Day 29 of 40 - Royie
I am Royie from Dedza, Malawi. I am working with Hands at Work in Africa organisation. With the help of my fellow friends, we are serving in 10 communities.
Currently, we are caring for over a thousand orphans and vulnerable children. Please help us to pray today for these children that we are serving. Most of them are rejected by their own mothers and fathers. As is custom, when the mother dies, the father leave the children with Gogos or aunts, who struggle taking care of them. The same way if the mother has been divorced. She leave the children and go away to look for work far away from home. In this case, the children, have very much been rejected.
So, I would like us to pray for this spirit of rejection that is within the fathers and the mothers who normally rejected their children. So, we may ask God to take control over these children because the parents may reject them, but God will not reject them. Jesus does not reject them. He died for them. He cares for them. We need to stand with these orphans and children in the community, so that, when they know Jesus, all the rejection issues will not be there because he cares for everyone. Thanks very much for listening.
Have you ever felt left out? Maybe at school you weren’t picked for your sports team or weren't invited to a party. How did that make you feel? Royie mentioned that many children feel left out and rejected. Please pray that children will know that they are loved and cared for. Pray that they will have people who make them feel included and that they will know that God will never reject them.
Day 31 of 40 - angel
My name is Angel Masuka. I’m serving with Hands at Work in Likasi Service Centre in the DRC. We are supporting nine communities, altogether 900 children who are coming from the most vulnerable families. I’d like to share the prayer request on behalf of our families.
In most of our communities, we see the most vulnerable families. They do have many children, and they are facing challenges on how they can care for their children. We do have the example of one family in Kikula B. One of the children name is Alex. He’s coming from the family of 11 children. The parents, they have this number of children, not because they liked it, but because they didn’t have any information about the family planning. They don’t have any job, and they are facing challenges on how they can provide for them and care for them all. So, three from these children, they are in a bad condition of malnutrition. Another example is from Toyota, one of the children from the family of four as she’s five years old, but weight is eight kg. She does have three siblings. The parent, they don’t have any job and they can’t provide for them. She’s facing a bad level of malnutrition as well. We also see from the youth camp we had, many of our youth, they are wounded and broken because they have to be breadwinners for their own families. They have to provide for themself and to provide for the whole family. They have to stop school to go to look for piece work to sell vegetable, fruit and eggs so they can get something to provide at home. Please pray for God to give us wisdom on how we can care for these children and on how we can support these families well, on the side of family planning and on the side of care. Thank you.
Angel mentioned that many children in the DRC don’t have enough food to eat. It’s hard to imagine being so hungry that we get sick and need to go to the doctor. Pray that children will have food to eat and parents will be able to provide for their children. Specifically, pray for the two families mentioned above, that they will be completely healed and will recover their energy.
Day 33 of 40 - Erick
My name is Eric from DRC. I’m one of the Zambia leaders, but I’m living in Likasi. I would like to share to you on this 40 Days of Prayer about Kikula community. Kikula is one of the five communities that the local Service Centre is supporting - over 900 children! So, Kikula has a background story where the community was affected by genocide in those years, 1992, 1993, and people have been killing each other and the community was left abandoned. This side of Kikiula B, where Sylvia is, is a poor place. The community has been affected by those wars, by those rebel fights. In this place we do have most vulnerable children. We are trying to care, and we are trying to go even more than the number we are having because the poverty is on the extreme.
So in this community, I’m sharing to you the story of Sylvia, who is eight years old. She’s a girl. She lost the father three years ago and the mother died a month ago or so. I visited Sylvia two weeks after the mother died, and I could see Sylvia, she was looking so desperate.
I saw in that house where there is poverty, misery, you know, there are many orphans staying in that house because they are cousins. Some have lost their fathers, some mothers. There are a lot of orphans in that place. Among those children, Sylvia is there. But Sylvia, she’s sick. She was looking so desperate. We discovered that she was suffering with spleen disease. So, with spleen disease, Sylvia is looking anaemic and malnutritious.
So, I’d like you to join me, in this 40 Days of Prayer so we can pray for Sylvia that the Lord may intervene, for Sylvia to receive the proper treatment, even surgery from the doctor on this disease too far to be healed. Because Sylvia saw how the mother died so Sylvia is scared. She’s thinking maybe she’ll pass away like the mother. Let us pray for Sylvia that the Lord restore hope and bring healing, even for the medical doctor doing this surgery just to remove the sickness in her body. That Sylvia will be healed totally. Bless you.
Have you ever been in hospital or taken to the doctor because you were sick? How did you feel? Were you scared? Erick shared about a young girl named Sylvia, who is very sick. Pray that God will heal her.