Bore Holes in Malawi - Bringing both HOPE and Water

In many communities in Sub-Sahara Africa, the need for water is as overwhelming and intense as the need for food. Agrina Majawa lives in Malawi. Here is her story.

Agrina Majawa, 36, has lived in Lilongwe for over 10 years. She washes her clothes and bathes in one of the polluted rivers in the country’s capital city, Lilongwe.
Agrina cannot afford piped water supply from the water board. Even the price of 3 kwacha (2 US cents) per pail from the water kiosks is out of her reach.
A widow, Agrina supports her family of three selling vegetables in the central business district of Lilongwe and says life has not been easy for her family following her husband’s death a few years ago.
She is not alone in her predicament in search of clean water and sanitation. The vendors at the flea market a stone throw away from the Lilongwe River use it for cleaning their wares and vegetables. Along the banks of the river, vendors have constructed temporary toilets. There is a paying toilet at the flea market but most vendors say they cannot afford the 10 kwacha (7 US cents). Instead, they use bushes around and shelters they have constructed to answer the call of nature.

Heart for Africa is working to make a difference in Malawi. We are currently working in the areas of Deya, Ngona Slum and Njewa. Bore holes, a drilled well with a hand pump, have been installed in Deya and Ngoma Slum. We have repaired a bore hole in Njewa so the people there have fresh, clean water again. We have commitments and donations received to place 3 more bore holes in Malawi and we hope to have funding for the 15 more needed by the end of 2007. Each bore hole costs $4,400. In North America, $4,400 doesn’t go very far. It could buy a nice cruise or a used car. But in Malawi, $4,400 can bring fresh water to an entire community, and HOPE to a many hearts.

Agrina’s story is only one of many. There are millions that walk for miles and miles to gather water that will only sustain them for the day. It is inconceivable that there are still those living today who do not have this basic need for water met on a daily basis.

Please join us in bringing water and HOPE to the many precious people in Malawi. How many lives can we touch? How many mouths can we pour clean water into? To how many hearts can we bring HOPE?

Dirty Fingernails: Journals from the Field - Troy Johnson

Walking Beside Him

Have you ever thought about what it would be like to walk along side of Jesus? What would it be like to speak to Him, to listen to Him, and to see Him perform miracles? This is something that I have desired my whole life. I have sought the absolute presence of God and craved to experience God working through my willing hands for His glory and His kingdom. I had the privilege of experiencing this on my Heart for Africa mission to Malawi this last December.

I will never forget the anticipation before the trip as my wife Katherine and I worked to get everything ready. We collected donations, we prayed for guidance and spiritual preparation from the Lord, and we purchased all the personal items that we would need for the trip. We also prayed every night that God would prepare our hearts for the work that He had for us to do there.

When we arrived, I realized that this trip would be a little different from the Never Ending Gardens trip I was on the year before to South Africa. Heart for Africa told us that we would help where the need was greatest and in the second poorest country in the world, the need was great! We focused not only on planting, but we took part in ministry, in fixing roofs, in playing with vulnerable and orphaned children that the world had forgotten, in doing AIDS testing, and yes in planting gardens. God led us to a place where the people needed to know that He loved them. God wanted us to serve their emotional and spiritual needs as well as their physical needs. A touch of love, a kind word, and a warm smile gave hope where little hope existed before and fed the people’s souls. I remember crying as I walked among the impoverished children playing with us happily as they wore their dirty, tattered clothing and ran around us with bare feet. I did not cry out of despair, rather the tears were tears of joy, because I could feel the absolute presence of God. I felt God working through our Team’s hands and I could see our lives being transformed as God used each one of us to touch someone’s heart.

The little children had no toys, so they either made them themselves or they sang and danced for entertainment. I was so impressed by how well they sang and danced together. But what touched my heart was that their singing was always a song of praise and thanksgiving to God. On our last day, we visited the poorest slum that I have ever seen. The people lived in tiny mud huts with thatch roofs and lived in extreme poverty and disease. We brought food and medicine to the poorest of the poor and prayed with those in desperate need. After we traversed the maze of huts that made up the slum, Somebody Cares Ministry started to pass out candy to the children. The children started to ask us for more food or money or anything. It started to get very tense and the children started to get impatient, as we had we had no more to give them. But God had something to give them.

Katherine and I got a number of children to line up to sing. One young man was studying to be a pastor and I asked him to lead the children in singing. They asked us to sing first, so we sang Jesus Loves Me and Jesus Loves the Little Children of the World. I asked our translator, Chapingua, what song we sang first at church on Sunday and he said Jesu Ayanaya (Jesus Saves) and then I asked the young pastor if the children knew that song. Well, they started to sing and dance and praise God. I will never forget that moment as long as I live! I saw the face of Jesus shine among the children. I felt God’s deep intense love and His presence as the entire atmosphere changed from “GIVE ME” to “PRAISE HIM”! The experience was life changing and it was truly a privilege to walk beside the Lord in Malawi and to be a part of what He is doing in Africa.

