"Guide My Feet While I Run This Race"

On January 14, 2007, Caroline McGraw ran a marathon in honor of those suffering in Africa. Caroline tirelessly and lovingly shares her heart with everyone in her world and she is making a huge difference in Africa. We thank you ... and we love you Caroline.

Here is her story...

"My heart for Africa.....You save what you love.....

As my feet met the street during my recent marathon run, I ran with great joy and in fierce pursuit of HOPE on behalf of the widows and orphans of Swaziland, South Africa.

After two trips this past year and one half to Swaziland, South Africa with Heart for Africa, the silence of their story seemed too loud and I knew I had to put Love into action and empty myself, sacrifice, you know, like running a marathon on their behalf!

ITS NOT OKAY WITH ME was taped to the back of my shirt, encouraging people to learn more about the plight of the AIDS Pandemic in Africa, specifically in Swaziland, the world's highest rate of AIDS where 1 in 3 are HIV positive. http://www.itsnotokaywithme.com/

As I trained for the marathon, the children's faces, the precious people of Africa, and their harrowing plight played like a news reel in front of me. Etched on the insides of my eyelids forever.

As my feet moved along during my training; some days fast, some days slow, most days I felt encouraged that my love and action could make a difference. Strangely enough I felt HOPE for this Nation, a Nation that is literally dying before our very eyes. Within three short years a whole generation of Swazi people will be extinct due to the AIDS Pandemic unless we take urgent action.

Currently in a Nation of 1 million there are 132,000 orphans, not to mention the vulnerable children and widows.
*Every 14 seconds a child is orphaned by AIDS in Africa
IS THAT OKAY WITH YOU?
*Every 3 seconds a child dies of hunger or malnutrition-
that is 30,000 children PER DAY
IS THAT OKAY WITH YOU?
*75% of girls between the ages of 15-24 do not know that
AIDS is a sexually transmitted disease
IS THAT OKAY WITH YOU?
*In the past 12 months, 1.6 million more children have been
orphaned due to the AIDS pandemic in Africa, leaving
15 million children children to fend for themselves.
IS THAT OKAY WITH YOU?

THIS IS NOT OKAY WITH ME, SO,MY feet ran the race in Pursuit of HOPE AND JUSTICE for the people of Swaziland and all of Africa!"

Caroline McGraw

Keeping You Connected with our New Forum

How many participants have come home from a trip, and suddenly felt disconnected from their fellow travelers who felt like family to them while in Africa, and from those they met and fell in love with in Africa? This has been a consistant, reoccuring comment from our past participants. It is for this reason that we are thrilled to now offer a wonderful way for everyone to stay connected through the Heart for Africa Forum.

To become a part of this Heart for Africa community, you simply need to register with our new website, and it is free. To register, please go to www.heartforafricaconnect.org/forum/register.php

There are so many ways you can use this forum, here are just a few:

1. Post Conversation Topics or Questions:
www.heartforafricaconnect.org/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=112

2. Upload Photos from your Africa Trip or view photos of other Trip Participants:
www.heartforafricaconnect.org/forum/photopost/

3. Start your own blog about Africa or Heart for Africa:
www.heartforafricaconnect.org/forum/blogs/

4. Help answer questions of others who want to know about Africa:
www.heartforafricaconnect.org/forum/showthread.php?t=71471

5. Read news and watch videos about Africa and Heart for Africa:
www.heartforafricaconnect.org/

We look forward to staying connected with you and to assisting you all in staying connected with one another.

A special "Thank You" to Drew Strickland for creating and managing this forum for Heart for Africa. You might want to let that be your first message after you join --- thanking Drew for his work in making this possible.

Janine speaking in California - Sharing "It's Not Okay with Me"

We praise our Lord for His movement in hearts as they read Janine's book "It's Not Okay with Me". The response has been overwhelmingly beautiful. It is surely a God kiss to see hearts moved so deeply in such beautiful ways over such a deeply troubling book. But God loves truth --- and this book is honest in every way.

Janine has already recorded Chapter 3 in the studio and it can now be downloaded from both the Heart for Africa website (www.heartforafrica.org) as well as the books' website (www.itsnotokaywithme.com) There were many tears in the studio, as Janine's heart revisited the realities of the moments when she saw, loved, and rescued Kantwa.

Be watchful for an update letting you know when the entire book will be available on audio with a chapter being released each month by pod cast.

Janine is currently receiving emails requesting that she speak at churches, chapels, schools, and ladies groups. We are working to make this happen as often as possible. If you would like to invite her to speak, please email us at speaker@heartforafrica.org . What a blessing to see God open doors of opportunity as He is longing for His children to know the truth and to act. What is happening in Africa is not okay with us --- and it is most definitely not okay with God either.

Janine has many talks planned for the Atlanta area, but if you live in California or Hawaii, we hope you will join her on the following dates:

February 28, 2007 – North Coast Calvary Chapel
Carlsbad, CA
7:00 p.m.

