Vanished

Hi friends,

This is a far more somber post than I usually make... I'm going to tell you about a recent experience I shared with my friends who run a local orphanage, Beautiful Gate, in Lesotho. Actually I'm going to use her words as I feel she beautifully captured in her blog exactly what I was feeling...

A mother showed up at Beautiful Gate (BG) with her new born child. She had gone to the government and explained she could not care for the child. Instead of the government just taking the child, they talked with her and then gave her some advice (of which I will not share on this blog). The mother left upset. She came to BG knowing that we care for children and tried to give us the child. (This was not the advice of the government). She told our staff member that if we didn't take the child she would abandon it. Because of the laws and regulations that we have to adhere to, we cannot just take a child from someone without the proper forms and documentation. Our hands were tied. To say we were stuck between rock and a hard place would be an understatement. If we take a child without proper paperwork and the mother vanishes, that child will be forever stuck in the system. If we sent the child with her, we feared she may follow through on the threats she was making. Our staff members talked the mother and asked her to make right choices for this child. We knew we couldn't take the child in without getting in trouble with the government. Instead of just sending her on her way we gave her some diapers and formula and then drove her and the child to her house. When our staff left her, they realized she had nothing and even though we went above what we were suppose to by giving her diapers, formula and a ride, she had no bottle to make the formula in. Our staff then decided to get a bottle from BG and bring it back to the mother. When they got there, she was gone. The following morning our staff went back again and the mother and child were not there.

She vanished...

My only hope in situations like this is that God knows right where they are. He knows the mother. He knows the child. He knows their pain and He will work to bring about good in this situation. He has to! My hope is that even though people vanish, God will never vanish from them. He has them in the grip of His hand and won't let go. - C. Terpstra

It's an impossible choice... having to turn away a mother and baby at risk knowing that if you don't obey their rules, the government could come and close down all operations at BG, sending more than 60 children out on the street. 

I spend each Wednesday night at Beautiful Gate with my closest friends. I was there the night this mother came, I watched my friends and several staff members agonize over this impossible choice. I found myself saying, "I'll take the baby... could I take the baby?" knowing it wasn't legal but unable to stomach the possibility of this child being abandoned. Would you join me in praying for the following:

• At-risk children in Lesotho

• Women who feel they have no choice other than to abandon their child

• The staff at Beautiful Gate Orphanage who care for the needs of children aged 5 and under. They truly are the hands and feet of Jesus!

• My heart as I hear stories of abandoned or orphaned children and want nothing more than to give one of them a forever family and home.

How to encourage a missionary...

Yesterday I wrote a letter to Mrs. Steiger's third-grade class at Friends Christian School. It was in response to their letter, specifically to their questions about me, my life and ministry here. What I didn't include were the comments and encouraging words they included with their questions... here's some of what they said:

• The land (Lesotho) seems really pretty.
• We like the way you preach God.
• We really like what you are doing.
• We encourage you to tell more people about God.
• We pray you will be safe on your journey.
• May God be with you and bless you.

These students are studying Paul and how he was a tent maker and missionary. Knowing that their study of Paul is what was motivating their questions to me, it's honoring and very humbling. They know I'm a missionary who does accounting so they were comparing how my life might be like Paul's - woah!

I believe God placed a call to missions on my heart when I was 8... the same age as many of these children. It happened when I heard a missionary kid speak about her life in The Philippines. It is my prayer that perhaps knowing about my life would resonate and ignite a calling in the lives of these children - who knows but maybe one of them will also become a missionary!

If you are a teacher - I'd love to be a pen pal with your students! Whether it is about culture, social studies, and history to a public school or about missions with a Christian school, I'd love to share a glimpse of Africa with your class. Shoot me an email kimberlybaker@maf.org anytime - I usually can respond within a week, though you can ask Karen Steiger, I usually respond much faster ;)

Another letter to a third grade class

Hello friends in Mrs. Steiger’s Class!

Thanks for taking the time to read my letter and to write again, what a blessing it was to receive your email. Today in Lesotho it is very chilly but we have crystal clear skies – I can see all the way to the mountains. Maybe someday you’ll get to come visit me here, it is a beautiful country. All of the grass that was green is now turning brown and all the leaves are changing colors and dropping to the ground. One of the craziest things about living in Lesotho is the seasons. We are in the southern hemisphere which means that while you are having warm weather in the spring, we are getting colder each day because it is autumn. Usually it’s no big deal, but I still have a hard time having a really hot Christmas and a freezing 4^th of July – even after 5 years it still feels weird J Can you imagine having snow on the 4^th of July?

