OZ Project Update, January - April 2008

Little People, Big Dreams

OZ Project Update – June 2008

After a one-month school holiday, where the school grounds were sadly void of the voices of our children, school is thankfully in session again! Here in Zambia the children are in school for three months then off for one-month. Now that we’re back in session, some of our classes have almost doubled in size, with new children enrolling every week! Although some of our children have not returned as their guardians instead opted to sponsor the child to attend a local government school, we rejoice at the new opportunities ahead of them. Tejan, who is in grade one, is nine years old, and is one of our faithful deacons, recently got sponsored to a local government school, but we find him each afternoon running through the gates of the Coptic Mission to rejoin his old friends for a rousing game of football (soccer). He tells us that he misses us because we are like his family, and wishes he could come back to school here.

Right now we rejoice for Tejan and others who are funded because the quality of education and resources available at the government currently exceeds what we can provide for our children, as it is with most community schools. We have dreams, however, to make our community school better than government and even private schools! Yet, this requires a lot of work and resources. But we do not give up hope, because although we are little people trying to help little people, we have big dreams and we know we serve a big God that makes big dreams – especially for His little people – come true!

As an answer to prayers, a generous sponsor, World Vision Zambia, visited our school. They were so impressed with our dreams and our school that they have begun to donate boxes of school supplies, such as crayons, pencils, pens, rulers, glue, and so much more!  The big surprise for us was when World Vision recently donated over 1,000 reading books for our children! Now, our dream for creating a successful reading program is starting to materialize.   Teaching every child to read is one of our top priorities as we know it is essential for them to succeed in the future. Thank God we are now one step closer to achieving our big dreams!

With all the hard work everyone is doing here in Zambia, you must wonder whether there is time for fun – well, of course there is time for fun, especially with 150 kids running around! The school-wide end of term party in April celebrated birthdays and outstanding student achievements with snacks, games, songs, and even special visitors. A team from World Vision joined in the festivities. They taught the children songs, played games, and enjoyed meeting face-to-face the little children whose big dreams they are helping to achieve.

You too are helping achieve the dreams of your children in Zambia.  We pray that one day you can meet your children face-to-face so you can hear their words, “Thank you for making my dream come true.”

A Land Flowing with Milk and Honey

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Calabar, a village in southern Nigeria, is called by the local natives ‘Canaan‘.  Canaan is the land promised to Abraham’s descendants – a land flowing with milk and honey.  The land in Calabar is lush and green, as if one was in a tropical paradise.  The palm trees, mountains, rivers, and quiet breeze bring peace and tranquility to this land. The people living in Calabar are very friendly.  They welcome you in their homes, in the marketplace and on the streets.

Mary Slessor, a courageous missionary, lived and died in this place of Calabar, never understanding why she was so attached to the people of Calabar.  She loved them with such a deep love and become a Mother to so many villagers.  When we visited Calabar, we understood why Mary Slessor made this place her home and the people her people.

In the Old Testament, Joshua led the Israelites into the Promised Land and discipled them, so Father Isozorous, is our modern-day Joshua in Nigeria. Fr Isozorous has been working diligently building the Coptic Church in Nigeria and caring for the needs of the people with complete abandon. Having gone to medical school, he tends to the clinical needs of the people, as well as guarding their spiritual well-being. He is renowned, in Calabar, with rescuing orphaned children and adopting them as his own.  Hearing the response of the children to Fr Isozorous, with exuberant cries of ‘Father, Father!’ is evidence of that fact. In less than a year, he has won the hearts of the people and served them wholeheartedly and faithfully. Yet, he takes no credit for anything, always giving God the glory for His work.

The people of Calabar love to praise the Lord in His house, however, in the past, choosing a church could prove particularly difficult. Any village street can have as many churches as there are Starbucks coffee shops on a busy street in the USA.  In the past, churches in Nigeria have been geared towards business-making.  It is common practice for a church to be opened with the sole purpose of making a profit. Those churches hold many meetings, such as miracle healings, faith clinics, counseling sessions and many other ‘ministries’ to help the spiritually and physic

ally sick.  However, to attend a meeting, a starving Calabarian must pay – choosing between feeding the children or gaining ‘spiritual help’.  These churches take advantage of those that are in need in order to make money.

