(Esther and John at at a special Hope Club party)

(The excitement of tasting ice cream for the first time for most of the children, thanks to our visitors Kayla and Sarah who treated us to the cold confection at Hope Club)

(On June 16th we were viewing a lunar eclipse with the children.)

Of Witches, Mumps and Pox, Oh my!

...From Kamau

Greetings friends! I trust this finds you all doing well! From what we’ve heard, you have been experiencing a sizzling hot summer season especially in the East Coast! Here in Zambia, the months of June and July are usually our winter season and yes it has been getting cold late in the evening and especially early mornings’ but it has none the less been a rather warm winter which is unusual.

You in the Northern Hemisphere may find it hard to believe, but it really does get cold in Zambia to a point where I have been forced to wear several layers of clothes to stay warm. The house we live in has a tin roof and no ceiling such that when its get cold, the only solution is to dress up and go to bed early. Now during the hot months, the opposite is true! The same tin roof gets so hot you feel like you are broiling slowly.

Now about those pesky witches! This is one of those things which as an African I really find aggravating! Especially when I witness the strong spiritual, emotional and mental bondage many are subjected to including some believers! It especially get me riled up when I see the adamant rejection of the care of a medical doctor because the person or the family of the patient believes that the illness has nothing to do with normal sickness which any person born of flesh may suffer, but a belief that someone has cast a spell or that out of jealously, the patient has been bewitched and therefore medical science has nothing to offer.

This was our experience recently when one of our workers became seriously ill and we decided to take him to hospital. He was admitted into the local district hospital but a few days later, his wife and his brother came to see me and told me that the patient was being transferred to the national hospital for more specialized care and they therefore need money to help facilitate this transfer. They were given the funds but several days later, they came back and said they needed yet more money! I was confused and thought perhaps we were having a communication barrier, because as far as I knew the transfer to the national hospital and already been effected! I don’t speak their particular language and so I asked one of the staff to translate. It finally came out that they needed the funds to pay a witch doctor who I was told was treating the patient! I got so angry and told and them there was no way we were going to take money God’s people have provided to pay for the services of a witchdoctor!

The whole story eventually surfaced and I found out that lies had been told; the district hospital had not really transferred the patient but the family had decided to remove the patient from the district hospital and taken him to a witchdoctor in the village because they had decided that what he was suffering from was not a “normal illness” but that he had been bewitched and therefore the only way he could be cured was through “traditional means.” They were heard to say that they had seen a witchdoctor and that the witch had actually shown them on a “screen” the persons who had bewitched their loved one. According to the family the people responsible for the “bewitchment” were the patient’s two co-workers who out of jealousy had done this terrible deed.

Now, being accused of practicing witchcraft is a very serious charge in Zambia! People accused of bewitching others have been killed and sometimes burned alive in their grass huts! Killings of people suspected of witchcraft occurred recently in a place called Mansa. You can therefore appreciate the deep hurt and pain our two workers were experiencing not to mention the danger inherent at such an accusation. The two threatened to report this matter to the police in order to be accorded protection and help guard their reputation. When we as management found out that the family had removed the patient from the hospital, we decided to step in and do whatever was necessary to help him access medical care. We paid a visit to the home of the worker’s parents in the village to plead with them to allow us to take him to a good hospital. We found the worker lying on a mattress on the ground very weak and emaciated; he could barely see or talk. We were informed he had not eaten for days nor used the bathroom. After some discussion, the family agreed to let us take him to the hospital, we took him to a private hospital where we were sure he would get proper care and attention. The doctors at the well equipped Egyptian Orthodox Hospital very quickly diagnosed him with TB which is a treatable disease. He was there for almost a week and was beginning to eat and get stronger when he suddenly took a turn for the worse and died. He was only 27 yrs. He left behind his wife and two children, one a very young baby. The cause of death was listed as respiratory failure and TB. NOT witchcraft! But a treatable illness! I can’t help but wonder if he would be alive today had he been able to access thorough medical attention much earlier instead of a dalliance with primitive and hollow remedies.

Here at the children’s home, we have faced our own challenges with chicken pox among some of the children and an outbreak of mumps. Four of our children in the same house tested positive for mumps and just last week, two other children from a different house also tested positive! We hope it doesn’t get out of control; we are trying not to panic! (Did I hear witchcraft!!!) Just joking! I am reliably informed that this illness is particularly bad for boys and especially older men! Boy, am I glad I have 44 children!

