A Sacrifice of Love

I heard quiet knocking on my door this morning at 7.  Not unusual for our day to begin early with visitors especially if someone has a need. I didn't hear the traditional "com licença" so I presumed it was one of our American staff. I was surprised to see beautiful and shy Fatima, one of our activistas on the other side of the door.  I suspected she came with bad news, but her beaming face told me otherwise. At 35, she has suffered more than I have the heart to recount: abandonment by her husband, single parenthood, contending with a terminal illness, an earlier battle with T.B., a mud house that melts in the rains, and a struggle to provide the greatest necessity of all - food for her daughter, granddaughter and niece.  Yet here she was, grinning from ear-to-ear, bearing a gift for me.

Inside her capulana she had carefully placed 10 pounds of rice from her machamba.  It was the first of her harvest and she wanted to give it to me.  I thought about the long hours she works walking for miles attending the needs of those in Project Life and wondered how she had found the time or energy to tend a high-maintenance rice field. I thought about the food in my refrigerator heaped with too many left-overs and the wide variety of food stacked neatly in my pantry. I thought about her meager salary of $25 per month in comparison to the cost of buying groceries in Dondo (i.e. margarine is $6 and milk is over $2 a quart).  I looked at her sweet face of joy in sharing what little she had and wanted to just sit on the kitchen floor and cry.

Later that morning, after she had left I questioned my national translator, Simone, as to why she would make such a sacrifice.  He looked at me with a sigh and answered with wisdom that those in the society of suffering can share.  "You don't give because you have a lot, and you don't hold back from giving because you have little.  You give because you love."

Oh, Father of all good gifts.....please help me to always love like that.

Week of Celebrations!

What a wonderful and busy week!  Sunday started out with a celebration of a baby dedication for Maria Verniz, our activista.  The rest of the week we worked hard on remodeling two buildings to make them ready for the basket-weaving business for the patients in Project Life.  Our first team arrived yesterday just in time for our first Green Door house dedication ceremony this morning!!!  Pictures speak louder than words, so I am going to post quite a few here.  But first I am going to blog about what this Green Door means to the donor, the recipient, and to me.

I had a few minutes to speak with Francisca as we drove to the hospital.  In just a few short days, she and her orphaned grandson, Domingos would be receiving the dream of a lifetime.....a house. I observed her old and tattered clothes as she spoke softly in her Sena.  "I never even had a dream that one day, my grandson and I would live in a cement block house with a zinc roof.  It just wasn't possible.  Yet now, God has provided this for us."  It had never occurred to me that owning anything but a precarious mud and stick house was all that she could imagine.  To own something better wasn't even on her radar screen.  Many in deep poverty succumb to their circumstances allowing it to even imprison their dreams.  I mused over her comments today at the celebration.  Her donors are a young family in the States.  They had given their savings out of love for God and love for these "neighbors" that live 10,000 miles away.  They had sent some precious words to share with Domingos and his grandma and it was no coincidence they closed their thoughts with a very apropos scripture out of Ephesians.  "Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think."

I fought back the tears as Domingos was given the keys and opened the door to his house. Our dream for building safe and secure houses for those with AIDS had come to fruition today.  God's gift to all of us...the donors, the recipients, the builders, the dreamers.  A perfect gift from above.

It is amazing that only $1400 can change a life here so dramatically.  Is God speaking to your heart to help?  We have so many on the list needing a safe home.  One young AIDS widow can't live with her children because there is no room for all of them in a relative's mud house.  Another man in Project Life has been asked to leave the home he is in because it belonged to someone else......and the list goes on.  If you would consider helping someone, please go to the CRI website. It will change their lives for the better.  www.childrensrelief.org  

Domingos and his grandma, Francisca - a new house!!

It is funny, but in a formal photo, Mozambicans refuse to smile. :-)

Opening the door to his new house.

A friend of Domingos.  So many are handicapped in Mozambique

The American team poses - Americans know how to smile in a formal photo!

THE BABY DEDICATION!

Many showed up to celebrate our activista's baby!

