Christ's Gift Academy (CGA) has been struggling for many years to get the school fully registered. What should be an easy process has become so challenging as just a couple of men are standing in the way because of their own need for control.
Let me attempt to summarize what has transpired since the
last urgent update…
After waiting outside the office for 1 ½ hours, 12 of us
piled into a tiny office to discuss the contentious issues between the school
and these two local community leaders.
The assistant District Commissioner chaired the meeting because the DC
was away. The meeting was a mirror image
of a meeting we had last December in the Education office with most of the same
people. It started with a dispute over
land, but that didn’t last long because every document concerning the land is
in the school or YWAM’s name. So then
these people start moving on to many other things trying to keep our school
from getting registered such as telling us that 85% of the orphans need to be
natives of this specific sub-location (any other orphan living here would have
to be left out) and telling us to hire only staff and teachers from here, etc. It was extremely tense and heated. I was worried for a while that a fight was
close to breaking out (and if not, I was so angry that I was about ready to
start one). They told many lies and
brought many accusations against us such as saying our school doesn’t benefit
the community at all, calling all of us missionaries “opportunists,” and
insinuating that we are taking advantage of the goodwill that the community had
in donating the land.
The assistant DC was pretty overwhelmed. He just moved to Mbita a couple of weeks ago
and had no idea what a huge issue this is and how “rough” these two people
are.
We stood firm as a team though and would not bend from the
truth or compromise our position. At the
end, the asst. DC concluded that we needed to get together with these people
and compromise to reach a conclusion.
Ben Ouko, the YWAM base director, looked at him and told him that is not
an acceptable conclusion. He said that
we have been meeting and discussing these issues for too many years and we are
finished talking. Then he told him that
the DC’s office needs to make the decision to register us or come and close the
school down. That was it. We returned to school.
Needless to say, we departed very frustrated. We talked as a leadership team about the
possibility of holding a large community meeting for all of Mbita so we could
explain what is happening and we talked about the possibility of having to shut
the school down in December and moving to another community that would accept
us. If the DC’s office wasn’t going to
act, then we would have to do something drastic because we can’t go on as a school
without this registration. We were just
praying that God would perform a miracle.
That He would rise up and defend the orphans and the fatherless. We knew
we had done all we could, but it was all in God’s hands.
One day went by and then on Thursday morning we received a
letter from the DC’s office saying they were coming to the school that
afternoon and asking us to make the necessary arrangements. We had no idea what to expect. It could be a good thing or it could be a bad
thing.
On Thursday afternoon the real DC showed up with the asst. DC
that chaired our meeting Tuesday and another asst. DC who happened to be the
husband of our newly hired Kiswahili teacher.
This meeting was short. They
walked in, sat down, and the real DC proceeded to thank us for what our school
is doing in the community. He said that
it is a wonderful benefit to so many people and he would do anything he could
to help us. After we described the whole
story to him, he explained to us that he knew how corrupt these few individuals
are and that they are against development in the district. They want to hold things back so they can
control everything. He listed a number
of other organizations and schools in the community that this group has
deterred and frustrated. He said that he
would not allow them to stand in our way.
He concluded by saying that he would get in touch with the Education
office on Monday to how he can help. He
also promised that the school would be registered as soon as their board meets
again later this year.
Wow!!! Praise be to God!! I can’t even explain to you what I
am feeling currently. I wanted to scream
out for joy in excitement and cry all at the same time. God came through in such a miraculous
way. So many thoughts have been rolling
through my mind about these children and what will become of them if this issue
is not settled.
Thank you so much for all your prayers. I appreciate all of your e-mails of
encouragement. Sorry I haven’t had time
to respond to them. I know hundreds of
people in the states have been praying for this situation along with our staff
and children. It is wonderful for our
children to see how God answers prayer and how much He loves them.
It is not over yet though.
We still don’t have the piece of paper in hand. Please continue to pray for this situation
and for the process to be completed. And
also pray for closure with these few individuals who have been hindering this
process. Pray that God would shut their
mouths from talking more evil about the school. Ultimately we are praying for their
salvation. That they would come to know
the transforming power of Jesus Christ in their lives.
A side note…
This morning we also found out that through the Constituency
Development Fund here in Kenya ,
we will be receiving the equivalent of about $2,000 this year to help in
providing for the needs of orphans. This
is really the first time that the Kenyan Government has contributed to our
ministry to help the orphan children in Kenya .
Praises, Praises and more praises!!!
What a Day!!!
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