May God's peace and grace rest upon you!

The Kamaus

Bwanji! Dear Ones,

In case you are wondering why everyone in this picture is dressed in fancy wear, it is because we all attended a wedding this past Sunday! One of the teachers at our School of Hope, Bruce Malowa wed his bride Alice and we were invited guests!

All of the children were so excited to be able to attend and get dressed up for the day.

Nelson, Shaibu and Isaac were feeling very debonair!

Kimani and Malaika

Here is a picture of the happy couple, although the picture does not reflect their joy! In Zambia, especially in rural settings, the wedding couple is expected to be very serious and somber even. This was really a culture shock for us because we are used to beaming smiles and laughter and if there are tears, they are clearly tears of joy!




Teacher Bruce's grade seven class was permitted to attend the reception. In this picture the children are watching the wedding party dance their way to the bridal table.
It was a very long day as we waited for the the bride and groom to arrive, watch various processionals, listen to the Pastor preach, witness the saying of the marriage vows, and prayers for the couple. Docklin took a moment to walk around and take a peek out of the window to see what else might have been happening outside!


Do you remember the maize that we planted using Farming God's Way? Well here are some of the children harvesting our crop! We are now learning how to make organic compost so that we can enrich our soil in preparation for the next planting season.

New arrivals at the Villages of Hope!! No, not children this time, but dairy cows! Shaibu and Joe are learning how to milk them in this picture.
When the milk has been collected, the children deliver them to the houses scheduled to receive milk for that day.

In March of this year, our nephew, Kamale, ( 3rd from left) from Kenya, came to live with us and attend school in Zambia. Also in this picture are our friends from Kenya, Anne and Lawrence and their two children who were visiting with us for two weeks.

Anne and Lawrence played some very interesting games with the children that helped to develop their thinking and communication skills. Actually we all enjoyed playing them!

All in all, the month of April, which is one of the months that children are out of school, was pretty quiet for us. Several of the children went away to visit relatives during this holiday time.
We are grateful that everyone returned safely and settled back into their regular routine. School begins today!
Please remember the newlyweds in your prayers for the Villages of Hope!

God's Grace & Peace rest on you,

The Kamaus

Kamau Family Update

Hello Everyone!

Recently, we received an end of the year update from one of our friends and it was such a pleasure to read how their sons were growing and developing their own interests. It kept them on our minds for days!

We thought that you might want to find out what the four us have been doing or thinking about individually over the past year. (This does not include the cats, although they have certainly been up to quite a bit of mischief and who can tell what kind of dark thoughts are swirling around in their minds! But we are sure you are not interested in hearing about their shenanigans!)

To start with however, we thought you might be interested in a wildlife update. Do some of you remember back in the seventies and eighties when the news reports were full of warnings about killer bees from Africa making their way to the United States? There were even some made for television movies about savage swarms of bees terrorizing unsuspecting people!

Well, we don't know if the fiendish buzzing insects ever made it to the US, but they have certainly been making themselves at home right here at the Villages of Hope. Their latest sojurn being a tree next to our house. We took a picture of the teeming mass because we thought you might enjoy looking at them. :-)

(We all agreed, except for Kamau of course, that this disturbing image can certainly cause many nights of unwelcome nightmares!)

After about two days they left and were spotted fighting with some other bees. This is what we were told by some of the children in the village, who seem to be quite knowledgeable about all the goings on in our little village!

(Here is Rafiki, the newest member of our family, who is very friendly as his Swahili name indicates, but at times exhibits some sociopathic tendencies. We like him though.)

From Kimberly:

Lately, it has been my joy to take time in personally developing as one of the worship leaders in our church. We have four teams which are led by Kathleen, Dick, Rose C. and myself. I had always been very nervous about playing my guitar in front of groups of people, (maybe this stemmed from a time years ago when I was playing and the guitar slid off of my lap.) I really hated the struggle because I felt like it was not honoring the Lord to be so concerned of my potential embarrassment and what people might be thinking. After all, He doesn't mind if my voice cracks or if I play a wrong chord or if the guitar winds up on the floor during praise and worship. He is concerned about the attitude of my heart before him. So I have been learning how to freely come before the Lord in worship and focus on what makes him wonderful and helping others to enter into worship as well. Whenever I have free time it is usually spent practicing worship songs and classical music styles on the guitar or reading.

