Too many babies.

Baby "Lori" - abandoned 3 days before her 1st birthday.

This week I was admittedly overwhelmed.  It was “the wave”.

Several years ago, before Project Canaan existed, I had a vision.  I was standing on the side of a mountain looking out across a valley to a mountain on the other side.  Something was pouring over the mountaintop like a wave and it kept pouring and pouring.  The closet thing I can liken it too would be from the movie “The Lion King” when the wildebeest are pouring down the mountain in to the valley and they keep coming and coming over the mountaintop with seemingly no end in sight.  That is the image I had, but I didn’t know what it was that was coming over the mountain, and it wasn’t wildebeest.

As I continued to stare and focused my eyes on the distant mountaintop I saw that the wave was a wave of children and I KNEW in an instant that they were orphaned and vulnerable children.  I was sick to my stomach and started to panic.  I ran around on my hillside and was shouting to the people around me that a wave of children was coming to us from over that mountain!  I pulled on their arms and tried to get them to look, but no one was interested in what I had to say. I was screaming, and no one was listening.

I got a sense this week that the wave has begun.  I was called on Wednesday morning about two babies who were abandoned. One was allegedly 9-months old and had been abandoned by her prostitute mother. The other one was 6-months old and had been abandoned by her mentally disabled mother.  We picked up the first child on Thursday and it turns out she had turned one-year old on August 5^th.  She has not had any vaccinations since her hospital birth and is severely malnourished and developmentally delayed.  We will get the 6-month old next week when the Court Order is complete.  The very next day I received an email about a 5-month old and an 18-month old child whose mother had just died, whose father was a “foreigner” and unable to care for them, with no family here to help.  He locks the two babies in his room all day, alone, with no food, no diaper changes, no supervision or love, while he goes out.  Could we help and take both children? 

I felt sick as I read that email.  Any time I get a call or message from a Social Welfare officer I have a moment of great joy that we can help another child in need, but then a moment of great sadness that another child needs help.  But this feeling in my stomach was different. I immediately remembered the vision of the wave coming over the mountain and I looked up and saw the very mountain that I had seen in my vision.

Project Canaan is a place of hope and is currently home to 64 babies (not including the three that will likely come this week).  But it is more than just a home – it is an ark of safety. As HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and the effects of Poverty wipe out this tiny nation, there is a remnant that is being saved.  These children are HIS children – children of the King of Kings, chosen for “such a time as this”.   For what purpose?  Only God knows. 

I am taking a day of rest today and then need to put on my “big girl panties” as I look to what next week has in store for those of us who are responsible for the children at Project Canaan.  I am weak, but He is strong and I am clinging to that truth right now.

Live from Swaziland … Come Lord Jesus.

Janine