Posts Tagged ‘Rwanda’
How Climate Change is Impacting Health and Nutrition in Rwanda
Poor communities are often on the frontlines of battling climate change. Many depend on climate-related industries like farming for food and livelihoods, and when climate disasters strike â whether flooding, drought, violent storms or extreme temperatures â thereâs little economic margin to rebuild and adapt.
While the economic effects of climate instability are severe among poor communities, the negative repercussions donât stop there. Climate change and adverse weather events also have a cascading, detrimental impact on health as communities experiencing poverty are at greater risk of disease, injuries and hunger.
The Struggle to Provide
Weâve seen the impacts of climate change on health first-hand in places like Bambiro village in Rwanda, where rising temperatures, extended dry seasons and heavier, less predictable rainy seasons have taken their toll on couples like Epiphanie and Jeremy.
As the water sources they had historically relied on shrank and became dirtier with each dry season, the farming couple could no longer earn a living by growing and selling crops as their elders had. In order to get by and afford food for their children, Epiphanie and Jeremy picked up odd jobs. They washed clothes and made mud bricks to buy potatoes, cornmeal and beans.
Although they wished to provide better, more diverse foods for their children, it seemed impossible. Animal proteins like eggs, fish, meat or milk were too expensive. In fact, when Jeremy was first asked whether he could buy these for his family, he laughed, saying, âI guess you are joking! Where can we get money to buy animal sources of food? Those are reserved for rich people.â
Sadly, when Epiphanie was pregnant with their third child, she noticed that her second born, Aphrodis, was weak. He was often ill and could not stand on his feet at age three. He was suffering from malnutrition.
The Help of a Neighbor
Epiphanie and Jeremy are not the only ones facing challenging circumstances like these. About 80% of the global population who are most at risk of hunger due to climate change are farming families living in Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia and Southeast Asia.
Yet, even as they are not alone in the challenges they face, theyâre also not alone in finding solutions.
In collaboration with UNICEF and The Rwandan national government, World Relief Rwanda connected Jeremy and Epiphanie to a neighbor, Jean Claude, who had faced similar circumstances.
Jean Claude had been selected and trained as a peer supporter through the Abarinzi Bâimikurire Myiza (ABM), or âThe Guardians of Good Growth,â project. ABM equips community and church leaders with knowledge and tools to help improve maternal, infant and child nutrition in Rwanda through peer-to-peer learning.
As part of the program, Jean Claude received training in food selection and preparation, child feeding practices, the importance of father involvement in child health and nutrition and household hygiene and sanitation.
Equipped with this knowledge, Jean Claude visited Epiphanie and Jeremy frequently to share what he had learned. He helped them plant and tend a kitchen garden capable of growing nutritious food with little maintenance and water. He also provided coaching on healthy practices for feeding a growing family. Within four months, Epiphanie and Jeremy had a garden full of mature, leafy green vegetables!
They were especially amazed that the water from their hand washing could sustain the garden in the dry season, and that the crops would endure even heavy rains.
Jean Claude also influenced Jeremy to change the way he spent the money he earned from odd jobs. âI used to spend money buying beer, sugar canes and ignore purchasing nutritious food for my family,â Jeremy explained. âAfter being trained on kitchen gardening, food preparation and food selection, I changed my priorities. I no longer buy alcohol in replacement of food. I try my best to provide different kinds of food varieties to my family on a daily basis. My wife and children need it, as well as me.â
Creating Climate Resilience Together
Now, Epiphanie and Jeremy are seeing the health of their family transformed in spite of the impacts of climate change. With more vegetables, protein and nutrients in his diet, Aphrodis has grown stronger and now runs around playing with other children.
Together, we have reached approximately 1,456 children like Aphrodis through ABM. Among them, we have seen a 20.9% increase in children ages 6 to 23 months consuming more frequent and diverse meals. We have also seen significant improvements in hygiene practices â among those who received peer-to-peer coaching from volunteers like Jean Claude, over 95% say they wash their hands at key moments, as compared to only 45% in the control group.
While Epiphanie and Jeremyâs lives are still impacted by a changing climate, they are raising healthy children and coping well, surrounded by a community of support thanks to Jean Claude, World Relief and generous people like you.
Read more about the impacts of climate change on poorer communities and how World Relief is responding.
James Munanura is the Senior Manager for Health and Social Protection at World Relief Rwanda. With a research background at the University of Rwanda and Makerere University in Uganda, he provides leadership and technical support to nutrition and health related projects. He assisted with the development and direct management of the peer-to-peer Abarinzi Bâimikurire Myiza project.
Jean Paul Niyitanga is the Communications and Operations Coordinator at World Relief Rwanda for the USAID-supported SCOPE Project. With a background in Journalism and Communications and a passion for serving the vulnerable, he began working at World Relief Rwanda in 2021. He has also served as a Communications Coordinator for UN-funded projects, including the Acceleration of Integrated Social Protection Interventions in Rwanda (AISPR) project and Maternal Infant and Young Child Nutrition (MIYCN) project.Â
Emily Kankindi is the Communications and Documentation Unit Coordinator at World Relief Rwanda and is also serving as acting Program Officer for Burundi, Rwanda and Kenya. She started with World Relief in 2005 and has been growing through different roles while pursuing a career in creative communications. Driven by a mission to serve the most vulnerable, Emily has a passion for telling stories of impact and using all forms of communication to inspire others to care for and serve those in need. Her educational background is in marketing and travel operations.
