March 20, 2007

Hi friends,
Habari yako? How are you? I know I’ve missed a week in writing to you (some of you probably hadn’t noticed, but in case you had, my reason is this:) I’ve been contemplating whether to tell you my news –

They’ve asked me to stay on and work here full time! And my answer is, without a doubt, YES!

Everything is still in the planning and discussion phase, but I wanted you to know. I definitely feel called to work here, I feel at peace in my heart about this decision, and I can’t wait to see how everything comes together. When Anne Marie asked me, tears sprang to my eyes. I was ready to say yes. I think it was perfect timing. A week earlier, I might not have been ready. But there it is.

From what I’ve seen, this is such an incredible ministry, run by strong, God-filled leaders, who are willing to sacrifice themselves and their lives for these children. I know that I can learn a lot from them and I feel so blessed to have this opportunity at this point in my life.

I will still come stateside at the end of June. I know this much. But beyond that, I need some time to sort out all of the details. I’m hoping to sit down with the leadership team this week.

Other stuff going on in Africa…

Lamu Islands
Two women from the States were supposed to come out and do training in Lamu for the caregivers of orphans and vulnerable children. Turns out they can’t make it. So I’ll be going with Anne Chege (one of our school Administrators) in April to present a four day training called Children in Crisis: Offering Healing and Hope. I’m excited about this. This’ll happen April 17-21.

speed bump parade
My Saturday night fun? Counting the number of cars outside my window that skid to a halt in front of the newly made, umarked speed bumps. So Kenya. No warning signs. So far – three, four, five, six, ten. I stopped counting after thirty. Now it’s not funny anymore. I’m cringing and praying. People’s cars are bottoming out, launching out of control, spinning and skidding. The guys outside on the street are laughing at the speed bump parade. It’s like a live reality tv show, or bloopers and practical jokes, or Cops without the cops, just the moronic events.

It’s quirky things like this that remind me that I’m living in a slightly more chaotic and disorganized “developing” nation.

Good Samaritans
And it just became clear to me what it actually means when they say, “This baby was rescued from the cho (toilet) by a Good Samaritan.” I pictured baby Joel lying sweetly on the floor next to the toilet, waiting for the next person to discover him. But social worker, Grace, explained further.

Things are dawning on me. God is good to increase His light slowwwly, knowing that I can only handle so much at once.

So when they say that baby Joel, this beautiful, perfect little guy, was found in the cho, it means that he was lying and dying in feces and urine in the bottom of a hole-in-the-ground. Someone dropped him in there. The brain doesn’t want to wrap around this one.

Social worker Grace says that many Good Samaritans risk their health, their lives even, to rescue these babies. It costs them sometimes an entire day’s pay because they’re stuck in long lines at the police station trying to report “child abandonment”. Apparently, holding an abandoned infant gives the Good Samaritan zero priority in line. It’s just the way it is. The value of the child…

The staff at New Life Homes uses that expression a lot– Good Samaritan – to describe the people who bring babies into our care. I was thinking about Jesus’ teachings about the man from Samaria who He called “good and merciful” and who was the original Good Samaritan. I was thinking about what this man did in contrast to what the other passers-by did. They were all presented with the same problem – a man badly beaten up and probably left for dead on the roadside. The first person to see the man was a priest. The priest crossed to the other side of the road and avoided the man. The second person to see the man was a person from the tribe of Levi (the tribe that “produced” God’s priests) and he did the same stinking thing – crossed to the other side of the road!

God,
as Your people,
give us Your strength
to stay on the right side of the road –
where the hurting people lie,
where the abandoned babies cry.
Don’t let “distance be the enemy of Africa.”
Don’t let us distance ourselves
from the needs we see and feel,
and hear about.

The man from Samaria (this supposedly godless area of the known world at the time) was the man who we know as the Good Samaritan. Jesus says that Good Sam saw the man and “he took pity on him.” (from Luke 10:25-37)

Thank you for being those who take pity on these children, who don’t cross over in avoidance. Thank you for bandaging their wounds, for putting them up in houses. Thank you for entering into their pain.

angel
Jacinta brings a pudgy baby girl named Angel into our office every day. We kiss her and love her for two seconds, then back to work! The other day, as baby Angel is laughing and smiling into Jacinta’s face, Jacinta says, “Gosh, I wish someone would see her soon.”

That’s stayed with me – I wish someone would see her soon.

We wish that for all the babies. Because we know that once you see Angel, you’ll fall in love with her. And always, in the back of our minds, we’re thinking – before it’s too late. Before she’s all grown up. Before she’s raised entirely without a mom or dad.

I’m not saying adoption is for everyone, but for those of you who have this tugging on your hearts, please don’t ignore it!

I was looking at the statistics on New Life Homes the other day. It’s pretty amazing. Seventy percent have been adopted since New Life’s beginnings. Over 500 babies placed in homes.

An international adoption just went through last week and a baby went home with a Canadian couple. We’re hoping and praying that this is a watershed event, helping open up the way to more international families.

These babies could be your little angels…

blogs & chocolate
Everyone loves chocolate here. It's like the universal language of love. I was sharing it in the office, and before I knew it, I'd offered it to the wrong person. She disappeared down the hall with the final one-third of my chocolate bar. She's on my hit list now.

Clive – the founder-director – cracks me up. He came in the other day and said that he tried to go on my blog, but it wouldn’t work. Then he asks in his charming British accent, “Can you believe that? See what you’ve done – blog – you’ve got me saying blog!”

Right now I’ve got to go because the Kenyan sun is setting so that it can rise in your sky. That’s strange to me, living the day before you... Have a great one!

Kwaheri na Afrika,
janay

CCTO Rock the Baby Team Updates
1. Two babies went home with families last week!
2. Baby E(the ACTS 1:8 baby) comes back regularly to “weigh in”. I saw her sporting light-up shoes and blue jeans, her African mama following her as she toddled into our house. She looks so happy.
3. Here’s an idea I had in passing – I’m just throwing it out there. I know that you’re all focusing on “Jerusalem” and local ministry right now. And I was thinking… what if…We started thinking about changing the “face” of the Thousand Oaks/Simi Valley community by literally changing its “face”, its demographic? Picture families coming over in small groups to live and serve in Kenya for 6 to 9 months while their adoptions are being processed. Then returning to the States with new babies, given new lives. Talk about changing our Jerusalem, our world. How awesome would that be? Rock-the-Baby teams morphing into Adopt-A-Baby Teams…