This is why the Coptic Orthodox Church in Calabar is essential.  We can offer truth, by giving help, genuine love, and true teachings of the Bible with no strings attached. The Coptic Church is opening a clinic to attend to the medical needs of villagers. Father Isozorous is also expanding the service of the church, to include several open prayer services during the day, youth recreational activities and discipleship meetings - all free of cost.  The Mission Center in Calabar is rapidly growing to meet the needs of the community, with a chapel, football field, church and accommodation for missionaries.

The people here are desperate for a church that stands for truth and love; a church committed to practicing what Jesus preached and how Jesus lived in this world.  Many of our neighbors were confused because they had never encountered a church that genuinely cared so much for the community, without expecting anything in return.

The mission in Calabar is new and there is much work to be done. Father Isozorous heard the Lord’s call for him, but is the only Coptic missionary in the entire country of Nigeria and he needs your help!  ‘The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him.’ (2 Chron 16:9) The Lord wants to work through you to build His Kingdom and proclaim His Gospel.  The vision has been set in place by the Lord, but now, who will heed Jesus’ call to come and serve here?

The children of Calabar are praying for you to come and serve them.

“He said to them, ‘Come and see.’ They came and saw where He was staying, and remained with Him.” (John 1:39)

“The harvest truly is great, but the laborers are few; therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His Harvest.”

(Luke 10:2)

Coptic hospital in Nairobi

Do you have a medical degree or experience in Hospital administration?

With the mission of providing the best quality care to those who otherwise could not access it, the Coptic Hospital offers a full range of inpatient and outpatient care, including specialized services.

Hope center for infectious diseases

Do you have management experience?

Are you interested in fighting the AIDS epidemic in Kenya?

The Coptic Hope Center for Infectious Diseases has initiated fully comprehensive and free HIV/AIDS management to over 8,000 clients.  Treatment includes delivery of comprehensive care services in the form of 3 sessions of adherence counseling, nutritional counseling, social work services, clinical monitoring for complications and semi-annual lab-testing.

Do you want to use your skills and talents

to serve those who are in need?

If interested, please contact and send résumé to:

bishoppaul@hotmail.com or

mikeygirguis@gmail.com

Let me just start by premising that Zambia must have some of the most humble and kind hearted people on this Earth.  I have never met such warmhearted men, women, and children – of all ages.  I really don’t know exactly how to put all of this into words, but I will try my best to capture for you just how the Lord is working through the missionaries and people here in Zambia. 

The group hit the ground running from the first day, reaching out and preaching to Zambians in the busy market place.  However, the second and third days were such a blessing!  We visited church members and non-members in their private homes to share the Word of God and show them His love, and honestly, I was blown away by their respect and kindness for strangers – and not just any strangers, but foreigners (FROM AMERICA!!)  Women and children are quick to grab small tree trucks that they use as chairs as soon as arrive and offer us food if they’re eating.  I think the most amazing thing is that they do not reject us!!! In the Western world, if someone comes on your property and rings your doorbell for anything, we get so defensive and may even rudely reject them, but here, that’s nearly impossible. 

People are truly thirsty for the word of God and praise Him; they praise the Lord with all their hearts and in their loudest voice!  I was so overwhelmed when I walked into the church in Munguli, which is about 2 hours from Kenyama (where we are staying).  We could hear the congregation singing and clapping in the church from down the road.  They had been waiting for us to arrive for one or two hours and all they were doing was praising the Lord and singing!  I cried as soon as I walked in… all the children were in the front and the men and women behind them.  It was so lovely. I’ve never seen or heard praising with such fervor in any church before.  These are people who live in huts… hours away from the city, who have taken nothing from this world and they are so thankful to the Lord!  We honestly have learned so much here and I believe the people here are serving us more than we are serving them!