No Longer Alone: How Mothers in Rwanda are Working Together To Care for Children
Every day, parents around the world, make the difficult choice between staying home with young children or leaving them home alone in order to work and provide for their families. Eunice is one of these parents.
Eunice is a farmer and mother in Rwanda. For her and many women like her, farming is not only a way to earn income, but to also grow food to feed her family. When her children were infants, she could tie them to her back while she worked. But once they became toddlers, it was no longer safe for them to accompany her to the fields.
Like many other mothers in her community, Eunice had to make the difficult choice every day to leave her children home alone. For families in situations like Euniceâs, itâs routine for two- and three-year-olds to be left home alone or in the care of siblings who are just a few years older.
Unfortunately, this impossible choice between providing and being present can impede early childhood development. Young children thrive when they feel safe, receive responsive and playful parenting and are provided with early learning opportunities through play. But without these, children miss out on building an essential developmental foundation that will help them reach their full potential into adulthood.Â
For Eunice, she knew her situation was not ideal â she worried about her children every time she had to be away in the fields. She hoped they didnât get hit by a car or abused because they were home alone.
Sadly, her fears were realized. She learned that her children were crying all day and that the food she left out for them was being eaten by older children who were sneaking into her home.
And yet, hope was on the way.Â
Thanks to support from people like you, a group of local pastors had been trained by World Relief and felt convicted about the need to work together to care for vulnerable people within their community. When they heard about the challenges Eunice and other families were facing, they decided to come together and discuss how they could help.
The pastors visited Eunice and invited her to a training held at a local church. There, church leaders helped Eunice and a group of other mothers work together and develop a plan to provide safe care for their children.
Collectively, the mothers had 20 children between them. They selected one womanâs home as the place where they would send their children to be cared for. Each day, four mothers stay behind with the children while the others go to the fields. The mothers rotate between these responsibilities, each covering childcare one day a week.
For the first time, Eunice and the other mothers knew their children would be safe.
In addition to solving their childcare problem at the training, the mothers received valuable lessons on child development and nutrition. Euniceâs children are now receiving quality childcare as well as balanced nutritious meals. She said she and the other mothers are rejoicing and their kids are happy again.
Currently, 17 Home-Based Early Childhood Development (ECD) Centers like Euniceâs are being piloted in World Reliefâs Ngoma Church Empowerment Zone in Rwanda. One of the local pastors has been so impressed by the Centers already that he has written to government officials to share what the moms have been doing, urging them to implement similar systems in all rural communities.
The ECD Centers are meeting a pressing need and creating lasting, sustainable change for families, even in the most remote village. Not only do they bring peace-of-mind to mothers, but they provide children with the foundational care and learning opportunities theyâll need to reach their full potential long into the future.
Dana Pair currently serves as Program Officer at World Relief. Prior to joining World Relief, she worked in adolescent girls programming in the Portland, Oregon area. She is passionate about empowering women and girls to bring sustainable change to their communities.
The Secret Behind Her Smile
Never Again
April 7th marks the beginning of 100 days of commemoration of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda. This is a special time to remember more than a million people that were murdered because of the way they were created. It is a time to grieve but also to unite and rebuild a new generation and a new Rwanda that has a vision of moving forward towards development. The Genocide against the Tutsi was a horrible tragedy no one wishes to see happen again, so we commit ourselves to never let it happen again in our country or elsewhere and say âGenocide never againâ.
While it is often hard to look back on the tragic events in our past, I see only hope when I look around at the Rwanda of today. All around me I see people and communities that have been reborn and made new. And in my work at World Relief, I am happy to get to witness and share so many of these stories of hope. Stories of women like Tuyisenge Valerie, a 43-year-old wife and mother to three kids.
Valerieâs Story
I first met Valerie while visiting Nyamasheke Church Empowerment Zone. Her genuine and beautiful smile caught my attention. Even though I already knew her as one of our project beneficiaries and have heard a lot about how strong and influential she is in the community, I always wanted to know more about the person behind her smile and courage. I asked her if she could share her story and she said “yes” with her beautiful smile.
âMy life story always changes peopleâs hearts so if you want to share it with the world I am happy with it, as long as it will help others and improve the way they envision their future. This is my calling and passion, to touch as many peopleâs lives as possible with my story,â she said.
Valerie is a survivor of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, when her parents and all 12 of her siblings were murdered. During this horrific tragedy, she was also sexually assaulted. In the wake of these events, Valerie was left feeling helpless and lonely. She faced extreme trauma and was put under medication to ease her pain and tension. She always felt lonely, even though she was being taken care of by the government through the 1994 Genocide Survival Fund, which provides access to money to support her and takes care of her medical needs.