March 1, 2007 - speaking in Fresno, California
(details coming soon)

March 4, 2007 – Christ the King Lutheran Church
Fallbrook, CA
8:00 and 10:30 a.m.

March 29 – 31, 2007 – Hawaiian Island Ministries
Hawaii Convention Center in Honolulu
Heart for Africa Booth display

In Honor of my Friend, my Sister, my Daughter – Rahab Njoki

Today I received news that Rahab is dead.

Rahab had the most terrible life from the beginning. She had no father, her mother was a drunk and used to beat her regularly with a big stick. She had 8 siblings and at the age of two years old (yes, two) she ran away to the streets to find food because there was none at home. Rahab moved in to the slums and went from hut to hut looking for shelter, food and maybe even love. The “big girls” took her under their wing at the age of three, but they beat her up and mistreated her daily.

When Rahab had just turned nine a group of boys grabbed her and raped her. She went home to find her mother to tell them and get help, but her mother beat her badly and sent her away. Her mother told her now that she was damaged goods, she was of no value because she would never be able to get a dowry for Rahab if she married. At that moment Rahab became a “street girl” – a soft expression used to not make us “westerners” uncomfortable in saying that a nine year old girl is a prostitute. Rahab was just that.

In 1993 when Rahab was 12 years old she was rescued by the Mully Children’s Family (MCF) home in Eldoret where she struggled to get clean from the life she had been living. Her addiction to drugs, sex and freedom caused her to run back to the streets three times over the next many years. In 1999 she ran away to Mombassa and lived on the street where she got malaria, tuberculosis and AIDS. Emaciated, dying and alone this young woman made her way back to Eldoret in 2003 to beg her Aunt or her brothers to let her live with them. They said no.

Terrified with no where to turn this 80 pound skeleton crawled up to the big iron gate at MCF not sure if she would be welcomed. But of course she was. The prodigal was home again and welcomed with open arms, and loved. Rahab’s AIDS then was full blown, she had tuberculosis and it did not appear hopeful that she would live.

It was at this point that I first met Rahab.

In April 2003 we had to help carry her to her chair as she was too weak to walk. She was on anti-retro virals to keep her alive, had a special diet that “Daddy” provided her and was living in isolation from the other children for a time, because of the contagious nature of TB. But her smile … I will never forget Rahab’s wonderful smile when she spoke of the love that the Mully’s showed her. She was their daughter and all was forgiven. She rededicated her life to God and was a soldier who waved His banner high for all to see.

Rahab rallied and became strong. In fact, so strong that when we rescued Lillian from the Kipsongo slum in October 2003, Rahab went and slept in the hospital with Lillian to reassure her and make her feel safe.

In 2004 Rahab decided to marry a young man named James, with the blessing of the Mully’s. Both Rahab and James were HIV positive. In 2005 Rahab gave birth to a baby, but the infant died only days after birth. Pneumonia combined with poor hospital care were blamed.

On December 12th 2006 Rahab gave birth to a baby girl by caesarean, but became sick due to complications and died on December 30th, 2006. Rahab was buried in Eldoret and the baby is under the care and protection of MCF. I await further details as to her health and future.

Rahab will not be mourned by her natural family, in fact she has been dead to them for a long time. The Mully’s will mourn the loss of their daughter and she will be missed by them all. And I will mourn Rahab because she was my friend, my sister, my daughter. No one deserves a life of such pain and sorrow.

Rahab, I will always remember you and will continue to scream from the mountain tops your name and the name of so many other children who are being starved and beaten and raped every day because no one cares about them. This is not okay with me.

God bless your rest Rahab.

Thank you Mully family for being the arms of Christ.

From the heart of Janine Maxwell

Download the audio version of "It's Not Okay with Me" - Chapter 3

"It's Not Okay With Me" was published on December 1 , 2006 and has been met with amazing response. We have received incredible stories from so many of you who purchased the book and were moved to action. Many of you have shared your own stories of how God changed your life while on a Heart for Africa trip in the past few years and many of you have told us that it is Not Okay with you either.

To help spread the message, Janine has just spent time in a recording studio creating an audio version of chapter 3, "A boy named Kantwa". We are pleased to offer this as a free download to anyone who is interested . You can stream the file from our website . Or even better, right click on the link and choose to save the file to your computer. Once saved to your computer, you can listen on your computer, put it on your iPod or other mp3 player, or burn a copy to CD to play in your car or share with your friends and family.

In the near future, we will offer the complete book on CD for purchase from our website, http://www.itsnotokwithme.com/ and will be releasing one chapter per week for 15 weeks via pod cast. In the meantime, please enjoy this free download and share it with your friends and family. We hope you will come and serve with us in Africa in 2007 - you can make a huge difference to so many people in just 10 days. Please go to http://www.heartforafrica.org/ for trip details today.