Our Vision

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P.O. Box 620170, Kalomo, Zambia
Our vision is to bring the love of Jesus Christ to the children of Zambia through physical and spiritual means.Our hearts longing is to empower the local church and village community to meet the great need of the many orphans and widows through the development of an orphanage.(Psalm 68:5-6a)

Friday, October 19, 2012

Well Update and prayers for Housemothers

THANK YOU for the tremendous amount of encouragement, support, and prayers that have gone out on our behalf for the well situation here. God has been good and we want to share all tha t He has done.
 
The drillers did come out last Wednesday and this is what happened.
- after a few days of trying to retrieve the broken drill bit from the bottom of the bore hole (well) that they did strike water in, they were still unable to successfully bring it up so they went to
- Plan B and ended up drilling another hole right next to that one which also has 43 meters of water in it and is producing 15 liters a minute (which may increase as the water channels open up)
- This well is now ready to be fitted with the necessary pump equipment and should be great and operational so we are very happy about that.Sep 2012 060
- Unfortunately, all of the hard drilling in this very water poor area (for us and for others) finished parts of the other drill bit and although they were prepared with another one to replace it, there was obviously other damage to the bit so they were not able to remove the old one no matter how hard they tried. 
- So... the second well (which would be for the community) was not able to be dug
- The bad news is that this will now have to wait until 2013 after the rainy season
- The good news is that they said we will be first on their list for next year when they return so the plans, money, and dream to have the second well dug (with water) will hopefully happen then.
 
Until then Please Pray that God would give us wisdom in how to proceed with the one new well that was dug. if we are to temporarily make that one usable by the community with a hand pump only, go ahead and put a submersible (electric) pump down in it for the orphanage use (like the original plan was) and just have the community continue to get there water from our original well (which is also pumped by a generator and very expensive due to fuel), or if Jako can find a way to have both a hand pump and an electric pump on the same well. 
 
We are now deep into the dry season and so the communities need for water is increasing as almost all of the shallow wells have dried up in the area and it will be a while before the rains will fill them up again.
 
On another note, would you please keep our housemothers in your prayers?  These past several months has been an especially hard season  on them with temporary/ part time workers having to fill in for the place DSC_7547of Rachel (one of our full time house mothers who has been out sick for a while now), for the full time mother's annual vacation time (one month a year per full time mom by law), and with moms being at clinics and hospitals for various illness' (especially Ruth who is doing so much better now).  Due to all of these different factors, all of the mothers have been stretched very thin, working more  hours/days than they normally do and often even having to work on their days off to fill in the gaps.  DSC_7597Since we don't know the current health status of Rachel (when she might return or if she will) we are desperately in need of two more house mothers (1 to fill in for a full time mom, possibly becoming a permanent position) and one as a part time worker.  It is not easy to find one who is interested, free, and lives locally so Please Pray with us that God will provide just the right women who will be able to love on these precious children and show them how valuable they really are
 
Thanks so much for partnering with us in this ministry/mission that God has given us.
 
We look forward to sharing more of His workings and goodness soon.
 

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Please Pray for our Wells

As some of you may know from our latest update we are currently in the process of having two wells dug here by us.   The goal is to have one for the orphanage and one for the community (with hand pump) but we want to ask for urgent prayers for this process.  While the drilling rig has been here since Saturday, they had hoped to drill one hole a day and be gone by Tuesday however Sunday, when they started digging the well by the orphanage they lost the drill tip/bit of the machine 54 meters down the hole they had been digging.  The good news is that they hit good water before then and were hoping to go just a bit deeper so that the water level would remain high in the dry season but the bad news is thatSep 2012 053 the bit that broke off is very expensive and logistically they cannot continue drilling in that hole unless it is removed.  The past two days (Monday and Tuesday) have been spent trying to engineer a tool that will fit down this tiny hole to retrieve this huge bit and while some of the attempts have been close, none have yet succeeded.  Tomorrow they are going to try one last time (with a modification of a previous design) so PLEASE can you pray with us that God will allow this bit to be fished out so that they continue drilling the orphanage hole and then proceed to the community hole.  We are soooo close to getting two functional great wells (the one that they have drilled now is in the area where the other two dry wells were dug and the fact that they hit good water is already a huge blessing) but yet so far in many ways.  We know that God is in control and will accept any answer that God gives to these prayers but if we could get the tip out tomorrow it would be a Great witness to the community of God's power once again.