Despite her trauma, Valerie is friendly and loves supporting others in need. She used to provide counsel to and advocate for those who were hurting, especially other survivors. This prompted her to be elected as the head of an organization named âIBUKAâ, which connects various groups who aid survivors of the 1994 Genocide against Tutsi in her village. This leadership also paved the way for her to join The National Women Council which is a group responsible for advocacy, capacity building and social mobilization through women empowerment projects, and which fights against domestic violence and advances women’s rights.
In August 1996, Valerie got married to Celestin Kitabonindege. A year later they were blessed with their firstborn and later had four other children together. Unfortunately, the second and fifth born died when they were still infants. After losing their last born in 2006, Celestin wanted to have more children, yet Valerie did not. Celestin became angry and abusive, and eventually, in 2016 he left her for another woman, with whom he had three more children.
Valerie thought that her life was over. She had depended so much on Celestin due to the fact that he had loved her after all she went through after the genocide. And so she became desperate again, for she was left with 3 kids and in a small house. Their life was not easy and she depended only on the money that the survival fund could provide for her.
The Tuzamurane Project
Valerieâs suffering continued until 2019, when World Relief, in partnership with Starbucks, started the Womenâs Empowerment, or Tuzamurane project. The project aims to âempower women to thrive through safe relationships, healthy homes, clean drinking water and economic opportunity,â and provides different lessons to help women sustain themselves towards development.
Behavior change for transformation, in addition to hygiene and sanitation, women and child rights, and economic development lessons were among lessons provided.
âThe behavior change lesson that pictured a tree among all, saved my life. I realized that I had false beliefs as roots that made my life continue to be miserable. I was focusing only on what had happened to me which made me not have hope for a better future. But the more we went through these lessons, the more my mindset changed. And I started thinking differently looking ahead for a better future,â said Valerie.
Through the Tuzamurane project, Valerie met other women who had been through similar circumstances as she had. She gained friends through social women’s gatherings and began to find the support she needed to heal and speak up for herself. She also joined a savings group, which helped her grow her finances. Eventually, she was able to build two houses, one for her family and another one for rent to earn income. In addition to that, she opened a clothing shop which she still runs today. Valerie says that her life has been completely transformed by the community and the programs she found through Tuzamurane.
âI got my life back ever since World Relief came into my life through the project Tuzamurane,â she said. âI became open and able to face my fears and problems.â
Hope & Healing
Today, Valerie has reached a point in her healing that she now helps other women who have suffered domestic violence and/or other tragedies that have made them suffer. She helps them overcome their pain, fight for their rights and rebuild their lives through economic and career development. She is so grateful for what she acquired which made her draw near to God and thanked Him for having brought World Relief into her area.
Celestin also decided to apologize to Valerie and she forgave him. They got back together last year and are joining hands in building their life together in harmony.
As we remember the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, Valerie is ready to help others by giving them hope for a brighter future. As a leader in her sector and village, she will be reaching out to those who face trauma during this time of mourning and seek to uplift them.
When I asked her about the secret behind her smile she said âdue to these trainings I received from World Relief, I became new, I learned as well that smiling with happiness is like food and medicine to my soul.â She went on by saying that âpeople fight and hate each other for nothing! If only they could be aware of how they were loved and created by the same God for a purpose they would unlock their blessings!â Her smile now is genuine and meaningful. It does not hide pain and sorrow anymore for she is healed.
A pioneer in the documentation space, Emily Kankindi is the communications and documentation unit coordinator at World Relief in Rwanda. She started with World Relief in 2005 and has been growing through different stages while pursuing a career in creative communications with a passion to tell the story of impact. Driven by a mission to serve the most vulnerable, Emily is best known for inspiring others to care and serve the needy by using all possible means of communication to promote and call forth positive ramifications of WR interventions in all aspects of life. Her educational background is marketing and travel operations.
Rwanda Responds to COVID-19
Itâs been a difficult season here in Rwanda. Like many places around the world, Rwanda experienced a total lockdown from mid-March to mid-May as cases of COVID-19 began sprouting up in communities across our country. Today, though some communities have begun to reopen, things have not completely returned to normal.
Most church buildings are still closed. Weddings can only have 30 people in attendance. Everyone must wear facemasks whenever we are out and about, and a country-wide curfew that begins at 7 p.m. and ends at 5 a.m. is still in place.
Itâs been a difficult time, indeed, but the hardships and restrictions have caused us to think creatively and find new ways to serve the vulnerable and meet their evolving needs.
At World Relief Rwanda, we currently run programs in six different communities through what we call Church Empowerment Zones (CEZs). CEZs are networks of local churches that have come together to serve the most vulnerable. It is through these CEZs that we are able to offer programs in savings, gender equality and agriculture to name a few.
One such community is Nyamasheke District in Western Province Rwanda. Many of our staff who work in Nyamasheke live in a neighboring district that is currently still on total lockdown because of the high number of COVID-19 cases in that area. As a result, our staff are not able to leave their district to go to work in Nyamasheke.