Val had the privilege of bringing NOÉ PASCOAL out of the house!!

Kathy comforts a sleepy one!

Friday - A Day in My Life

The newly designed Green Door house going up.

Domingo is an AIDS orphan.  He lives with his grandmother.

Often Domingo is sick.  On Friday I found him sick with a fever.

"Missionaries," comments Jonathan, "never know when to slow down."  I laugh at his observation. The morning had started early at the local pop store. Coca-cola statues around Beira are shrines to the fact there is no shortage of pop in this country. We had bought a case for the activistas' meeting to celebrate Jonathan's departure back to Germany.  A young man of 20, Jonathan showed up in Dondo a year ago with a single pack on his back. He had come to Mozambique seeking God's will in his life.  He will not return the same man; walking among the suffering embeds a deep footprint in the heart and soul that perpetually changes the course of one's compass.  I agree with him and continue to teach the weekly Bible story enabling the activistas to teach in the bairros next week. We finish the celebration so Jonathan, my translator and I can walk to the hospital to serve soup.

We greet the mothers and babies first. One baby is almost comatose lying in her mother's arms. Another mother rushes to us thinking we are nurses asking for help with the IV that has quit dripping into her child's arm. We explain that we have brought soup and a heart to share something more valuable than soup or medicine. We gather them together and share our spiritual manna, free for all.

In the other section of the hospital is a young man dying in the corner of the room.  He can't be more than 18, abandoned by his family. I note two lemons by his bedside.  I question the woman sitting next to her ill husband.  She explains that no one cares for this boy or brings him food.  She left two lemons picked from a local tree for him to eat because that was all she had to give. I wonder how long it has been since he has felt anyone's hug.

In the last room we find an elderly woman in her 80s.  She is missing an eye and her other eye clearly has a cataract.  It is so unusual to see the elderly here in Moz so I ask her age.  Without hesitation she says, "39." We ask again.  She confidently nods her head and repeats, "39."  We look at each other in amusement. Many older Mozambicans do not have any idea when they were born.  Records were not kept during the war. I nod my head in agreement, 39 is a nice age.  We pray, give the last of our soup and leave.

It is lunch time and some American friends stop by our new rental in Lusalite.  I can see they are tired so I offer to share our lunch - matapa and masa.  We discuss the world's happenings - bits of information we obtain from the internet.  Soon it is time for the afternoon's activities.  I have set aside Friday afternoon's to visit people in their homes.

I stop by Luisa's mud home.  I have brought some coats for her children as winter is almost here. She is dear to my heart.  Her son Tiago used to scream and run when he saw me coming.  Now at three,  he adores me because I have a car; he likes to play with the gearshift. His sister Ana is at the scream-and-run stage but her wide grin reveals the excitement of having something new.

Next my translator and I stop by the market to buy food for a church plant leader.  He has been out of work for some time and recovering from a very bad bout with malaria. But before we go there, we stop by to pray for one of our activista's sons who has cancer.  Paulo is a sweet boy with long eyelashes. Maria Luisa said he had been waiting patiently all day for our visit. I pull out the promised small bag of homemade peanut butter cookies with Hershey's chocolate chips.  I sadly appraise his rotund belly that encompasses the cancer.  There are no cancer centers in Dondo. We pray, asking God for a miracle that only He can provide.

Close to Paulo's house is Domingo, the AIDS orphan who is receiving a Green Door house.  It is satisfying to see the progress on this new cement design.  I notice that Domingo is covered up and asleep on the ground. His grandmother explains that he continues to be sick.  I pray in earnest for God's intervention.  She promises to take him to the hospital in the morning.

It is getting close to dark but we stop by and visit the church plant leader's family.  He is not home, but his wife and four children greet us.  I had named the youngest when he was born and now he is old enough to know who I am.  He crawls up in my translator's lap and falls asleep. I am so thankful for God's provisions to help this family. The happiness in their eyes to receive the food completes the day. We leave as my translator is late for his high school and I am not supposed to be out at night by myself.

Later that night, I lay in my bed thanking God for the day's opportunities.  I just pray that I have made the most of them.