Abandoned-Orphaned

World Orphans Weekly! - Birth and Renewal

Dear Friend of the Fatherless,

The holiday season from Christmas to New Years brings about thoughts of birth and renewal. We reflect upon the new covenant, plus look ahead to the changes and promises that the next twelve months might offer.

The time is punctuated with resolutions and hope. For many of us, that means drastic changes or commitments. For some of us, it means picking our lives and spirits up from the rubble of circumstances and tragedies that temporarily got the best of us.

In that vein, I’d like to share some reflections that I’ve had over this season.

The first set refers to the third anniversary of the South Asian Tsunami. I’d like to introduce you to one child and show you how one of our church-based homes stood ready to not only take him in, but expand to give other orphaned children hope for a new future.

The second set is more personal. It shares further on the progress of my dear friends, the Ochoa family. David and Rhonda Ochoa lost their daughter, Talitha, to cerebral malaria earlier this year while serving children’s ministries in Uganda. They now have a new baby and have moved to Colorado to join World Orphans. It’s certainly a time of new birth and new purpose for them. I think their story will serve as a good example and inspiration to you.

The third set gives you a pictorial update on the opening of the World Orphans’ Iraq office. This serves as yet another illustration of fantastic new beginnings filled with great hope and possibility. Please rejoice with us as we pioneer the work for orphans in this conflict-torn country...giving them new families, new legacies.

THREE YEARS LATER

Part One – Death on the shores; Hope across the street

Part Two – Fire and water, one boy becomes a full orphan

Part Three – A new home and a new future

PERSEVERANCE & FAITHFULNESS

Part One – A time of healing and transition

Part Two – Of Christmas delayed

Part Three – Words of wisdom born by pain

WORLD ORPHANS IN IRAQ

Spirit of 1776 – Now tangible: A new hope for Iraq’s orphans

More from Iraq – A trinity of languages to introduce The Trinity of love

From all of us here at World Orphans, we wish you a very blessed 2008, filled with new purpose and promise.

Thank you for your continued prayers and support.

Until They All Have Homes,

Paul Myhill
President/CEO

World Orphans
1840 Woodmoor Dr., Suite 100
Monument, CO 80132
1-888-ORPHANS
719-487-1700
Facebook Profile

All contributions are tax deductible and eternally significant.

Perseverance & Faithfulness (part three)

Here is the rest of the Ochoa family's e-mail that I alluded to in my last post. It's certainly sums up 'perseverance and faithfulness.'

Greetings Brethren,

So many people struggle with Christmas and the Holidays, yet we have never had the experiential knowledge of this until this year.

We now know the pain and absence, and can identify with all too many.

We are honestly struggling through this season.

Christmas was our last holiday with Talitha.

We are filled with deep emotions on this very first Christmas without Talitha.

We have absolute confidence of our baby's faith and of her presence with Daddy in Heaven, yet her absence is almost defeating at times.

I share this as a little piece of our life and burden.

Love deeply the ones you have.

Teach them that Jesus is the way the truth and the life.

He is whom our joy must be in to make it through any trauma.

Please celebrate richly this Birthday Celebration of the King that ushered in the freedom to all who will receive Him.

Let Christ rule in your hearts thoroughly each moment in thoughts and motives and actions.

Walking by faith not by sight,

The Ochoas

(QUITE DIFFERENT FROM AFRICA. David Ochoa watches his daughter, Anais, sled down a hill near our home)

(ALWAYS LOVING AND TEACHING CHILDREN. Rhonda Ochoa shows my daughter, Hannah, how to build a gingerbread nativity scene)

If you wish to support the Ochoa family financially during their transition to ministry with World Orphans, please make checks payable to World Orphans, 1840 Woodmoor Dr., Suite 100, Monument, CO 80132. Write "Ochoas" in the memo line of your check. All contributions are tax-deductible and eternally significant.