In addition, many of the men and women in Nyamasheke rely on daily wages to meet their basic needs. But when the markets shut down, they had nowhere to sell their goods and missed out on that vital income. Itâs been heartbreaking for myself and the rest of our team to see vulnerable people becoming more vulnerable.
But in the midst of this hardship, our team has been so encouraged to see local pastors from the Nyamasheke CEZ come together to continue serving the vulnerable in their communities. Although these pastors rely on the regular tithes and offerings that arenât currently coming in due to churches being closed, theyâve banded together, mobilized their members and said, âWe are going to do the best we can with the resources God has given us to really care for the vulnerable.â
Pastors like the ones from Nyamasheke have really stepped up by providing food to those who have not been able to make an income. Since March, churches from across the six CEZs served 4,056 families. In addition to these families, World Relief provided support to 1,346 families as well as support for 350 pastors and their families.
As we continue to adapt to this evolving situation in Rwanda, our team has drawn strength from scripture like this one found in 1 Corinthians 15:58 â âTherefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.â
Weâd ask that you continue to pray for us in Rwanda â for the health and safety of our staff as they carry out programs in compliance with social distancing measures; and for the pastors with whom we partner, that they would continue to discern and pursue Godâs will in this difficult season.
Moses Ndahiro serves as the Country Director for World Relief Rwanda. He is passionate about addressing the roots of human problems and unlocking peopleâs potential to fulfill their God-given purposes.
The Church is Divided Over Racial Justice. But It Shouldnât Be.
Rejection and Division
In 1915, as famed baseball player-turned-evangelist Billy Sunday prepared for a Washington, D.C. crusade, Black Presbyterian Pastor Francis J. GrimkĂ© wrote to him, urging him to decry racism among other sins. Sunday never replied, and GrimkĂ©, like generations of Black Christians after him, lamented Sunday and so many other white ministers, âclaiming to be ambassadors of God,â yet âsitting down quietly in the midst of this spreading leprosy of race prejudice.â
This rejection by white Christians was not new. It was true over 50 years earlier during the time of the Emancipation Proclamation, and it would remain true nearly 50 years after Sundayâs crusade when Martin Luther King Jr. faced rejection from white pastors, which led him to write the âLetter From a Birmingham Jail.
Today, as images of George Floydâs murder at the hands of Minnesota police have taken over our newsfeeds and television screens, scenes of violent clashes between police and those protesting police violence show up right alongside them. Some Christians â particularly those among the evangelical tradition of which we are both a part â suggest that they support violent police tactics and militaristic language.
âOur streets and cities do not belong to rioters and domestic terrorists,â one prominent evangelical said, echoing the president.
Yet others appeal for healing and call out the sin of racism, which they see as the root cause of all violence and upheaval. âBoth read the same Bible, and pray to the same God, â President Lincoln once observed, so why is it that the views of professed Christians on this issue are so divergent?
Our nation, as it has been throughout much of history, is divided. And so, it seems, is the church.
Divergent Experiences
I (John) have been a pastor for thirty years, and our church ministers to 11,000 parishioners a week. But like so many of my African American brothers and sisters, I have so often been treated by white people as if I donât exist. And I grieve that I have had to teach my children that if they are finally acknowledged, it will often be in the form of an accusation of wrongdoing and a presumption that because they are Black, they can do no right.
One Sunday morning, as I left my home for church, when I pulled out onto the main highway to head toward the church where I pastor, I was pulled over by a white police officer. I was curious as to why he pulled me over. I was not speeding. I had not broken any traffic laws. My car didnât have anything wrong with it. After I pulled over, the officer quickly approached my car with his gun drawn and aimed at my head. I wondered, âWhat had I done that made him feel it necessary to approach my car with his gun drawn and aimed at me?â
As many of my Black brothers and sisters know, I was driving a nice car, coming out of a nice neighborhood, and I was Black. The officer wasnât sure that I âbelongedâ in âthatâ neighborhood, and he thought a reasonable response to his doubt was to aim his gun at me.
How many white pastors â or white men â have such a story to tell? And how does a nation begin to unite and to heal from generations of racism, and denial of it?
Martin Luther King Jr. once noted that âthe law cannot make a man love me, but it can keep him from lynching me.â Politics and policy matter. Racial injustice persists because it is reflected in our laws. But law is not where racial injustice begins. Rather, it starts in our souls.
Unjust systems and laws will not ultimately and durably change until attitudes change among the majority of Americans. And unfortunately, when it comes to these attitudes, the church is divided today, just as it was in the days when Dr. King was alive.
Nevertheless, our Scriptures, our own history and the history of a nation that has suffered one of the worst genocides of the last century, make it very clear which side our nationâs churches should be on.
A Lesson From Rwanda
We have witnessed the toxic nature of racism both at home and abroad. The dehumanizing of any group of people empowers injustice of every kind. We saw it in Rwanda when ethnic hatred led to a horrific genocide. We see it at our own border when people fleeing violence seek safety for their children in the United States, but instead of receiving compassionate welcome, they are slandered as dangerous criminals. We witness it as African Americans face daily discrimination and suspicion. We see it tragically and horribly in the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery and so many others.