I have so many stories to share already and it has only been three days!  One man who really touched my heart was in Munguli.  Abouna Abraham and I went to share God’s word with Him and I shared the story of the sower (Luke 13:6-9) with one particular elderly man.  He said to me, “That was so beautiful, I have never heard a story like that. The Lord truly is great.  Praise Him!” Then he asked where the church was and said he will start to come to hear more stories like this!  I was so touched, praise God!  I thought to myself, how many of these people attend the church and love the Lord so much, without even knowing that much about the Lord or about what He has done?  It made me realize that faith and love in the Lord does not come from memorizing His words or knowing every story in the Bible. It comes from praising Him, glorifying His most holy name and thanking Him for every condition and in every condition.  These people have nothing, yet they have everything!  God bless them and may He grant us His grace to be just as thankful, kind, and loving as the people here in Zambia.

As Told by Salwa Salib

Good morning, “mwauka Buanji,” this is in Nyanja (Zambian language).

What a unique opportunity it is to be among the Zambians. I felt lifted up when I prayed together with them.  Yesterday, we visited St. George’s church in “the Bush” (Munguli). The people had already gathered and unfortunately, we made them wait, but the amazing thing is that they were getting themselves prepared for our meeting by cheerful singing and clapping.  We were even able to hear them from a distance.  Most of them came from a long distance walking through rough land.  What an awesome fellowship when we are with other members of the Body of Christ!  It only shows the greatness of our heavenly Father.  Also, medical mission was part of the service in this lovely church.  We were able to examine the need of many patients, ladies, children and men.  It touched me to see how thankful the men at the end were despite the fact, that we could not give them enough attention as we did with the ladies and children due to lack of time.

The church members meet once a month for Liturgy, but they have weekly visitations by the servants and Father Mark, the Zambian priest, is originally from this area.  We met his mother and his oldest sister, who all members of the church. 

In Zambian native language, we would like to say “Zikomo Kwamberi” (Thank You Very Much) to Mission Life Center and all our sponsors for their wonderful generosity of the OZ Project. We are extremely grateful for the kind donations and would like to share with you how your donations have been put in action and our future plans for the Orphans of Zambia.

As you may know, an imperative component of the OZ Project includes maintaining a preparatory Christian school for the orphans and vulnerable children that cannot afford the local schools. When we first began this school, a deacon from our church had upon his heart to gather these children and teach them basic things such as English and Math. About 7 children used to attend “school” every day in a little hut on our church property. Eventually, through many prayers, financial contributions and volunteer teachers, we have a newly renovated school building with four classrooms, student desks, a large chapel, and fixed blackboards. The number of students has now significantly increased from 7 students in our mere beginnings to over 150 students! And when you see these young children walking to school carrying their schoolbags (or even plastic bags) with their notebooks, they are so eager to attend school. Their smiles and joy are unbelievably encouraging that anytime we have a bad day, we are immediately lifted up to the Heavens when we see these children’s smiles and their excitement at the opportunity for an education.

No longer learning in huts, the classrooms have greatly enhanced the children’s learning environment, because we are able to hang learning aids and posters for the children. We have also been able to decorate the classrooms with the children’s art work, which encourages the children for doing a job well done. The teachers have really felt a change in the character and behavior of our children since the beginnings of our school. For instance, the children, normally used to fighting and pushing, are better-behaved and are sharing now as opposed to pushing. The academic growth has also been tremendous. We have seen the children go from learning basics about the ABC’s to acing spelling exams.

In our mission to raise these children to be the next spiritual leaders and missionaries of Zambia, we focus a great deal on their spiritual life. Each class has its own devotion time in the chapel where the children sing, share the Bible, and pray together. As part of our curriculum, we also teach a Religion course to ensure their knowledge increases along with their spiritual lives. Our teachers are also growing spiritually as they meet together to share the Word of God and pray together.