I really love teaching, whether it is Kimani and Malaika in our homeschool and taking great delight in finding activities that will help them learn in fun ways or in Hope Club teaching God's Word to our children. Earlier this month, I began teaching guitar to Mary B., Brighton, and Joe. I am excited at the thought of how the Lord will use everything that they are learning for His glory!

This year I am hoping to also begin teaching several children at the Villages of Hope how to share their faith in Jesus Christ with others and also to train them how to teach Bible lessons to other children. Please pray that God will show me which children to begin with and that I will be faithful and consistent in instructing them.

Feeling Joyful,

Kimberly




From Kamau:

As I recall the years that the mission committee met in our home in Delaware and prayed for Southern Sudan, I am very excited and grateful to God. I am so encouraged to witness how God has so graciously answered those prayers. Just this month, the referendum for the independence of Southern Sudan was held and it passed with an whelming majority. The South will officially become the newest independent country in world in July of this year! After more than 20 years of war and oppression, finally a breakthrough has sprung forth! God is indeed faithful and he does answer prayer!

As my church in Delaware continues to pursue a piece of land where we can build a home church, I can vividly remember how for years we have prayed and petitioned the Lord for this vision to became a reality in our time. There are times we despaired and did not see how this could possibly happen, but just like Elijah after a three year drought in Israel, I can see a little cloud on the horizon and I ask myself, Lord, is this it? Is this the time that our long wait and prayers will finally be realized? Will this land we are now pursuing be the answer to our years of prayer? I can only hope and continue to pray and remind myself, that our God is gracious and indeed faithful! He has done it for the people of Southern Sudan in answer to the prayers of God's people, perhaps at GEFC, now is our time!

Now, many of you who know me are aware that I have not been one to take a great interest in farming. Actually, I have found this occupation to appear rather dreary apart from when I am eating farm produce! Of late however, I have suddenly become very curious about this noble profession after observing Mark Wenham, our farmer friend from Zimbabwe, teach about farming God's way and witnessing the results of the demonstration patch that we began last November.

I find my self looking forward to a trip we are taking to Zimbabwe in March to attend a Foundations in Farming conference and field demonstration that will present principles from the Word of God and apply them to farming. I do not know why, in my late forties, there is now this interest, but who knows, maybe with all of the children who have entered our lives, God may want me to learn how to grow and provide food security for them now and in the future!

Ready to learn new things,

Kamau

(At first, learning the guitar seemed so hard, but now I feel good that I can play some nice pieces of music!)

From Malaika:

Dear Friends,

I'm ten years old and I'm in the 4th grade. I like soccer but the boys in the village barely even pass the ball to me. I really, really like school, but sometimes I don't like school. I play guitar and sometimes the recorder. We have two cats and one of them is named Rafiki, which means "friend" Kiswahili. This is the language that Kenyans in Africa speak. I am learning that language and I'm learning how to type. It's fun. I am also learning about American History and I like it. I am sometimes homesick for the United States, although I have my brother and my parents and cats to cheer me up. We went to Kenya in 2010. It was fun. I got to visit my cousins there and we stayed with some friends for awhile. While I was in Kenya we went to a restaurant called "Carnivore," and I ate different types of meat. The new things that I ate were ostrich meat and crocodile meat. It was tasty.

Bye for now!

Malaika

(I am so excited about learning chess. I had been waiting a long time for my mom to teach me! Now I am waiting to learn some strategies so that I will be able to beat my brother and play my grandfather one day!)

(Malaika, Kamau & Kimani visiting friends in Kenya last year.)

(Here I am at one of my favorite places!)

From Kimani:

Habari Zenu!

That is how you say "hello" to more than one person in the language of Kiswahili. How are you? I miss you all so much.

I am twelve years old now and I am in the sixth grade. Here is an update on what I have been doing and some things I like to do. I still love reading, and I love playing the guitar and hanging out with our two cats Orlando and Rafiki. I also really like math and I am enjoying learning about physics. Computers really interest me! We have a drawing and computer programming program which my sister and I use to draw cartoons and animate them. It is really fun!

We're learning how to speak Kiswahili because, I mean, we are part Kenyan and we thought it would be a good idea to learn it.

Well, goodbye! Or in Kiswahili, "Kwaheri!"

Sincerely,

Kimani

( And here I am doing one of my favorite things!)

Well, we hope you have enjoyed our personal update!

