Compassionate Rain

Today was a day of compassion. We headed off to Kihesa church to see one of the programs the church operates for the local children. Compassion International is one of the "sponsor a child" organizations one encounters at spiritual concerts, conventions, and such. Since 1952 when Compassion began in Korea, they have supported over 12 million children. Kihesa Lutheran Church operates a compassion center for 272 children. They provide activities, schooling, health screening and connection to other social services for children whose lives need support. Saturday is compassion day and these children gather at the church from 10 to 5. We were invited up to see the how this all came together.

As we arrived, guess what? The first real rain of the season started. We found the kids gathered under the eaves to stay dry at the time they should have been out playing and running after a morning of instruction. We found Shem, the church's youth leader and Sabera, the C ompassion social worker and talked in Shem's office. He provides education for all ages at the church (Sunday school, Confirmation, Adult Ed, ...) as well as help coordinate the Compassion Kids activites (nearly every day after school and all day on Saturday).

We then walked up the hill to Sabera's office. Here she and her staff maintain files on all the kids supported by Compassion. Carrie and Dale had heard much about Compassion Children and we got a complete run-down on the program. Here Sabera and Carrie are looking over the typical records kept on each child. In the background, you can see some of the children's files.

Shem, Dale and Caleb admiring the Tanzanian flag and the new bracelet Caleb made with the same colors.

It rained for about an hour and the whole world changed. The roads were gullied, the dust settled, it cooled off considerably and some of the flowers fell off the trees from the pounding rain. In addition, the flying ants are driven out of their nests on the ground. Tobie and Caleb tried to catch some of these slow moving winged things as the rain clouds lifted.

At the end of the day, Compassion kids lined up for a meal. We will try to return on a day when we can all get outside with the kids and burn off some energy.