Women At Risk do Isaiah 58

For the past 4 days I’ve had the immense privilege of representing Cred at the strategic development review for Women At Risk, one of our partners working in Ethiopia.

W.A.R. works with prostitutes, reaching out to them on the streets and running rehabilitation programmes for the ladies, including counselling, discipleship, skills training, health support and child-care. Their success rate is that 90% of the ladies who go through the year long rehab programme do not return to the streets and pursue better lives for themselves and their children. 

I have spent time with a few of the W.A.R.team before when leading Cred team trips to run activity weeks as part of their children work summer camps and I had always been very touched and impacted on those occasions at the love and compassion of the W.A.R.team members towards the children of the prostitutes that we worked with. So many of the children themselves have been through awful traumas, as well as all that their mums have been through, and yet the unconditional acceptance, value and care shown to the children is second to none.

These past few days, all of the W.A.R. team were present, from Cherry the founder, through all the leadership team to those involved in outreach, skills training, discipleship, children's work and all other aspects of the work, plus the driver, the lady who does the cooking and anyone else who is part of the team in any way.

Seeing them working together, there was no evidence of any sort of hierarchy and everyone participated in the discussions and group work with equal voice and equal passion to seek the way forwards for the organisation, that they might better support a group within society who are treated with such contempt and disgust by so many, and by others as little more than an object with which to satisfy their own distorted lustful needs. 

Some of the discussions about why prostitution occurs in Ethiopia were very heated as different team members spoke from the heart. Some were speaking from the many testimonies they've heard given by ladies who have passed through the rehab programme, and some were speaking from their own experience as ex-prostitutes who now work on the staff of Women At Risk. 

There were stories of abuse, stories of escaping being forced into a marriage to an old man whilst just an 8 or 9 year old girl, stories of poverty, of abduction and of trafficking.
So many examples of the cruelty of humankind and the vulnerability of girls and women in patriarchal societies. 

The place where we all met was a beautiful place. Situated on the shores of a volcanic crater lake, it was a place of peace and tranquility - an oasis of rest and relaxation for the team, and a place that I was honoured to join them in. 

The work they do is so so gritty and edgy and tough and emotionally draining and challenging and fulfilling. 

It’s not something you can survive alone and these past few days have given a huge insight into the massively family-like and supportiveness that undergirds the organisation. 

To be part of all this has been inspiring but also challenging. 

At one point we were reminded of the words of Isaiah 58: 6-9:

“This is the kind of fast day I’m after:
    to break the chains of injustice,
    get rid of exploitation in the workplace,
    free the oppressed,
    cancel debts.
What I’m interested in seeing you do is:
    sharing your food with the hungry,
    inviting the homeless poor into your homes,
    putting clothes on the shivering ill-clad,
    being available to your own families.
Do this and the lights will turn on,
    and your lives will turn around at once.
Your righteousness will pave your way.
    The God of glory will secure your passage.
Then when you pray, God will answer.
    You’ll call out for help and I’ll say, ‘Here I am.’

There is no doubt that the work of Women At Risk is fulfilling that call of God. Women are being set free from the captivity of prostitution, mouths are being fed, wounds healed and hope restored. 

But what of us who aren't up against those issues on a daily basis? How much are we fasting in this way? 

To fast is to give something up. What am I giving up in the pursuit of justice for others, here at home as well as overseas. Not food fasting but deeper than that? When God looks at my life does He see the right kind of fasting?

I'm still wrestling with what that fasting should look like in my life and for each of us it will have our own unique angle but I dare to suggest that for each of us there is something extra we can do in pursuit of the cry of God in Isaiah. 

PS for those of you who like songs to meditate on, try Casting Crowns ‘Love Them Like Jesus’. I don't know the background to the song, but it fits really well!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wh2IRvavyms

6 year olds being tear-gassed

One of the most upsetting items on the news that I came across this week was on Monday when police in full riot gear, attacked the students at a primary school in Kibera area of Nairobi, with tear gas.

The reason for the attack? The children were complaining at the erection of a fence around the playground of their school, which prevented them from being able to have full access to their school. Local officials had erected the fence after the land had been bought by wealthy developers, and the children weren’t going to let this underhand move go unnoticed.

The photos on the BBC news report show children overcome by the tear gas, and several were taken to hospital.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-30879938

I confess I have a soft spot for the children of primary schools in Nairobi, having spent many happy occasions at the Spurgeons Academy in Kibera, as part of CRED Team Trips there. I have seen on many occasions the hunger these children have for education, and how much they will sacrifice to be able to go to school. This event is just another example of that. They are so inspiring and their attitude to education is often a transformative part of the experience for our young people who take education so much for granted.