You Can Make It Happen In Africa

You've asked, "How can I help?, What can I do to really make a difference in Africa?"

Each year we receive a list of projects that our African Partners hope to be able to get done during the year. Without your help it is impossible to have these needs met. Please consider partnering with Heart for Africa and our African Partners to bring HOPE to the people and children of Africa. Please pray and ask God what your part in Africa is this year.

Are you to build a school for children who have no hope of an education?

Are you to buy a dairy cow so children can have the milk that they so desperately need?

Is your family or small group to fund a bore hole so that a whole village can have the clean water that they have never had?

Are you to support a children’s feeding program?

There are as many opportunities as you can imagine to become involved with the people of Swaziland, Kenya and Malawi. Please consider the following opportunities in the following countries:

El Shaddai Childrens Home/ Swaziland
5 school rooms $30,635
Mission House $7,000
School garden project $2,730
Staff housing for 10 teachers $6,300
New homes for orphan headed homes $57,600
Chicken project for ongoing income $5,650
Expand Dairy 10 cows @ $825 $8,250
Plant fruit trees 400-500 trees $5,500
6 sewing machines $1,320
Cloth, cottons, beads for crafts $1,870

New Hope Childrens Centre/ Swaziland
2 Houses for teenage children $132,000
28 Seater bus $66,000
12 Seater van $8,250
Wardrobes for new children $3,300
Bunk beds for new children $880
Clothing for children $4,400
School materials $5,500
School curriculum (ACE wookbooks) $6,600
New homes in community for orphans
And widows 20@ $2,880 $57,600
Arts and Crafts at school $2,750


Somebody Cares / Malawi ( Villages of Njewa, Chatimba/Chikudzulire, Mvunguti/Ngona, and Deya)
School supplies for new school in Deya $5,500
Bore Holes (wells) 11@$4,400 $48,400
Feeding centers in 5 villages $27,500
Community gardens at feeding centers $16,500
Home repairs for widows, aged and ill $75,000
Building pit latrines at Ngona 10@$750 $7,500
Seedling/seed farm at Balaka $82,500
Repairs of churches in 5 villages $16,500
Repairs on 5 child care centers $16,500
Funding for 5 feeding centers
5@$550/mo for 12 months $33,000

Rongo and Kitutu Masaba, Kenya
Bore holes 2@$11,000 $22,000
Medical supplies $1,100/mo $13,200
Orphan feeding center in Rongo $33,000
Orphan feeding program $1100/mo $13,200
Oasis Childrens Home 100 girls $278,573
Classroom for local school in Rongo $12,000
Complete church building in Rongo
Roof $6,600
Floor and seats $4,400
VCT testing center building $11,000
Staff training $2,200
Staff $4,800
Sports outreach soccer tournament $1,650
Vehicle for AIDS ministry with GOA $11,000.

Herefords Never Ending Garden Project/ Swaziland
Bore Holes 2@ $13,400 $26,800
Follow up nutritional study $23,500
Fontotje Care Center
Fencing $100
Classroom structure $1,775
Cooking Shelter $260
Ncatsavaneni Care Center
Fencing $100
Classroom structure $1,775
Cooking Shelter $260
Seedling shelter $500
Transportation for Jabulani to gardens
$85/wk $4,420
Daily laborers $1,560
The need may be overwhelming and maybe you don’t feel that you can make a difference. But if by your giving you can bring one shred of hope to one person in need, you will have made a difference far beyond anything you had imagined.
BRING HOPE TO THE PEOPLE OF AFRICA, GET INVOLVED, TAKE ON A PROJECT AND MAKE A DIFFERENCE.
All donations are tax deductible.

It's NOT OKAY with me...

It's Not Okay with me that girls are traded for cows.

During one of my visits to the Mully Children’s Family home in Kenya I was out in the bean processing building on the farm and saw a strange poster on the wall that made me laugh. It said “Don’t exchange girls for cows. Give them an education.” What a silly poster. Who would exchange their daughter for a cow? I didn’t quite take a moment to think it through, but rather asked if I could take the poster. I was sure that no one in North America would have ever seen something like this before. When I asked if I could have it I was met with some surprise and disbelief. My hosts politely shook their heads and explained that it is important that it stay up here to remind the local workers that they shouldn’t trade their daughters for cows. This poster was not created by the Mully’s, but rather was a government produced and distributed poster that was designed to address a growing problem in the country.