With much gratitude for you all,

The Kamau Family

A Very Merry Christmas to All of You!

The rainy season is upon us and farming activity is well under way. The monkeys are also quite active in their thievery as they regularly raid maize fields!



Our children at the Village of Hope are taking some baby steps in farming as they experiment with planting their own little patch of maize. We have received some instruction from Mark Wenham who is an excellent farmer. He taught us principles from the Word of God that we can apply as a foundation to our farming technique. Here are some of them:


1. Be faithful with what you have been given
2. Give and you will receive
3. Whatever you do, do it with all of your heart as unto the Lord. Make sure our standards are excellent.
4. Do not be wasteful
5. Do it with joy

Mark had a captive audience as we learned how to prepare the ground (first through prayer), dig the holes neatly and evenly spaced, apply fertilizer and the seed, and mulching.

He then performed two experiments; one demonstrating what happens to the soil when fields are continually plowed which cause loss of important nutrients as opposed to the soil in which the field has been cultivated using conservation farming methods. The other experiment demonstrated the importance of having “God’s blanket” or mulch applied over the cultivated area once the seed and fertilizer has been applied and how much moisture and soil were retained in the area with the mulch.

The children and caregivers have been taking turns weekly in caring for our maize patch and we have been very encouraged by the growth and health of the plants!



(The Mumba Family, Back Row from right: Dick, Jesse, Anita, Abraham, Front row from right: Rachel, Michelle, Esther)

We would also like to introduce to you our new missionary family who joined us in November this year; their names are Dick and Anita Mumba. They have five children, Jesse 17yrs, Abraham 16yrs, Michelle 11yrs and two 8yrs old twins’ girls Rachel and Esther. They are from Zambia and have been serving in the mission field with a ministry called Youth With A Mission in the Eastern part of Zambia for the last five years. They completed their five year commitment with YWAM and felt lead to Join All Kids Can Learn to help minister to the orphaned and vulnerable children.

Life sometimes has an interesting way of catching up with you; Kamau and Dick first met twenty one years ago when Dick, then a single man, left Zambia and came to Kenya to attend a Discipleship Training School where Kamau was a student. After graduation, both went their separate ways, married, had children and continued serving in the mission field in different locations, little did Kamau know that one day, he would come to Zambia as a missionary and not only renew his ties with Dick, but actually end up serving alongside each other in the mission field. Dick has attended a bible school and served as a pastor in several churches in Zambia. His wife Anita is a trained pre-school teacher and has worked in the role of teaching for the last past five years. Anita is from a small island in the South Pacific, she and Dick met in Kenya where they both worked at Youth With A Mission.

Kamau is particularly happy to have Dick on board as he will be another father figure to our 42 children and yet another 16 children to be admitted sometime next year; It was becoming rather challenging for Kamau to spend quality time with all of the children! Dick will also assist in our local church at VOH among many other responsibilities. Please be praying for the Mumba family as they begin this journey with us.

On the 22^nd we had our Christmas dinner celebration. The event was catered by the restaurant and we invited Pastor Zulu and his family to join us. We put out some tables, chairs and benches and arranged them on our front lawn. It was a very nice intimate atmosphere, just like an outdoor restaurant! After eating, the children sang songs and then the mothers and the aunties sang. Dick led us in singing after that and we had a really nice time.

(Anita Mumba with some of her children and Kimani)

Kimberly shared a Christmas message about an African American pastor in the early 1900s named Charles Tindley who pastured churches in Delaware and in Philadelphia. After witnessing gifts being passed out to children on Christmas day and one child being left out, he was heartbroken and asked God when would there be a time when the Spirit of Christ would so fill the hearts of people throughout the world that such things did not happen. The Lord responded by reminding him of Rev. 22:1-1,2 where it speaks of the tree of life and that Jesus is this tree! From that time he began to preach on "Heaven's Christmas Gifts" at Christmas time and many people were saved. They are, Hope for the Helpless, Forgiveness for the Guilty, Help for the Weak, A Friend for the Friendless, Peace for the Troubled Soul and a Home for the Homeless.

We then sang "Happy Birthday" to Jesus and also to Kamau because he was celebrating his birthday that day. We enjoyed some cake before we ended a very good day!

May the grace and peace of God rest on you moment by moment!

Many many thanks for your continued partnership with

us in this ministry.

The Kamaus

(Mama Anna with her children on Christmas Day!)