The Caring Place

This was a very special day. Paul had emailed us and asked us if we would be interested in bringing clothes for 18 street boys in Jinja that had been taken in by a 23 year old woman named Serah. We were so happy to do this project and started gathering clothes immediately. We were only guessing at sizes and I have to say we did very well. Everyone had several shirts, a pair of jeans and a pair of shorts. We brought flip-flops too, but some of their feet were bigger that we expected so there were 3 or 4 that didn't get a pair.

This is her story as told by Paul in one of his updates. It's too good not to share with everyone.

Several years ago Serah, was noticed by some people in Chicago. I think it was because she loved to play soccer. Their relationship developed and they fell in love with her. They began to save money so that Serah could go to America and attend university.

Something happened on the way to America, however. Serah met some street kids and fell in love with them. She and her sponsors were ready to obtain a visa so that she could study at a university in the States, but she had to share her heart with them. They discovered that she would rather forfeit her tuition money so that she could begin to work with some street kids with whom she had started relationships. One of these kids had been on the street for seven years! They were filthy beggar, thieves, sexually abused, liar, and without any history of love.

Serah began to love them on a daily basis. None of them believed that she would come back each and every day with some little food. But, each day she came. As she came she began to test them to see if they could be managed. She required much of them, but loved them in spite of the fact that they could get cocaine and most of them were huffing glue.

I wish each one of you could have been with us in their home today. Called the "Caring Place". It is NOT an orphanage. Serah makes it clear that this is a home. She is specific with details that reinforce that it is a home and each boy is loved equally. That right... each BOY!! Eighteen of them! There is a momma with a young boy that lives in the home with Serah, but Serah at age 23 is the momma. She has been providing for the 18 boys... in the home... for the past seventeen months. The people from Chicago had to terminate their funds because of health concerns with the wife that has left them broke. There is just one young man, age 21, from Canada which attempts to send several hundred dollars a month. I know what it costs to maintain a house here in Jinja and that will not pay the rent, utilities and food bill.

Again, I wish each of you could meet this young lady. She is so quiet, so humble, so unassuming, in fact when she was in junior high her friends would ask her " why are you so quiet, why are you so sad?" " Why are you so miserable?"

Why would a gifted, intelligent and beautiful young African woman get involved in such an incredible adventure? God is the answer behind this question. But, let me give you a brief snapshot of the journey that brought Serah to this point in her life.

Serah was born September 9, 1986 as a Tutsi, living on the edge of Kybye in Rwanda. The global disgrace of the Rwandan genocide began in 1990, but it wasn't until Serah was four years old that the Hutus reached Kybye and began to move from house to house reaping mayhem.

When the human atrocities reached Serah's house around 4 p.m. where she was staying with her aunt and uncle, the Hutus hung her uncle and decapitated him as she and her cousins watched. The vicious men with weapons then raped her aunt and killed her with an ax, again under the watchful eye of this young girl. Next, Serah's 16 and 18 year old female cousins were raped and stuffed in a bag, one down and one up and thrown into the back of a truck with others. It was around dark when these bags from the truck were chucked into the Kagera river. The 16 year old whose head was down in the sack died. The older cousin survived and managed to get out of the bag, the river and find her way back to the site of the carnage to gather the young ones and flee the site through out the night.


The Hutu soldiers had left the young ones alive, because they knew that without the adults to care for them they would starve and die. Early the next morning, this small group found some Tutsi soldiers who managed to keep and care for them for four days. On the fifth day they began to walk toward the Ugandan border. With no other means of survival, Serah and her cousins began to rummage through garbage and eat any rotten thing they could find.

It required two weeks of foot travel to reach Mbarara in western Uganda. There they found some relatives. Serah's parents had been in contact with her aunt, but when all contact was lost they assumed that none of them were left alive. Serah lived with her new relatives in Uganda for six long years. Long because they mistreated her. Any extended family members only increased the struggle to survive as extra mouths had to be fed. Serah was not allowed to eat until the family had eaten and then if there was food left as she cleaned up after them she was able to get some little nourishment.

After this period of half dozen years, Serah's parents left the Congo where they had fled where they had came to Mbarara to discover that they had a daughter who had survived the genocide! There were tears of joy that day.

As some semblance of peace came to Rwanda, Serah and her parents traveled back home. However, for Serah, the memories were too severe. In fact, after witnessing the murder of her uncle and aunt, she did not speak for over two months. She hated Rwanda and come to think of Uganda as her home. She returned to Uganda and has remained here since, regarding it as home.

What would cause a young woman of 21 to have such intense compassion and love for street kids who had no one to provide a home for them. Maybe this brief history helps answer this question. Whatever the reason, one thing is for sure. I have met member of the next generation who is living who is living for something greater than herself. She is an amazing and powerful minister of God's love and grace and I am proud to call her my friend and spiritual sister.

He who is kind to the poor lends to the Lord and He will reward him for what he has done.
Proverbs 19:17


This has been tough to write and even tougher to comprehend for us. We have never sacrificed anything compared to the people in other countries. This day has touched each one of our lives today and we will never be the same. The boys were so excited to receive the clothes and we received hug after hug. They boys sang and danced for us and they are the happiest boys. They love Serah and they know that she loves them. It is an amazing story! There is so much more to share about this day, but it will have to wait until tomorrow since it is late. I did manage to upload a few pictures today. I was glad, because I couldn't get any on yesterday. I will try to get some posted of the well and the way they worked to get the tank up.