All I saw of Mrs. Bush was the motorcade that I got caught up in. The biggest I have ever seen. Too bad...

Sandra

Posted by ACE Staff at 7:43 AM | Permalink

Dear Ministry Family,
I never knew four months could pass by so quickly. The Lord has been so good to me, and to the ministry here in Zambia. Knowing that all of you are very busy, even as we are, I at least wanted to highlight some of the wonderful news from this side of the world before traveling home on July 26th. Jennie has been with us since May 22nd (my 61st Birthday). She leaves on July 12th.

Child Rescue

We are working hard to keep up with the numbers of children in our three homes. Each is at capacity. The poor are getting poorer and children are dying in the compounds at a faster rate than in previous years. House of Moses is caring for 21 infants, House of Martha has 17 children and the Bill and Bette Bryant Nursery has 16. Several, especially the older ones, are ready for adoption so pass the word along. We are also continuing to work toward, and pray for, good adoption laws and procedures.

House of Martha will have a new location! The Goad Family, an internationally known evangelistic and singing family (been around as a family since the 1960's) raised the funds to buy a wonderful property just 5 minutes from House of Moses. Much has changed since the Outreach Foundation purchased the House of Martha property in 1998. The roads have deteriorated, the utilities became very unreliable and the area is cholera prone. The Goad's lost their mother many years ago and wanted a place to care for orphans and vulnerable children in her honor and memory. Her name? MARTHA!! The family was in Zambia last week and had several mission outreaches and also did a ribbon cutting and dedication of the new home. We will have to do work on the property before the children are moved, but they were with us for the dedication and everyone was smiling, singing and even climbing the trees in the big front yard. When the children move we will sell the Kanyama property and use the assets to continue to upgrade the new location. We rejoice as God brings many new partners together for children.

Education

Faith Works Schools continue to get better and better each year. There are over 2,500 pupils in Grades 1-7 and 58 in Grade 8 which opened in January. Grades 9 and 10, 11 and 12 also have our children who are now in Government schools with scholarships we are providing. We broke ground for the new Helen DeVos Christian School and the plan is to open in January 2008 for Grades 7, 8, and 9. The school will be one of the first in Zambia to offer a first rate education to orphans and children with no financial means. We are grateful to Helen DeVos for her faith in us and the $428,000 matching grant (we are about 25% along to matching that goal) that she gave Alliance for Children Everywhere which allows us to continue to raise the support needed to provide this kind of an education to eager children with hungry minds.

Empowerment of Guardians and Women

With a grant from a German organization, we have trained 40 guardians of orphans (men and women) in our community projects. We are providing them with a means of supporting themselves and their families. We are using our hammer mill to grind maize (corn) and package it in sealed bags with a consistent 1Kg. weight. Ground maize is eaten by every Zambian. The maize when ground is called mealie meal and this is boiled in water to make the staple food, nshima. The program is called a "Commodity Lending Scheme" This strategy is radically different from the existing way mealie meal is sold. The weights are typically not consistent, the bags are not sealed and the prices are not the same for the weight of the bag. People know they are being cheated, but that is how the market was—until now. We are being deluged by folks wanting to get in on the sales side of Heaven's Blessing Mealie Meal, but we are in a pilot mode and so are limiting ourselves to the first 40. If all goes as planned we may expand the operation to include more of the needy people we are here to serve.

Summer Teams

With 9 visitors left to come to Zambia during this next month, we have had over 30 visitors that have blessed us and been blessed in return. The teams were very well prepared by their respective team leaders, and each person had a chance to teach and to learn at the same time. We are already talking about 2008!

With love and thanks for making the lives of little children matter,
Sandra

Posted by ACE Staff at 9:03 AM | Permalink

Greetings,

SIMU, the contractor, is on the property. Tuesday Chris and Evaristo visited the property and found they were breaking out the slab and preparing the ground. The plans call for only a 2 meter space between the wall and the building, but this space will have to be increased to 3 meters for security reasons. With only 2 meters of space it would be too easy for thieves to span the space from the top of the wall to the overhang on the roof. (The overhang on the roof reduces the space.)

Sandra and Fackson found a vendor who will sell us excellent quality blocks and cement for the wall-fence. The blocks are 2,500 kwacha ($.70) each delivered and the cement 38,000 kwacha ($10.00). This is good news because cement is very hard to get and the street price has jumped to 60,000 kwacha ($15.80). When we went around to various cement dealers and called the factory we were told that there will not be new supply until October. We will get 600 bags at that price and see what we need to do about other projects, but for now we can at at least start the wall. The trench has already been dug. We were happy to have Claud on site as the trench was being dug.

We have 26 women signed up to work on the road and hope to start work late next week. Evaristo will return to the site on Friday.

Evaristo and Matildah were in Kanyama today for a meeting of pastors, PCSC committee members and teachers there. They had 25 in attendance and all the churches were represented.

This term will end August 9. On August 10 a meeting will be held at Helen DeVos Christian School for all teachers, PCSC committee members and church leadership.

We have had every team and visitor this summer visit the Grade 8 class. The children are really doing very well and when asked what they like most about their school they said 1). Our books 2). Our teachers 3). The fact we are made to speak English and 4). The good food.

Two weeks ago the desks from the Goad's arrived and they are splendid. These youth know that although they are poor, they are SPECIAL!

Sandra just returned from the grocery store. She was delayed as all traffic was stopped for a huge motorcade—Barbara Bush arriving from the airport! Sandra has already called the US Embassy Ambassador's Office to give Barbara a special invitation to visit House of Moses. Now, that would be cool!

Love and Blessing to each one of you!
Jennie

Posted by ACE Staff at 7:45 AM | Permalink

We have purchased a large plot with a house that needs work just five minutes from House of Moses on the way into town. The asking price started at 600 million kwacha ($153,000), but the owner agreed to sell it to us for 370,800,000 kwacha. This comes to approximately $95,000, depending on the exchange rate on the day of the bank transfer.

The plot is 33.55 meters by 70.25 meters (larger than the House of Moses property). We will need to do quite a bit of work to the house, but the potential is enormous. The house is on a paved road and sets back from the street with a beautiful area of trees and bushes in front. Behind the house is a yard and then a large block chicken house that, if the foundation is deep enough, we can add rows of block to make it taller and use it for our classrooms for the children in the home. Behind that is a house that is the servant's quarters. To the side is a good sized garden plot. There is room for two more houses on the plot.

Posted by ACE Staff at 8:51 AM | Permalink