The children’s physical needs cannot go unnoticed. With many children coming to school with ripped clothing or no shoes, we must provide for their needs. Through many contributions, we were able to provide winter clothing for the children in order for the children to have something warm to wear in the cold and rainy seasons. Further, blankets were also given to our children. How exciting it is to see the children overjoyed for something most of the Western world takes for granted! In addition, we gave many children food bags. Eventually, with enough funding, we would like to provide monthly food bags and hygienic supplies for the children. We also provide refreshments at school because many children are hungry and cannot learn with a hungry stomach. Last but not least, through the work we are doing in the Coptic Hospital, all the children are given free medical treatment at our hospital. Thus, any contributions for the medical hospital will be greatly appreciated.

As we are experiencing tremendous growth, our short term plan is to increase the number of classrooms, teachers and school supplies. We are also working on improving our library and equipping our students with a variety of books as well as audiovisual resources. Your contributions have been helping us get closer to this great demand.

The OZ Project’s long term plan is to eventually expand into a boarding school/orphanage. We feel that an environment where the children are in a nurturing, spiritual home such as the home that we would provide is the next step in our goal of building great leaders and missionaries for God. In order to achieve this goal, contributions are still needed in the areas of financial and technical assistance.

We see a hopeful potential in all of these orphans and see a bright future for them. Your contributions are greatly needed and can come in many forms: 1) prayer; 2) financially; 3) bringing the love to Zambia by serving. We pray that through the OZ Project, the lives of these beautiful children can become transformed into great spiritual leaders and missionaries of Zambia.

To help support the OZ Project please  visit  http://www.missionlifecenter.org/support-mlc/

“Every gift of noble origin Is breathed upon by Hope’s perpetual breath.”
William Wordsworth These Times strike Monied Worldlings

Through much prayer God has really been revealing to us much about the clinic. We feel God calling us to be faithful to the clinic here at church and through that process we believe the doors for the Hope Center in DC will be opened. The clinic here at church has been running successfully for many years however they are in great need of volunteers. The vision for the clinic here is for it to not only be a mission clinic for our congregation but to mission to others here in the community. God really showed us if we can be faithful to the clinic here we will move onto DC next. We have the advantage of helping organize and learn here before moving onto DC. However, what we desperately need is your help. For the time being the clinic has moved to Saturdays. We are looking for people to volunteer twice a month 2 hours each time. Below are the areas we need help in. If you still feel called to help with this project please identify a position below that you have a desire to serve in, email me, please include address and background. Monica Fam will be the Volunteer Coordinator for the clinic. If you would like to sign up for one of these positions please email mfam@smcmail.com and please list any dates that you are not available. Thank you

Positions- All Positions require 2 Saturdays a month and 4 hours total per month

Clinic Positions & Details

Medical Assistant

Draw blood from the patients

§ Process the blood sample

§ Write down an order to the lab

§ Call the lab to come and pick up the sample

§ Leave the blood sample in the box at the door of the school

§ Follow-up on the lab results: download the results from the lab web page and attach them the web based chart program.

Social Service

§ Incorporate the spiritual aspect

§ Relate to the patient

§ Listen to the patients, many of them may be elderly or not have family so they usually just need someone to talk to

§ Help patients with filling forms for them e.g. forms for school physicals

§ Drive new comers to respective health resources like the department of health for immunizations or Ob/Gyn offices for pregnant mothers or for X-ray facilities.

§ Follow up calls to inquire about patient health and needs after his/her visit to the clinic.

Accountant/Purchaser

§ Credit card machine

§ Create a budget for supplies

§ This person must be available during the clinic hours.