Yet, racism, like many sins, hides itself from our conscious mind. In my (Scottâs) time as a pastor of a large, mostly-white Midwestern church, I spent many hours in pastoral counsel, helping people confront an array of issues they confessed were troubling them. But never once in my decades of work did anyone come to me asking for help because they saw within themselves the sin of racism.
âWe so want to believe we are not racist,â Doug Hartmann, chairman of the University of Minnesota sociology department, told The Star Tribune, âwe donât even see the way that race still matters.â
In 1908, the London Times invited leading thinkers to write an essay answering the question, âWhat is wrong with the world?â In response, G.K. Chesterton reportedly offered a two-word answer: âDear Sirs, with regard to your question, âWhat is wrong with the World?â I am. Sincerely, G.K. Chesterton.â
And this is my (Scott) answer as well. I, too, am caught in the backwash of hidden motives and sins, including racism. Prejudice is a human problem and lurks in every heart. Perhaps the reason our politics and policies fail us is that the fortress of racism is too seldom admitted or challenged. Only when we confess the reality of our blindness can we ask for help from those of another race, as we also ask for their forgiveness.
I have seen a nation heal from unimaginable trauma. Traveling from village to village in Rwanda with a group of American pastors (both Black and white), I witnessed Hutu and Tutsi grapple with the horror of nearly one million deaths fueled by tribal hatred. I watched as perpetrators named their crimes without excuse and sought forgiveness. I saw survivors and the families of those murdered extend a human touch, allowing the journey to healing to begin, and that healing continues in near miraculous ways today.
What was most surprising to me was that pastors led the way by first confessing their own sins of complicity and cowardice to stand against the tide. Our group sat in stunned silence as one Rwandan pastor admitted, âWe grieve over the sin of our inaction. We knew what was coming and we did not speak out. We live with this pain.â We took courage knowing he had used that regret to fuel his work of reconciliation over the past twenty years, and we understood that this was a challenge we, too, must face to bring healing to our land.
As Christians, we believe that change can happen because the Bible recognizes each human as made in Godâs image. The same Bible gives clear and explicit instruction to fight for justice and speak out against any and every injustice, regardless of our nationality, ethnicity or party affiliation.
A Call to Confess
For white evangelicals in particular â who will be held accountable for disproportionate political influence, particularly with the current administration â that belief must compel humble listening to those who have been marginalized: Black men and women subjected to violence at the hands of police, immigrants cruelly detained in the midst of a global pandemic and refugees whom our country has excluded.
It requires confession that we have indulged a racism that has blinded us to a system that aided us at the expense of others. And worse yet, we have justified it.
The church is divided over the issue of race. But it should not be. Our history makes it clear that those who defended slavery, instituted the Jim Crow laws of the South and resisted the Civil Rights act were not only on the wrong side of history, but on the wrong side of the gospel as well.
As the Rwandan church has modeled, we must name our sin against the Black community without excuse, deflection or denial.
We must seek forgiveness for our complicity in and defense of unjust laws that were to our benefit and at their expense.
The white church, and especially the white evangelical church of today, must turn from the dehumanizing attitudes, rhetoric and policies that are so destructive to the Black community and toxic to our own souls.
And as we do this work within our churches, we must also turn outwards. We must hold our political leaders accountable. We must demand that evil acts be punished, regardless of who committed themâ even police officers. And above all, we must cling to a gospel that unites â one that defines every person of equal and infinite worth. And those who have denied that worth to others must be willing to confess, lament and repent if we and our nation are to be healed.
John Jenkins Sr. is the pastor of First Baptist Church of Glenarden, Maryland, and the board chair of the National Association of Evangelicals.
Scott Arbeiter retired from World Relief in 2021 as president after serving the organization in various roles for more than two decades and is a former pastor of Elmbrook Church in Brookfield, Wisconsin.
Voices from the Field: COVID-19
Over the last several months, our International Country Directors have recorded video messages to update us on how things are going for their teams and beneficiaries and to encourage those of us living in the U.S. In times like these, we are grateful for technology that keeps us connected as we weather this pandemic together.
You can view their messages below.
Updated on May 5th
Democratic Republic of Congo
âNothing is impossible with God.â – Jean Nyandwi
Currently, DR Congo has nearly 2,000 known cases of COVID-19, and the number continues to rise. Country Director, Jean Nyandwi, recently connected with some of our U.S. staff and church partners to update them on how Congo was dealing with the growing crisis.
Early on, Jean and his team took advantage of an already planned agricultural program to spread COVID-19 prevention messaging to over 4,291 people. The team continues to spread virus prevention messaging by utilizing our vast network of church partners and program participants. Though the threat of the virus is still very real, Jean offered some words of encouragement at the end of his call. Watch the video below to hear what he had to say.