But what is so upsetting, apart from the evidence of corruption and underhanded means that are increasingly rife in Kenya regarding land-grabbing, is the manner of the police in dealing with the situation.

Riot gear and tear gas do seem very heavy-handed, especially when used on children as young as 6 years old.  What was the rationale behind this approach? Talk about using a sledgehammer to crack a nut – it’s just appalling.

Around the world are too many examples of oppression of free speech. We’ve seen it in France and in Belgium recently, in Saudi Arabia, in Syria, in Pakistan, in Nigeria, in so many places. This is another example, and it’s just so wrong. 

So wrong, and for those of us who live in countries where we don’t need to watch our backs every time we say something, it is a right we must continue to cherish, and to stand in solidarity with others who are doing all that they can to preserve the right in their countries.

belated new year blog

First blog of the new year, and as it is still just within the first half of January it sort of feels like it's ok to write something that is in the spirit of 'new year hopes and dreams'.

I know there tends to be a lot of this type of writing around at this time of year, so please forgive me for following the trend in that way, but in this slight lull before the full on busy-ness of life resumes, I'm going to seize the moment.

Looking forward into the coming year for CRED, there are some obvious events that immediately lead to prayer pointers. In February we have a team going out to Uganda to work with the Acholi children, in June we have a small team of vulnerable young people going on a 360 trip to Uganda, in July we have teams going to Rwanda and Malawi, and hopefully Bulgaria, and then in October we have teams going to Bulgaria and Uganda.

There are also 3 other possible teams yet to be confirmed this year, and some planning for 2016.

From that come some immediate prayer needs, that tie in with hopes and dreams: for the young people preparing for the trips - that all the monies will be fundraised, that all the plans for the trips will be fully carried through, and that on the trips they will gain a greater understanding and experience of God at work in this world, in and through them, as they come alongside out partners and both give and receive from the inspiring and faith-centred work taking place.

Ultimately, may God be glorified and His Name made increasingly known through the vehicle of CRED Team Trips.

Moving on to the CRED partners, there come a whole other raft of hopes and dreams.

For each partner there are unique hopes, dreams and prayers -

For Spurgeons academy in Kenya - that the political situation would settle down, to enable the teachers to teach and the children to learn, as they are so desperate to do. For safety for the children and staff living in kibera slum, and that one day things will settle enough that we can send a team out there again

For FIAM in India - that the weather will settle down enough for the parents of the school children to get good harvests in, earn some money and be able to pay school fees that in turn gives the school a more secure foundation.

For our partners in Ethiopia - that the elections this year pass peacefully allowing the work of the partners to continue in a secure way, and ensuring that we can take teams out there again from 2016

For GNPDR in Rwanda - that they will secure some funding to help bring long term security to a couple of their vulnerable yet much needed programmes.

For Link in Uganda - so many exciting facets and aspects of potential growth going on here that I don't know where to start - thank goodness God does!

For Partners on the Thai/Burma border - that their ongoing work supporting the ethnic minority groups of the area continues to flourish and bring increasing security and stability to the lives of those who have been so marginalised and outlawed for so long; and that if possible we can resume team trips to this area.

For our newer partners in Malawi, Bulgaria and Mexico, as we continue to build relationship with them - that we will put down strong deep roots of partnership hat can grow in the ways that are right for each individual project.

Of course these are the hopes and dreams that I have for the partners as organisations, but the truth is that the partners are made up of individuals, who each have their own set of hopes and dreams. Whether it is work-related, or family- focused, or a mixture of all sorts, may the hopes and dreams of each individual in each partner organisation be realised.

As I think about our various partners, and their individual circumstances, it is a relief to remember that, at the end of the day, nothing is too hard for God. Yes He may have different timescales to us on getting things down, but the reality is that His timescale is always the perfect one, whilst ours are often way out of line, and born out of a desire for everything to happen now!

And I am also reminded that our hopes and dreams aren't necessarily God's hopes and dreams, but that His are the best ones, and so the important thing is to make sure that my to-do list is based on Gods plans, not my plans, and that prayer is the starting point for all actions.

I could include in the hopes and dreams for 2015 something about financial security, and something about staffing levels. But God knows what we need, and when we need it, so I'll leave those details to Him.

For now, here's to 2015! May it be a great year, when we each draw closer to God, and gain a better understanding of what He has in store for us, as individuals, as community. And may it be a year when, by the end of it, we can look back and rejoice at all the amazing ways that we can see God answering prayer, and being glorified in and through and despite all that we have done.

Happy New Year to you all, may you know God's blessings in it all.