What did they mean? I probed as I was sure I had heard them incorrectly. It seems that often when a family runs out of food and does not see a solution, they will take their daughter to a neighbour who has cows and exchange their daughter for a cow. That’s right, “Hey, I need some food – I’ll give you my daughter if you give me one of your cows, and I’ll throw in a couple of cabbages to sweeten the deal.”

The girl is then pulled out of school (if she was lucky enough to be in school) and is used as a house servant and sexual slave by the man who purchased her. This is crazy! This is absurd! This is happening in our world in 2007. We stand and wonder why 75% of all girls between the ages of 15-24 don’t know that AIDS is a sexually transmitted disease and I propose that this is one of the reasons. If a girl does not get an education she will never know the truth about AIDS. She will never have a hope for her future. She will live and die and become one of the terrible statistics we read about.

This is NOT OKAY with me. Is it okay with you? If not, what are you prepared to do about it? Come with us to Africa in 2007 and help us bring hope to families so that they don’t have to exchange their daughter for a cow. Help bring them hope so that they CAN give her an education. Will you join us?

Why vacation when you can go on a life changing adventure?

Imagine, you’re on a cruise ship; you eat and sleep, read a book at pool side, catch a show or two and hit the shore for an excursion of snorkeling and shopping! You head home and get back to the grind. You share some pictures with friends and work hard to make up the debt you’ve incurred. The joy of it all wears off and you’re dreaming of next year again.

Now imagine you go to a land that makes you feel closer to GOD. You toil in a garden and play with some orphan children and meet people from a culture that you often wondered about. You even see animals that you’d thought you might only see in a zoo or a circus show, up close and personal in the wild. You’re just as comfortable in the accommodations and equally fed.

But…
You start journaling, because you’ve experienced soooo… much that you don’t EVER want to forget a second of it. Every emotion is at peak awareness. The Spirit in you has found new life. You make friends for life. You feel the eternal bond and your heart swells with joy, TRUE JOY!

You head home and you’re still so high, your feet haven’t hit the ground after half a year of sharing it with everyone you encounter! The entire cost was tax deductible and everything in your life has changed. You look forward to going to work; you look at your children, parents, employer, neighbors and friends differently. You’ve gone through a paradigm shift in your perspective of the meaning of life. You’re continually blessed with the stories of others who say they were inspired by your trip and story and the way you life has changed. You look forward to seeing the same change in them, when they return and relive the excitement with them.

I’ve been there done that and I’m begging you, “Get out of the Boat,” and walk where you never dared before. I promise, you’ll be changed forever and the entire world, more than you can ask or imagine.

Right NOW; Go to www.heartforafrica.org and educate yourself about this non-vacation adventure opportunity of a life time. Then go to www.itsnotokwithme.com and buy Janine Maxwell’s new book. Read it share it and answer the title question. When you’ve done that, you’ll be ready to sign up and watch GOD work in your life, like you’ve never known!

Listen, in the whisper of the wind, your name is being called….

Written by David Lee Waters, Sr.

On Board with Heart for Africa's Board

Heart for Africa will take its North American volunteers to Africa this year with a renewed sense of purpose and clarity about its goals.

Meeting in Alpharetta, GA, in February, the directors unanimously approved the strategic plan presented by President Ian Maxwell. The plan recognizes both the organization’s roots and its call by laying the cornerstone of Heart for Africa as backyard gardens leading to food security.

By coming alongside Africans in Malawi, Kenya and Swaziland to plant seedlings rich in nutrients, we will be helping these families and villages—who choose too- to move toward a sustainable food supply. By doing so, they will have hope for a future. Bringing that hope is central to why God has called us to Africa.

We will use the three-phase planting model that was piloted in Swaziland last year in Malawi and Kenya. Utilizing drip irrigation and compost trenches, it leads to sustainable rotational gardens.

In Malawi, it’s particularly intriguing because Ian’s research led to a missionary couple that had flourished for more than 20 years by only growing food crops native to Malawi. They’ve dubbed the program permaculture. Isn’t it remarkably logical to encourage folks to grow the plants that God put on that land originally?

We’re excited about the new partnership in Kenya with Glory Outreach and Help a Child Face Tomorrow that will combine our efforts with a medical mission and evangelism followed by discipleship.

Our trips will combine gardens, work with orphans (both in villages and in children’s homes), some light construction and, for trained professionals, medical outreach.

The board left Georgia excited to see what God was going to do this year and thrilled to have a role in His plans for His kids in Africa and North America.

Come join us and serve as the hands and feet of Jesus in Africa.

by: Tim Hunt, Chairman of Heart for Africa Board