Updated on April 8
Kenya
âTogether, we are still making an impact.â – Elias Kamau
Kenyans are very relational people, and like many in the U.S. they look forward to the day when social-distancing is a thing of the past. Country Director Elias Kamau sent us an update asking for prayer and outlining the ways World Relief Kenya is adjusting its programs, partnering with the Minister of Health and utilizing its network of churches to reach thousands of people across Kenya.
Updated on March 27
Rwanda
âThis is my prayer for you. And I ask that you continue to pray for us too.â – Moses Ndahiro
In March, Rwanda issued a shelter-in-place order. Country Director Moses Ndahiro said that the team worked quickly to establish virtual offerings for some of their programs. Mosesâ encouragement from Philippians 4 reminds us to continue with a posture of prayer as we move through the unknowns of this season.
Co-Authoring Godâs Story
Our world is full of stories. From ancient hieroglyphics to the stories in the Bible, to cultural fables and modern fiction â stories create understanding and give meaning to our world. They captivate and compel the human brain like nothing else can. They affect how we think, how we behave and how we respond to the world around us. Stories can empower and encourage us or take away our hope and our dignity. They can compel us to reach out in compassion or turn inwards and hide behind walls. In the words of Robert McKee, stories âare the currency of human contact.â
Itâs no wonder, then, that when people ask me about the World Relief story, I get excited because ours is a story of God at work. Itâs a story of solidarity with the suffering, the oppressed and the marginalized. Of people saying âyesâ to Godâs call and co-authoring his story of hope and transformation. Of a small ministry birthed in Park Street Church in Boston in 1944 that has grown to touch more than five million lives every year and has responded to disasters, extreme poverty, violence and oppression in more than 100 countries since it began.
For over 75 years, World Relief has sought to discern the movement of God and respond to it. Our identity and character of today have been molded by the recognition of our dependence upon God and in our belief that we, as believers, get to be co-authors in the story God is writing today. Throughout our history, we have been formed by the countless stories of individuals who have followed Godâs call and allowed him to use their lives and experiences to shape who we are and what we do.
Take Debbie, a young American nurse who was working in a mission hospital in Ghinda, Ethiopia, in 1974 when rebels armed with machine guns and grenades burst into the hospital where she was working. She and another missionary nurse named Anna were abducted and forced to run across the mountains of Northern Ethiopia in 104-degree heat. When Anna couldnât keep up, the rebels shot and killed her while Debbie looked on in horror. Debbie, who was pregnant at the time, was held in captivity for 26 agonizing days. Most of us, I think, would have turned our backs on Africa after such an ordeal. But not Debbie. She and her husband later settled in Nairobi, where she joined World Relief and found herself responding to the HIV/AIDS crisis that was beginning to engulf the continent.
Years later, Emmanuel, a humble, soft-spoken man of deep faith felt called to Rwanda and became one of our first staff members in the country. It was 1994, and the genocide had just ended. Christians around the world were grappling with the horrific reality that the church was complicit in many of the atrocities that stunned the world. I first met Emmanuel a few years ago and asked him what it was like when he first arrived in Kigali.
âThere werenât many people then,â he told me. âJust lots of bodies by the roadside, and dogs. Lots of wild starving dogs, feeding off the corpses.â
Nearly twenty-five years later, Emmanuelâs selfless, compassionate love and quiet, spirit-filled wisdom in those early years has built a reservoir of trust with local communities and churches that has paved the way for our work to flourish. The respect he commands within local communities, and his powerful ministry of presence has opened the doors to hundreds of churches and homes, allowing our staff to come alongside families and communities in transformative ways.
Meanwhile, a South African man named Dr. Pieter was working at World Relief in Mozambique, pondering the question, âhow can we address high levels of child mortality in very poor remote communities that donât have access to healthcare or clinics?â He piloted an innovative program to reach women and communities with education that encouraged healthy behaviors, ultimately resulting in the creation of our Care Group model. At the time, this use of peer group instruction was a complete paradigm shift in development work.
Of course, the stories that make up our organization donât just belong to our staff. Thousands of them come from the small stirrings and big leaps of faith of men and women like you. People like Jonathan, a software engineer from Massachusetts who identifies strongly with his Jewish family history. His father was on the last Red Cross train out of Germany during WWII, and his grandparents both perished in Auschwitz. Today, Jonathan gives faithfully to World Relief to fight back against the violence and oppression that so many, like his father and grandparents before him, experience on a daily basis, and to support them on their journey as refugees to find safety.
As I reflect upon these different stories of faithful commitment, I am struck by the fact that no amount of central planning, no government organization or think-tank could ever have assembled the people and the pieces that have contributed to the World Relief story, and make our approach to development and sustainable solutions so distinctive today.
These separate strands of commitment, curiosity and discovery were the yeast that gave rise to our theory of change and our model of church empowerment. Years later, our staff codified and professionalized these learnings, as we came to understand the uniquely powerful role the local church could play in poor – and especially remote – communities. We recognized the importance of trust and relationship building, and of allowing communities to take ownership of their own destinies rather than depending on outside interventions.