Perseverance & Faithfulness (part two)

David and Rhonda Ochoa were busy with visitors and ministry activities in Uganda last Christmas. What’s more, the parcel of presents from David’s mom hadn’t been delivered from America yet. They decided to postpone their gift exchange until it would arrive. At that time, they would "re-celebrate" Christmas as a family.

According to a recent family e-mail, daughter Talitha had planned much for the Christmas celebration and had "loaded the stockings with many gifts."

The parcel from America arrived on the day Talitha died.

The stuffed stockings sat still.

On Christmas Eve, here in Colorado, those stockings finally revealed their joy and memories. Almost one year later, the family received the gifts that Talitha had carefully and lovingly made for them.

(AWAITING NEXT YEAR'S STOCKINGS. The hearth at the Ochoas' new home in Colorado is adorned with garland and a photo of Talitha)

If you wish to support the Ochoa family financially during their transition to ministry with World Orphans, please make checks payable to World Orphans, 1840 Woodmoor Dr., Suite 100, Monument, CO 80132. Write "Ochoas" in the memo line of your check. All contributions are tax-deductible and eternally significant.

Perseverance & Faithfulness

For those of you that have been following this blog for the ten months since its inception, you are aware of my family’s love of the Ochoa family, and of the great loss (this side of eternity) of Talitha Ochoa to cerebral malaria earlier this year. In fact, this blog was started as I was deeply moved by the tragedy and started writing about Talitha.

You also know that God blessed David and Rhonda Ochoa with a new baby, Josiah, last month. We praise God for again adding to their numbers and expanding their legacy yet further.

During the past couple of years, the Ochoas were serving in Uganda to train indigenous leaders in ministry to children. In their region they had over one thousand churches at their disposal, churches that hadn’t established (or didn’t know how to establish) children’s ministries.

David and Rhonda’s goal was to see the vibrant, holistic development of children in the developing world, through the training and equipping of indigenous leaders.

It still is.

To that end, I’m pleased to announce that they have now joined us at World Orphans for the continuation of this purpose. The official start date is January 1st – a new year of ministry to children, a new year of service and endless possibilities.

Rhonda described the role discovery and transition in the last Ochoa prayer newsletter as follows. I encourage you to read it as a lesson in perseverance and faithfulness. Good lessons for all of us as we face a new year ourselves...

After we returned home early this year we began to pray, "What now?" "Where now God?"

The two previous years we spent working with HESED Ministries in Jinja, Uganda, under the umbrella of Africa Inland Mission (AIM). Earlier this year we stepped away from ministry with HESED. David and I were both agreed that this horrible tragedy was not meant to stop us from Kingdom work. Both of us still had such a passion to reach children by the training of indigenous leaders, yet our souls needed deep healing and direction.

"God we belong to you. We want to follow you, even though we are scared and crushed. Show us your will. Direct our path and give us the strength to follow." This was our prayer.

We left our future in God’s capable hands, trusting that He would be faithful, and went about the immediate - the nurturing of our family.

Early summer we were invited to join some dear friends in the ministry to orphans. When time availed late summer, we planned a trip to Castle Rock, Colorado, where we could hear about the ministry and stay with Paul and Lisa Myhill for some needed fellowship. Paul enthusiastically shared with us about the ministry of World Orphans and his dreams to go deeper in their partnerships with the orphan homes. We felt as though we had known about World Orphans, for we had met up with Paul several times in Jinja during his visit to some of the children’s homes. Yet what we heard was so different than what we had understood previously.

David and I were so excited to hear of World Orphans’ partnerships with indigenous church leaders to foster care for their local orphans. Notice I said partner, not make dependencies. We have so often seen that westerners give nationals what they truly do not need - money. We do understand that nationals usually are lacking the basic needs of life, but the approach to fixing that can’t be to just hand them money if we want to see spiritual transformation occur.

The problem is much deeper than that. God is the only true answer to their needs. Besides, it is not our job to "FIX IT." That is God’s role and we do not want to be seen as the "FIX IT MAN!"

