A life of hope - thanks to Women At Risk

Y comes from a rural part of Ethiopia, where she grew up with her parents and siblings. At a young age her mum died, leaving them in an even poorer state, and Y’s older sister left for Addis to find work.

One time when the sister returned to visit the family, Y went back to the city with her sister as the lure of work and money was so enticing. She had no education however, so there was little work available to her.

Her sister was working as a housemaid, and found Y similar work at a different house. For a while it worked, but then things became bad, and around the same time a friend of Y’s sister, who was working as a prostitute, started telling Y about the ‘easy money’ to be made in her line of work.

As a result, Y left her job as a housemaid and started working as a prostitute, little knowing the downward spiral of despair that she was entering.

Y worked as a prostitute for 19 years, and has now been off the game for 4 years thanks to gaining access to the WAR programme.

She has a 12 yr old son, a 7 yr old daughter and a 4 yr old daughter.

Due to prostitution, Y has suffered from several STD’s and required some long periods of medical treatment to overcome them – medical treatment made possible by WAR funding.

As part of the WAR programme, she trained as a hairdresser, although she currently isn’t using that skill due to the young age of the children; however she hopes to use it sometime in the future and is glad that she does have a skill to dream about using.

Y lives in a tiny shack. Just big enough to get a single bed in, plus about 50cm walkway around two sides of the bed. The walls are plastic sheeting against a timber frame, and as well as the bed there is a small cupboard. There is also some wooden shelving through a hole in the ceiling that is now used for storage, although when Y was still working as a prostitute that was where the children would sleep whilst Y served her clients on the bed.

Y has two forms of income – she washes clothes for other people, and she sells corn at the market. Selling the corn requires her to be out each evening, as that is the best time to try and make some money, so the children have to put themselves to bed, and the 12 yr old lad essentially has to head up the household for those hours.

On a good evening Y will make 15 – 20 birr (30 – 60p), but often she will come home with much less. The rent on their home is 400 birr a month – hence the clothes washing as well.

Despite what sounds like a very ‘hopeless’ story, this is actually one where there is a definite glimmer of hope shining through, thanks to the impact of coming to know Jesus and His love through the people and work of Ellita Women At Risk.

Y has remained out of prostitution, and is determined to give her children a better upbringing than she had. Love for them shines through, in what she says and how she interacts with them.

For our visit she had roasted some barley seeds and made coffee – two traditional Ethiopian forms of greeting, and there was pride in being able to give us that welcome.

Y has a long road ahead, and I doubt life will ever be easy, as she doesn’t have the education to be able to gain her access to well-paid jobs. But what is clear from her face, and her quiet dignity, is that she has hope, she has self-belief, she is able to give love as a result of feeling loved, and within it all she knows Jesus, and that through His love for her, she has been able to come out of the darkness and feel alive again.

This is definitely not a prosperity gospel story as can tend to be touted in some parts of the Church – but it is a story that demonstrates the truth of God’s Kingdom being worked out – of what happens when people put into practice the commandment to love our neighbour, no matter who that neighbour might be, and the impact of that love on the neighbour’s life, and the lives of those around them.