The home and children of Love Children’s Home

Dear Friends,

For the past few days we’ve been away from Myanmar’s primary city, Yangon, and in the city of Taunggyi, in Shan State, which borders China’s Yunnan Province. I’m writing this blog entry from there in anticipation of once again being able to connect to the internet when we’re back in Yangon tomorrow.

Yesterday we visited Love Children’s Home, a Christian orphanage that was “adopted” by Heaven’s Family U.K. earlier this year. It was started by a missionary from India who came to this unreached region to spread the gospel among those who had never heard of Jesus. Inadvertently, however, he found himself taking care of a growing number of parentless children. Most of the 20 orphans who now live with him and his family lost their birth parents to AIDS, cholera, or because of the on-going conflict between Myanmar’s army and Shan nationalists.

For about eight months of the year, Love Children Home’s buildings are located in shallow waters near the edge of Inle Lake, and are thus built on stilts, as are all the houses of Inle Lake’s numerous villages. The other four months of the year, during the dry season, those same buildings are on dry land. Inle Lake is more like a gigantic marsh with very undefined shores than it is a lake. Most of the villages that are found around its “edges” can only be reached by narrow water passages through the brush. We had to rent long, narrow boats to reach the orphanage.

Our team with the children inside the main room. The floor is made of thin bamboo slats.

The children were absolutely delightful, and we enjoyed several hours interacting with them. I asked them if they preferred the wet or the dry season, and their consensus was the former because they liked to swim. They also told me that they are not afraid of Burmese pythons, and they showed me the 12-foot skin of one that they had eaten for dinner not too long ago!

Today we spent time with one of our beloved Heaven’s Family-sponsored national missionaries and his family. We started our day visiting the students of their missionary training school and rejoiced with them as they showed us their brand new Heaven’s Family-funded girls’ dorm. Currently, 32 students are enrolled who represent 10 different ethnic groups. Most intend to spread the gospel in unreached villages when they’ve graduated, something they are already doing during periodic outreaches.

HF-sponsored national missionaries, Khamh and Nini

We also met one of the Christian widows in this area who has benefitted from a Heaven’s Family small-business start-up grant by which she has been raising and selling pigs. We were so inspired to hear how her life has changed for the better, and to learn that her children, who previously turned away from God when they lost their father, have had their faith renewed by seeing their mother so blessed. It was the perfect ending to a great day. I’ve included some additional photos below. We have much to rejoice about. — David

One of the waterways we had to travel to reach the orphanage

Orphan Win Win Pyeh, who lost both her parents to cholera, and who is recovering from hepatitis A

Enjoying a moment with a woman from the Padaung tribe

One of the beautiful beneficiaries of a Heaven’s Family village water project

Dear Friends,

We arrived in Myanmar on November 7—the day of the first free election held here in two decades. No foreign journalists or observers were permitted in the country by the military rulers, and the elections were widely considered a sham. Prior to and after the elections, the government has done all it can to keep information from flowing out of the country, including via the internet. So we have found it impossible to send emails. However, after Saturday’s release of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, who had been held under house arrest since her landslide victory in Myanmar’s last election 20 years ago, it seems that internet access has also been freed somewhat. So I am finally able to send a blog update.

We’ve focused our first week on hosting two 2-day conferences for all the orphanage directors whom we’ve been helping over the past 8 years—38 directors in all in 2 primary cities. In those conferences, we’ve been introducing the concept of Christian foster care as a better alternative for children than institutional orphanage care. We’ve brought with us an expert from the U.K. to speak on that subject—who has years of experience establishing foster care in nations where it has been heretofore foreign. I’ve been blessed by our orphanage directors’ receptivity to the teaching, and our hope in the years ahead is to slowly facilitate foster and kinship care in this nation.

We’ve also been meeting with many people who have been helped through Heaven’s Family’s various restricted funds. Many critical medical needs have been met here, and it has been a joy to meet, for example, little children who once suffered with tuberculosis who are now completely healthy.

The highlight of the trip so far for me was a trip to the most remote village I’ve ever visited in my life. Heaven’s Family has funded a water project there in the past year, and now the 150 very poor villagers—many of whom are Christians—don’t have to walk 2 miles for their drinking water. They now have 7 public faucets right inside their village. The entire population turned out to meet our team when we arrived, and the first thing they did was pray for us.