World Orphans find strong, reputable national leaders that have formed a home for orphans through their local church. They then fund them to build a children’s home/church building. The national leader is responsible to hire local men and women that can construct and complete the building. No western construction crew.

When an orphan home is in the middle of a township or village, then the community can begin to see the local church reach out in compassion for their own orphans as well as the people of their area. This is crucial in building the local church and this is the World Orphan model.

Many times we have found beautiful, faithful leaders with a passion in a given area, yet they have not been discipled to do the work of the Kingdom. World Orphans desires to come along beside the national leaders to equip them in the work at hand.

This is a dream job - to be able to gracefully equip indigenous leaders around the world to raise up godly, loved, secure children with a deep foundation in their Lord Jesus Christ.

After a great visit, we headed back to Texas. Several months later, David and I realized the great peace, actually more than peace - even excitement - that we had about this opportunity.

God had made HIS direction clear and had so graciously laid it out before us: We were ready to follow Him in joining World Orphans.

If you wish to support the Ochoas financially during their transition, please make checks payable to World Orphans, 1840 Woodmoor Dr., Monument, CO 80132. Write "Ochoas" in the memo line of your check. All contributions are tax-deductible.

Three Years Later (part three)

Pastor Jacob and his wife adopted six needy orphans many years ago. That was the beginning.

God had favor on Pastor Jacob’s heart and saw to it that Jacob now oversees twenty five churches in this tsunami-stricken region. He had prepared Jacob for this appointed time. Over 2,500 orphans have now been rescued by Jacob’s churches.

(THE OLD HOME. Paul and Scott during their visit 18 months ago)

Abejeeth is one of those lives that has been radically touched by the loving hand of this kind pastor and his expanding ministry. He and 39 other boys were in the care of the home sitting across the highway from the point of devastation that we visited. It was a rented facility. But because of your faithful support and prayers Abejeeth was moved down the street to a new church-based home that we helped to fund. There, he and the other boys were joined by another 30 more who were desperately waiting for a new home and a new hope.

(BLUE SKIES AHEAD. The new home as it appeared 18 months ago)

And that’s just the start. A second floor that can accommodate more boys and families is planned to be added shortly after the completion of the first phase of the project.

Abejeeth can still look across the road and see the reminders of a past life of pain and loss, but he is doing it hand-in-hand with those who comfort him and teach him about the Ultimate Comforter.

Three Years Later (part two)

Abejeeth is 5 years old. One year before the Tsunami hit his village, his mother was cooking the family meal over an open fire. An errant flame licked her highly-combustible Sari dress and she was soon engulfed. The shock and burns were too severe and she was quickly lost. Even the most commonplace of daily activities in India can instantly turn into life-threatening, life-taking situations. Life and death there are often separated by extremely thin margins of error.

On that dreadful day after Christmas, Abejeeth’s father was going about his normal routine of delivering tea to thirsty fisherman on the shore. It was a simple task, but one that supported the family and brought refreshment and joy to many who tended the nets for a living.

I can imagine the tea kettle and cups briefly floating on the surface before succumbing to the heaving, churning waters.

Fire and water...Abejeeth was now a full orphan.

(TSUNAMI ORPHANS. Aberjeeth (left) stands with other boys who lost parents on December 26, 2004)

The body of Abejeeth’s father was found three days later washed up down the coastline. He was just one of almost 300,000 lives extinguished in a moment, resulting in Abejeeth being one of thousands upon thousands of orphans left in the wake.

To be continued...

Three Years Later (part one)

Tragedy in India comes in many forms.

During my visit last year to this populous Asian sub-continent, seven terrorist bombs ripped through packed train cars in Mumbai, instantly taking lives through shredded metal containers. The carnage was unimaginable. Over 180 people were literally blown to bits, unveiling yet another gruesome chapter in the powder keg of Muslim/Hindu relations that has plagued Northern India for far too long.

