.
My team and I walk a half mile down the main road to our care point. We hold children. We play with children. We sing with children. We show them that they have a voice. We show them that they are loved. We tell them about their heavenly father who loves them, and His son that died for them. We help the gogos cook. We sweep and mop the floors of the classroom. We love these children the way Christ would.
Most importantly, I pray over children as I am holding them. Prayers like the one above.
The days are exhausting, but so worth it.
Our life on earth is but a blink of an eye next to eternity. Please join me in praying not only for these children, but for all of the people of Swaziland. It is a beautiful country of rolling hills and beautiful people. While it’s small, it has some big problems. It reminds me of how broken our world is. It also reminds me of what we have to look forward to when we leave this world– but we still have so much kingdom work to do. Adventures in Missions, along with other organizations, are doing incredible things in this country. They are not only meeting basic needs, but empowering the local people to take charge and make a difference. Most importantly, they are sharing the gospel with these people– something more valuable than any amount of material goods.
Pray for these organizations and the people working or volunteering for them: Adventures in Missions, World Vision, Feed My Starving Children, and Children’s Hope Chest. AIM has multiple families here that have truly given their lives for the sake of the gospel. They moved here to truly be invested with what the Lord is doing here in eSwatini. They will be the ones continuing to work at these care points when we leave.
Pray for the shepherds, which are community leaders placed at every care point. Pray that they can lead from a place of security with the Lord, and that they are working from an overflow of a relationship with Jesus.
Pray for continued strength for me & my squad. We have a little over a week before we begin the next leg of our journey– in Asia!
Love you all & thank you for your continued support!