Speaking of prayers, thanks for your prayers for our team. We’ve still got a week of ministry remaining here in Myanmar. — David

Standing at one of the seven public faucets in the village

Dear Friends,

Jeevan Lam is nine years old and lives in Nepal. In April, the director of Loving Children Orphanage sent a photo of him to our Heaven’s Family office asking us if there was any way we could help this child. He had been diagnosed with a rare benign tumor behind his nose that occurs primarily in adolescent males. If this tumor continued to grow, Jeevan would likely die, the doctor said. He needed extensive radiation treatments to shrink the tumor, followed by an operation on his nose and then brain surgery. After learning of Jeevan’s urgent need and looking at his photo, God grabbed our hearts and we had to help.

Over the next six months Jeevan was bathed in prayer and our Critical Medical Needs Fund began to help him. As you can see in the next photo, he has had his radiation treatments and his nose operation. Although his health is improving he still needs more surgery.

Jeeval is on the mend, but will need more surgury

Recently we received this report from the orphanage director, “On behalf of Loving Children Orphanage I would like to thank our beloved Lord Jesus Christ and Heaven’s Family who provide us to have a treatment for Jeevan’s health. Without your prayer and support we would have not done anything.” Jeevan sent us the following thank you card he made himself. Our hearts were touched.

We thank the Lord that he touches the hearts of those who generously contribute to the Critical Medical Needs Fund. Because of your help, Jeevan and many others say, “Thank you.”

Patti Samuels

Director, Critical Medical Needs Fund

Dear Friends,

I wanted to share with you a recent monthly report from the life of Bienvenu Bizimana, our beloved missionary in Burundi, East Africa, who recently witnessed a life redeemed by the blood of the Lamb. Thanks to Bienvenu’s four sponsors, we’re celebrating his one-year anniversary as a Heaven’s Family-sponsored national missionary. We are so thankful for the way the Lord is using Bienvenu to produce abundant fruit for His kingdom. Please read the story he wrote below about one of his converts, Sandrine—the story of a life redeemed—it will make your heart rejoice!

We’ve got a number of worthy national missionaries whose ministries could become more fruitful with a little help. To sponsor your own national missionary for as little as $25 a month, just send me an email at DavidG [at] HeavensFamily.org.

Redeemed in Christ,

David Growden

Director, National Missionaries Fund

A Life Redeemed by Christ

Sandrine Nkunzimana: a life redeemed from prositution

Greetings in the precious name of Jesus, our Lord and Savior. I wanted to share with you the story of Sandrine Nkunzimana, a life redeemed and transformed through our ministry to prostitutes!

Sandrine is 25 years, the firstborn in a family of 3 children. Her father passed away when she was 15 years old, leaving all the family burden under the care of Sandrine’s mother.

Before that, her parents used to work in the fields to earn enough money to pay rent, feed the family, and pay for children’s studies.

When Sandrine’s father died, her mother gave up hard work and sold herself to prostitution hoping to earn a lot of money easily and quickly. But after realizing that she was not earning as much as she expected, she influenced her daughter Sandrine to prostitution to be able to meet her needs and contribute in meeting the family’s needs of life.

In the process, Sandrine got pregnant and had to leave school; secondary school at that time. Worse, her mother forced her to go out of the house because she was pregnant, unfit to the job!

Since Sandrine did not know the father of the unborn child in order to seek support, she decided to abort it. She managed to get some money to cover the abortion cost and took it out against her conscience. After the abortion, she decided to go work in the fields to earn her living instead of getting back to prostitution.

A couple of months later, Sandrine got raped in the fields and got pregnant again. Disappointed, she thought of finishing her own life by hanging herself. That’s when I met Sandrine and won her to Christ. She repented of abortion, murder, and all her sins and asked for water baptism.

I gladly gave her water baptism and encouraged her to follow the Lord no matter what and reach out to her family and old friends. Since then, she has reconciled with her mother when she led her to Christ and their relationship has been redeemed. Now she lives with her mother again.

As disciples of Christ, Sandrine and her mother said they would rather die of hunger instead of sinning to earn their living. When they get a chance, they work in the fields and earn some money to survive. But it is rare.

Now Sandrine—a life redeemed by Christ—saves lives. She gave birth a few months ago, and helped rescue her mother’s eternal life!

Thanks for helping me reach Sandrine.

Bienv

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