Public Relations/Marketing

§ Negotiate low prices for x-rays/mammograms/other procedures

§ Look and obtain grants like United Ways and similar charity organizations as well as the Health Department

§ Weekly announcements @ Church

§ Update and Website on health announcements, hours, general information

§ Create Flyers English and Arabic

Receptionist

§ Welcome patients to the clinic

§ Record patient information in the computer

§ Collect nominal donation form patient

§ Show patient to the exam room

§ Keep order and entertain patients in the waiting area

Technology/Communication Person:

§ Get familiar with the computer program and train everyone one it

§ Establish a fax line

§ Establish a telephone line with an answer machine

§ Contact physicians with urgent matters coming through fax or phone

Medical Residents

§ Get the vitals form the patient

§ Present the patient to the attending physician

§ Enter doctors notes into the chart program

Pharmacy

§ Need someone to keep track of inventory

§ Dispense medications to patients

§ Collect nominal cost of the medication

Please take the time and watch this video. This video introduces our newly announced MLC Project-The OZ Project. This project is meant to build local missionaries in Africa. As many of you well know Africa has been ravaged by AIDS. In the wake of that has emerged an innumerable amount of orphans. This Project hopes to address the physical, educational and spiritual needs of those children.

Father Abraham Fam in Zambia along with his wife Dalia and the Coptic Church in Zambia are working to address those needs. Together with the Hope Clinic there they are tirelessly working to this cause. However what they need more than people to help is money and resources. To learn more about the OZ Project visit: http://www.missionlifecenter.org/get-involved/

Father Abraham

Father Abraham is an American born missionary priest in Zambia. He took his first mission trip in 1999 and fell in love with the people of Africa. He knew in his heart then that he would someday return to the people of Africa. He did many times after through various mission trips little did he know it would be his home one day. He was leading an ultra successful life as a manager at Accenture but was finding that his time and passion and energy were poured into his service at church with the High School Ministry and bookstore. It was then that he was called to serve as a full time servant at St. Mark’s Coptic Church in Washington D.C.

He was initially asked to lead the High School and College ministry. However, on his heart was always the greater mission of reaching all of God’s people. His first mission trip had a huge impact on his life and he felt that it would have the same effect on others if given the chance. It was then that he formed an organization by the name of Mission Life Center to prepare and send out missionaries. Little did he know that one day he would be leading by example and be called to be a priest and missionary in Africa. Please keep Father Abraham and Dalia in your prayers daily.

This is a cartoon from one of my favorite cartoonists, Gary Larson of Far Side Fame. This cartoon reminded me of our relationship with God at certain times. It seems that God is always talking but sometimes all we hear is blah blah blah. So the question becomes is it because we really don’t want to understand what He is saying or we don’t want to hear what He is saying. God speaks in various ways throughout the world-not to get too cheesy but of course we see Him speaking too us throughout nature-but lets face it we are not the dog in that cartoon-God speaks to us very clearly in words that we can understand-the bible. It is incredible if we take the time to delve into the bible and spend daily time with Him, He will speak clearly-yeah sometimes we might not still understand but He is still speaking. Our church has a quiet time program for everyday of the year, http://www.stmarkdc.org/content/view/121/.

Today’s quiet time was beautiful it was from Revelations 22:1-5. Whoowee love getting hopeful messages from Revelations. Take the time and go read it but there were 2 messages that really stuck out to me. Verse 3 talks about how in heaven His servants will serve Him. It doesn’t say people that love God, doesn’t talk about people that go to church, or people that say are Christians. Nope it says His servants will serve Him. Not people that become servants in heaven but specifically His servants. So that means they were already servants here on earth. See in heaven there aint no on the job training-its gotta start here. What plumber would you trust to work on your house that had never had any training? So then why do we always think God’s standards would be below ours. Everyone knows the famous parable about people being invited to the banquet but turning down the invitation to do other things. God is inviting us to His banquet not to eat but to serve-guess what you get the appetizer hear on earth – a taste-but the big banquet is in heaven. God is calling each of us to serve Him daily not to His benefit but to ours. Come on does God really need us? He calls us to serve Him so that we can know Him better and the more time we spend serving Him the more we understand what He is telling us.

I cannot tell you the power of quiet time I have seen people make life decisions over quiet times. I have seen very successful people leave their lives to become missionaries due to how clearly God was speaking to them in quiet time. Question is do you hear what the Lord is saying or do you hear a lot of blah blah blah in your life.

New and Updated Features:

• Fisherman’s Guide
• Get Involved
• Photos