I thought to myself, every person on that train fully expected to get to their destination that day. It was the evening rush hour and most would have been heading home to their families. Instead, those families waited anxiously for loved ones that were never to arrive. Empty seats at evening dinner tables. Empty hearts beating in the chests of those left behind.

Having a member of the family die as a result of a natural death is hard enough. Having one taken unexpectedly due to violence or catastrophe, is more than many souls can bear.

The southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu is no stranger to instantaneous calamity and devastation. As a cataclysmic wave pounded shorelines and fishing villages three years ago today, many startled people were swept to a watery grave. The stories and numbers are now well known the globe over. Stories of tragedy and triumph, of loss and recovery. But forgotten are the stories that continue to unfold, the daily lives of countless children whose parents were snapped away in a blink of an eye.

To these children, the South Asian Tsunami of December 26, 2004, was not just a single point in history, not just a sensational news moment to occupy headlines for a brief period of time. For them, the disaster continues to play out daily in their lives.

Eighteen months after the Indian Ocean swelled and wreaked havoc in Tamil Nadu, we drove the coastline where fishing village after fishing village ceased to exist. In the stead of flourishing communities sat rows upon rows of flimsy reed huts erected by a plethora of relief agencies and other non-governmental organizations. A few hundred yards away new concrete buildings were springing up from the rubble of former lives and foundations.

And just across the ocean highway of one of the villages, perched on the northern boundary of the devastation, sat one of our church partners and one of their homes for orphans.

To be continued...

Merry Christ-mas, Dear Friends!

I always seem to be traveling overseas during December. It's no excuse, but between trips abroad and catching up afterwards, we never quite get our Christ-mas cards out.

However, we don't forget about all of you, our dear friends and family. You are always in our prayers...and our wishes are especially with you during this season.

Here's a few obligatory photos of the kiddos, a requisite for this time of year. The first shot was taken in our front yard a couple of weeks ago after a powdery snowfall. The subsequent snaps are from the kids' Christ-mas parties at school this past week.

Faith was in the choir and recited a Bible passage; Caleb was the Angel Gabriel in his class play; and Hannah was willing to eat any goodies arranged for the kids on back tables.

From our family to yours: We love you and wish you a wonderful Birthday celebration for Jesus!

In Him,
The Myhills

 

More Photos from Iraq

Here are a few more photos from Billy R. (Last name withheld for security reasons) from his recent visit to our new World Orphans office in Iraq. Billy and his family will be moving to Iraq next year to oversee our work with the churches there.

(IMAGE: Billy (rt.) poses behind the new office sign with two of our church partners. The sign is in English (top), Arabic (middle) and Kurdish (bottom), representing the primary language groups we are working with in the country.)

(IMAGES: A partner church service)

(IMAGE: Billy with some local shopkeepers. He'll be shopping in markets like this when he moves there next year.)

(IMAGE: A reminder of the danger and hope. A concrete blast barrier is painted with images depicting creative and technical education.)

Sasha

The Director of an orphanage in St. Petersburg, Russia, described to us the jovial personality of an outgoing boy named Sasha. Sasha was one of approximately fifty orphans living with AIDS at the medical institution.

On one occasion, the Director asked each child who their best friend was. Sasha’s reply was immediate and deliberate, "My grandmother!"

Puzzled, the Director asked, "Who are you talking about, Sasha? You have been here for more than six years and I have never seen a grandmother visit you. You have no grandmother that I know of."

Six years ago an elderly lady visited the orphanage. She gave Sasha a stuffed animal, hugged him, and said, "My child, I could very well be your grandmother!"

She hadn’t returned since, but she left an indelible impression on Sasha. Over the years, the little boy held onto her sweet memory and statement. To him, the thought of a grandmother, of family, was to be cherished above all the friendships he had made since then.

She, or what she represented, made the elderly lady his very best friend in the world...even though he had encountered her briefly - just once - many years ago.

Children desire families.

And God desires to ‘set the lonely in families.’

Institutions aren’t the answer. Families are.