Our theory of change did not emerge in a classroom or research laboratory, but on the margins, âin the dust of the communities and the heat of the huts, where we recognized the storehouses of [preexisting] wisdom,â as Debbie puts it. Only the hand of God, the movement of his spirit and the faithful obedience of people like Emmanuel, Debbie, Dr. Pieter and Jonathan could write such a beautiful and unexpected story.
Today, these experiences and more have led to the adoption of our Care Group model by more than 25 different NGOs in over 28 countries with beneficiaries now numbering in the millions. Similarly, our innovative Savings Group model and our grassroots Village Peacekeeping Committees are creating incomes, building independence and preventing the outbreak and spread of violence in places like Congo and South Sudan.
At World Relief, our fluid approach to the changing world reflects what New Testament scholar, N.T. Wright, has described as âobedient improvisationâ â faithful to scriptural authority and tradition, but alive to our time, open to new learning and discoveries and constantly seeking out what story God might be writing on the margins and responding to it.
I thank God that World Relief has brought help and hope to over five million vulnerable people around the world this last year. But what amazes me most, and what I am most grateful for, is the commitment of the 1,500 staff, 6,000 churches and 95,000 volunteers who have joined us as co-authors in this story. I thank God for the thousands of you who make this work possible by choosing to engage, pray for and give to this work. Your commitment, courage and faith is an inspiration to us every day. Thank you for co-authoring this story of restoration and hope that God has so graciously entrusted us with.
Tim Breene served on the World Relief Board from 2010 to 2015 before assuming the role of CEO from 2016-2020. Timâs business career has spanned nearly 40 years with organizations like McKinsey, and Accenture where he was the Corporate Development Officer and Founder and Chief Executive of Accenture Interactive. Tim is the co-author of Jumping the S-Curve, published by Harvard Publishing. Tim and his wife Michele, a longtime supporter of World Relief, have a wealth of experience working with Christian leaders in the United States and around the world.
Renewed Hope: An Interview with Pastor Orr
Pastor Orr is the Senior Pastor at Brown Missionary Baptist Church in Memphis, Tennessee. In July 2019, he traveled to Rwanda with a group of pastors to learn from World Reliefâs peacebuilding and racial reconciliation efforts in Rwanda.Â
Q: Tell us about your trip. How did it compare to your expectations?
Iâve always been impressed with the way World Relief helps our church accomplish its mission by bringing the world to our backyard. We believe Jesusâ mandate in Acts 1:8 is not optional. Any church can accomplish this mission by partnering with organizations like World Relief. Brown Baptist has always been a big advocate for racial reconciliation in Memphis, and I was expectant for what I might learn from the reconciliation efforts in Rwanda.Â
I was also eager to get away with other pastors and hopeful that the trip would be a good spiritual reset for me. It must have worked because one of my members came to me after the trip and asked me when I was going to go back out. He said when I returned, my preaching was so much better!
Q: What was the most memorable part of the trip?
Two things stood out to me. First, was the community Savings Group. Twenty or so people worked together to save about $63 U.S. dollars. They used those funds to build homes and better their community. It would have been easy for any of us on that trip to reach into our pockets and give them that small amount. But sometimes itâs not about using money to solve an issue; itâs about empowering people to be the change in their own communities. Often, we take our Western mindset and try to solve everybody’s problems the way we think they should be solved. World Relief has a great model for empowering communities to identify their problems and equipping them to make change. Â
Second, was the reconciliation efforts in the aftermath of the Rwandan genocide. We were told that even church leaders of different denominations were at odds with one another during the conflict. But through grassroots peace efforts, victims and perpetrators of the genocide came together and found forgiveness. We read about that kind of forgiveness in the Bible, but these people are actually living it out. Thatâs powerful.
Q: Did anything about the trip make you think about church or community differently?Â
Most definitely. Every community and every country has its own set of problems. Yet when people come together, in unity, itâs possible to find solutions. If Rwanda can experience the change theyâve seen in the last 25 years, I have hope that we can see something similar in America. This trip gave me a greater determination to continue working with other churches and leaders in the Memphis area to better our community. Recently, 400 pastors from Memphis came together around an initiative to see every school in the area adopted by a faith community. Our goal is to see our faith community supporting students through mentorship and tutoring, and resourcing teachers with the things they need to give their kids the best classroom experience they can have.Â
Q: Did anything shift in your own life because of something you experienced on the trip?Â
The Lord spoke to my heart that maintenance is mandatory for ministry. If we are going to be the best we can be and do what God has called us to do, we have to shut down at times in order for that to take place. We must close our eyes to get rest; we must close our ears to get receptive; we must close our mouth to get refocused, and we must close our door to get reconnected.Â
Q: Whatâs something from the trip you brought back to your own congregation?
In addition to rest, The Lord gave me a sermon series from the book of Ephesians about how everyone matters to the Lord. I am more convinced than ever that we need to stay the course and strive for reconciliation within our church and our community. I believe the church can be a catalyst in bringing about revival in our land. The spiritual renewal God gave me personally on the trip has given me new hope for the renewal He can bring to our nation.Â
Hear more from Pastor Orr:
Rachel Clair serves as a Content Writer at World Relief. With a background in creative writing and childrenâs ministry, she is passionate about helping people of all ages think creatively and love God with their hearts, souls and minds.