New Years Day - a day for looking back and forward

I don’t know if everyone has the same tendency to be a bit reflective on New Years Day, or whether it’s a sign of my personality / age / something else, but I certainly find myself doing a bit of a look back and forward at this point.

From many perspectives it’s been quite a busy year to say the least, and that includes the CRED perspective. There have been the expected number of unexpected (if you see what I mean), but the reassuring thing throughout all of those times is that they aren’t unexpected to God, and in retrospect we can see how He has been preparing the way to absorb those changes as well as possible.

So, for the team that initially were hoping to go to India but had to switch to Uganda for logistics reasons quite early on, it meant that not only were they not in India at the time of some cyclones, but it also meant that they were in Uganda at the right time to able to help a little Acholi lad who was suffering from sickle cell anaemia and needed hospital treatment that his family couldn’t afford, but the team could when they clubbed together. A beautiful opportunity for one of our teams to respond to an immediate need from the prompting of their hearts, and in so doing unwittingly be involved in a profound time of responding to God’s nudging – something that many of them reflected on in different ways afterwards.

Another team also had to switch locations, this time very last minute, from Kenya to Uganda. It was Al-Shabab’s Nairobi antics that caused the switch, and whilst it was pretty full on at the time, everything went well, and we ended up still being able to bless the Kenyan partner with resources when we stopped over at Nairobi airport, as well as being able to start a new project of providing numeracy and literacy to the Acholi non-schooled children. A double blessing of God’s works emanating from potential disruption by Al-Shabab; and definite proof that good will always prevail in the end J

On the partner front, we’ve also started building good relationships with new partners in Malawi, Bulgaria and Mexico and have teams lined up to go out and get involved with the Malawi and Bulgaria work in the next 12 months.

And of course we continue to work with our other partners, all wonderful and inspirational and doing amazing work in extremely challenging surroundings. The challenges come in many forms – financial, climatic, religious fanaticism, government policies…..but one thing I am reminded time and again in liaising with the partners is just how important it is to cover everything time and time again in prayer. Their faith, and persevering pursuit of God’s will, even when the chips are really down… well it makes my lack of spiritual discipline very evident and certainly prompts a renewed effort, albeit not always for long at a time I’m ashamed to say!

One of the wonderful things about CRED trips, apart from the partners and projects that we go to, are the transformations that we see in the young people who take part. And this year has been no different. I can think of one lad who used to average a detention a week before the trip, but since getting his perspective on life and his role in it reviewed, he has not been in detention once – and he’s been back for 5 months. Another participant is now pursuing family-centred social work as a career, due to the great sense of fulfillment she got through participating in the trip. Another is pursuing a career as a GP rather than a surgeon as she has realised she wants to ‘treat the person as a whole not just as a problem to be solved with a knife’. And many others have had other life-impacting experiences that they are working out in various ways.

The exposure of the young people to God’s Kingdom work is something else very special, and again we have seen examples of previously un-churched young people getting a feel for God in their lives for the first time, as well as others who do have some level of faith growing to love Him more, and to recognize His call on their lives. Some amazing conversations around all this have been had, and it’s an honour to be part of it, and of raising up the next generation in this way.

I could go on about many other bits of the CRED year but I’ll save you that! Instead I’ll close this first blog of 2015 with 3 snapshots of why 2014 was so special for me:

• .      In Addis in July on the Women At Risk trip, there was a special celebration event at the end of the week for all the children and their mothers. Three of the mums who came to the event were ones whose homes I had visited the previous year, and each of them came up to me with smiles and hugs and welcomed me like a long-lost friend: I felt so humbled, and it reinforced for me how important these trips and relationships are for the children and families on the projects.

• .      In Uganda in October I had the chance to teach 6 ladies how to write their names – something they had never been able to previously do. As a result they said that they feel like real people again. A very powerful moment and from that has been birthed an adult literacy class for these 6 ladies, and some of their illiterate friends, that will be run by a local Acholi lady who is studying education at University. All it needed was a bit of seedcorn money and encouragement to take it forward – and now that they have that the classes have begun and some of the older ladies will soon be much more empowered than they previously were.

• .      In Uganda in November I sat and listened to the story of John Njendahayo – as he told it, sitting in the village of the tea plantation where he grew up. It is a real rags to riches story although he will never make it to riches as he keeps giving everything away and living simply so that he can ensure others may live. John’s story was a reminder of all the stories of our partners, and of how selfless and faith-filled they live their lives. Stories full of lessons for us all to take away, be challenged by, and be transformed by.

May 2015 be a very special year for us all, and may we each have, and grasp, opportunities to live out God’s calling on our lives. May we each have people around us to inspire, challenge and help us grow closer to doing things the way Jesus would do them, and may we be that person to others.

Love and prayers to you all.