I am amazed, each time I come back to Kenya, at how much can change in a year. The Lord is constantly growing this work. Many are asking what the needs are here. Currently, the most important need is for construction on the school expansion to be completed, so that plans can be made to start the orphanage. Though we are prayerfully planning for the future of an orphanage, Tom, Sarah and I all agree that we cannot start the orphanage until the construction on the school is finished. We have to take one step at a time. We started working on plans for the new addition to the school, over three years ago. The building has been in good use for about two years now, but it is still not finished. Since last year, the bathrooms have been finished and one of the upper floors now has office spaces for teachers to prepare for their lessons in. The school has almost doubled in size in the past 5 years, having almost 700 students. The original school building now has all of the kindergarten, preschool and nursery classrooms in it. The tin roof, on the kindergarten building, was a continual hassle because of the rain. The roof was leaking a lot and the hard rains beating down on the roof caused teaching to be nearly impossible. With the coming shipment of books from Lafayette Rotary Club, Tom is trying to make a place for the school to have a library. There is currently no library at the school. Now that the roof is being replaced, on the kindergarten building, they have decided to build two more floors on top of the bottom floor. It has been proposed that the first floor, will be a library and classrooms, the second floor will be more classrooms and bathrooms, and the top floor will be a space for a temporary orphanage.
I have been talking for 5 years now, and Sarah for much longer than that, about the need for an orphanage at New Hope School. After speaking to Tom, he would like one of the floors, that is to be added to the kindergarten building, to be a place to start the orphanage. It would not be a permanent place, but would be sufficient for a few children. There is a lot to learn about having an orphanage, and we will have to prove to the government that we are sustainable before they grant us a permit to build a complete orphanage. Thinking about the orphanage takes a lot of faith. It is so evident that we cannot make the orphanage possible on our own. Only by the Lord’s grace will it be possible. Please pray for us, that all involved will listen to the voice of the Lord as He guides and directs us.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
BlogArchives
March 2019
Categories |