I hope you enjoyed the pictures and answers to your questions… looks like you have some more questions, so why don’t we get to them now? I’m going to answer the table groups as they wrote to me:

Table 1:

When was the last time you had pizza? I had pizza about a week ago, we have a chain here called Roman’s Pizza and it is pretty yummy… one of the flavors here is called Fiji, it is bacon and banana. At first I thought, “Who would put banana on a pizza??!!” but you know what, now I really like it!

How old were you when you started preaching about God? I think I have been sharing my faith since I was about your age, but preaching? I guess I preached officially when I was 41 years old. Here’s a picture from that day, I was preaching at Maseru United Church:

When was the last time you went to a fast food restaurant? We have a KFC here and I got chicken for lunch while I was running errands last Thursday, April 30^th.

Table 2:

What type of house do you live in? I live in a town home, here they call it a flat. It has 3 small bedrooms, one bathroom, and a toilet room upstairs and a small kitchen and family room downstairs with a one car garage. Here you don’t often put the toilet in the same room with your shower/bathtub. The toilet is in a very small room like a closet. I also have a small garden in the back. I live there with Em & Henry my cats.

Are you enjoying Africa? I really am, I love living here but by far the hardest part is being so far away from family and friends.

Table 3:

Are there crickets in Africa? Yes, though they are quiet now because it is cold outside. We also have grasshoppers – and they are HUGE!

Do they play football/soccer? Soccer is by far the most popular sport followed by rugby and cricket. No American football here but at the gym they have basketball courts and tennis courts and squash court too.

What kind of clothes do they wear? Most Basotho dress just like we do with one very large exception. Here, especially in winter, most people wear a Basotho blanket or even a regular blanket like we would wear a coat or jacket. The Basotho blanket is made of wool, it is very heavy and keeps you very warm. I have a Basotho blanket and I’ll wear it in winter over my clothes since we do not have a heater in the hangar and sometimes the temperature in my office is in the low 40’s – brrrrrr!

Table 4:

Do you eat modern food we eat here? Yes, almost everything there can be made here. The biggest difference is you have to make it, you can’t just go and by something already made. I really miss good Mexican food though. We have to make our own tortillas and then we can make tacos, or chips or enchiladas or whatever from them. Here are some pictures from Thanksgiving, I made pumpkin pie:

Did you bring any food from the U.S.? I did. I brought tarragon which is one of my favorite spices but one I haven’t found here. I brought chocolate chips, butterscotch chips and toffee chips for baking, ranch dressing packets, canned pumpkin, Reece’s peanut butter cups and candy canes as these are all things you cannot find here. Reece’s are my favorite candy and many of my missionary friends like them too, so I shared them.

Table 5:

Do you have kids? I don’t… yet. I am in the process of adopting an orphan here, I’ve asked for a girl between the ages of 3-4. So hopefully one day soon I will have a daughter.

Do you play any sports there? I love to swim, but for enjoyment not competitively. Sometimes we’ll play soccer or volleyball or Frisbee for fun, volleyball is my favorite.

What is the weather like there? Right now it is getting chilly here. The autumn and winter are our dry seasons usually. There will be snow in the mountains and sometimes we’ll even get snow in Maseru but it will only last a day or two. Houses here do not have central heat or air conditioning, nor do they have insulation as most homes are made of sandstone or bricks with tin roofs. This means it can get as hot and cold inside as it is outside. Right now the temperature in the morning is in the 40s and it will reach the 70s during the day. My bedroom was 50* this morning when I jumped out of bed. I have never enjoyed hot running water as much as I do here in Lesotho. If it is too cold the pipes will freeze and I’ll not have water until they thaw. Sometimes the water or power will be off which will also keep me from a warm shower in the morning.

Thank you all again for taking the time to write, if you have any more questions I’d be only too happy to answer them! Maybe if we can arrange it, I could make a skype call to your classroom and we could talk face to face, well sort of.

I pray God is blessing you and that you finish your school year well!

Blessings,

Kimberly ‘Mamosa Baker