Zambian family updates

Esther- Tiny Blessing # 2
October 19th another unexpected blessing was brought to our attention.  Tiny baby Ester was born early that morning to a mother who was very sick unable to breastfeed. Born 3 weeks early she weighed a mere 1.8 kg (barely 4 lbs) but compared to how Genesis was when we first got her, was already much stronger and more stable.  Although we had said that we only wanted to take children who were double orphans, this baby needed formula (which is too expensive for the villagers to afford) and stood no chance of survival if someone didn’t step in to help.  Knowing that her life hung in the balance we asked her to be brought to us until we could decide the best course of action for her.  With the house mom’s now having experience with  Genesis it was easy to hand her over to them and they cared for her like a champ.  Two days later Jako was asked to bring the mother to the hospital because her health was failing fast and after talking to the Father, we agreed to care for this child for the first 6 months as long as the father was willing to come and help at the orphanage with odd jobs once a week and attend all of her medical visits.  This was a hard decision to make because we don’t want to become a drop off center for people just not wanting to care for their own children (and be a bigger burden for the community to support) but in this situation our options were either to refer him to another orphanage much farther away, or try to work with him here so that the family can visit the child and be more involved in her care.

Ester on the left next to Genesis that was also premature when we got her.
After 6 months we will reevaluate the situation but our plan is to help her get strong and healthy so that we can transition her back to her family as early as possible when she no longer is so dependant upon formula or milk, most likely at one year of age.  Please pray that the father continues to work with us on the care of this precious little girl and that he will take the full responsibility of caring for her when she gets just a bit bigger.
Family News

Family wise things are going well here.  Jakob is doing well and is as active as ever, wanting to walk and be on the move always.  He continues to thrive in this environment and apart from a few ear infections is doing great.  He loves spending time with the kids at the orphanage and the local villagers are doing a great job at speaking Tonga to him.  Always a personable baby – he loves any attention and brings smiles to anyone’s face.  Easily adaptable, it is easy to see how God has designed him to compliment this ministry, even at such a young age.

The last few months, Amber’s mom has been weighing heavy on her heart.  After much prayer, we feel as though God is directing us to spend Christmas in the States with her and her family.  Her health is holding up but she has been sicker than ever with the new clinical trials she is on.  Her spirits are still high and she is a trooper despite everything but we just felt it would great to be able to celebrate Christmas all together and to give her the gift of having all her kids and grandkids around for the holidays.  We will then get to attend Josh’s (Amber’s brother) wedding, and a missions conference in Tampa, Florida in March.  We also hope to be able to make it up to Virginia to visit some friends, churches, and supporters up there.  All in all we will be gone almost three months.  Please pray that it will be a time of rest and rejuvenation for us, that we will be able to enjoy some good time caring for and loving on Amber’s mom, and for everything to run well at the orphanage while we are gone.
It was a big decision for us to think about leaving the orphanage so long, especially in the rainy season, but we knew that if God was calling us to go that He would provide for the needs here.  At first we were hoping that somebody would step in to fill our place but the more we prayed it seemed the more God was saying that we just needed to get things in place for the locals to step in and fill the void.  While that idea seems a bit scary (as I guess it is any time we give up our control of a situation) we are also quite excited for the opportunities it holds in forcing the house mothers, orphanage committee and the community to step up to the plate and take on more responsibility instead of relying on us for everything.  And when we started talking to the locals about it, they all seemed up to the task and excited as well.
Pastor Petrus
Almost anyone who has been here to visit us has had the opportunity to meet Pastor Petrus and his family.  He was the one who first had the heart for the orphans in the area and took us in as his own from the projects start.   He allowed us to put up tent in his village and we were accepted into the community based on his acceptance and approval of us and his elderly father was the one who gave us one of our first pieces of land.  These past few years have have been trying for him however since he became a headman, and was entrusted with the full time care of his elderly father who really could do nothing by himself.  Because of that he was able to allot less time to the care of the local church and the orphanage project.  Always a humble man, it was hard to see him being torn in so many directions.  In September it seems that God decided that his father had fought the good fight as he went to be with the Lord.  He will be missed but now Petrus is able to start a new chapter in his life where he can be more active leading the church again and taking his rightful role as one of the three directors of the orphanage (Amber and I being the other).