An Extraordinary Yes
Extraordinary. Itâs not a word many of us use often. We reserve it for people, times and places that are so exquisite, so set apart, that no other descriptor can carry their weight. As people, thereâs nothing we love more than an extraordinary story. Ordinary people who rise up to become champions, superheroes or world leaders. Stories of strength, courage, hope and perseverance. Stories that allow us to dream about the possibilities of the seemingly impossible. Television, theater and books are full of these stories. But what does extraordinary look like in real life? And is it only reserved for the special few; the born-to-be-leaders, the trailblazers, the uniquely gifted?Â
Perhaps nowhere are these questions better answered than in Bugesera, Rwanda, where a small group of ordinary people are leading extraordinary lives, and where the power of their âYesâ is transforming their community.
Four years ago, 25 men and women in Bugesera said âYesâ to becoming outreach volunteers as part of World Reliefâs new Outreach Group Initiative. Their mission? To take messages theyâd learned at church out to the most vulnerable families in their community by visiting 10 households a week with scripturally based lessons on health, nutrition, savings and more. These selfless men and women dedicated their time to visiting suffering community members and broken families with messages of love, healing and hope. Little did they know that their example would transform the way World Relief works across much of Sub-Saharan Africa and Haiti, and pave the way for our programmatic impact to multiply in ways we never dreamed possible.
Today, the power and potential of our Outreach Group Initiative is unlike anything weâve seen in nearly 75 years of our work around the world. Reaching hundreds of thousands of people across five countries, their impact is unmatched and their sustainability incomparable. Through mass mobilization, Outreach Groups have become inexpensive, self-sustaining vehicles for transformation, galvanizing a multiplication effect that costs just US $40â50 per life transformed.
In 2018 alone, we saw our outreach volunteer force increase by thousands, catalyzing holistic transformation across entire villages. What makes these groups, and these people, truly extraordinary is that they are not highly specialized social workers or health professionalsâthey are simply people saying âYesâ to God and reaching out in love to their neighbors. Because of their faith in Christ, they commit their lives daily to a love, patience and perseverance that astounds and transforms. They say âYesâ to acting as teachers, but more importantly, as friends, entering into a deep relational commitment with the lonely, most vulnerable and least loved in their communities. They donât do this for a paycheck or for reputation, but because of their conviction and deep sense of calling. For some, they do it because they themselves were transformed by an outreach volunteer and because they know itâs through love and in relationship that lives are saved.
Outreach volunteers are ordinary people, doing extraordinary things in the name of Jesus.
Over the last few years, we have seen church volunteers say âYesâ to walking hours each week to come alongside families as they repair broken relationships. We have seen beneficiaries say âYesâ to opening their homes and hearts to church volunteers as they witness change in the lives of their friends and neighbors, and yearn to experience that same transformation. We have seen churches say âYesâ to joining together in unity to expand their ministry of volunteers, reclaiming their roles as true agents of change and engaging with their communities in ways theyâve never done before. And in response to their faith, we have seen God move in extraordinary ways.Â
In Bugesera, Rwanda, 84% of households reported they had made changes in their spousal relationships as a result of the church volunteer visits, 96% reported changes in their relationships with their children, 91% purchased health insurance, 90% planted kitchen gardens to improve nutrition, and 100% adopted regular (4x weekly) washing and bathing practices for their children. Extraordinary, indeed.
Extraordinary stories begin with ordinary people like these Outreach Group volunteers in Bugesera. As we move into a new year, weâre taking our cue from them because theyâre exactly the type of people we aim to be â ordinary people doing extraordinary things in the name of Jesus.
Extraordinary stories begin with a leap of faith, a journey into the unknown, a deep resolve and quiet courage. They begin when we open ourselves up to Godâs leading and ask him to reveal a path. They begin with a small next step, and they begin with âYes.â
What will your extraordinary yes be in 2020?
Francesca Albano currently serves as Director of Branded Content at World Relief. With a background in Cultural Anthropology and a graduate degree in Strategic Marketing Communications, she connects her interests in societal studies and global cultures with her training in brand strategy and storytelling. Francesca is especially passionate about grassroots community development and the treatment and advancement of women and girls around the world.
World Reliefâs Church Empowerment Zones: This Changes Everything
Picture a village. Remote, undeveloped, overwhelmed by poverty and characterized by broken relationships. Where malnutrition, illness, and a small number of positive role models oftentimes leave children extremely vulnerable. And where the perpetual cycle of poverty cripples entire generations, decade after decade.
Now picture that same village in community. A community characterized by thriving relationships, strengthened families, spiritual richness, economic sustainability, and good health. Picture community leaders and church pastors, once isolated and fragmented, sitting together, in conversation. Learning, talking, sharing, and envisioning. Eager to connect, encourage, and challenge one another. Eager to love and serve the most vulnerable, to fulfill the Great Commission, and see the next generation renewed, restored, and transformed in Christ.
What if I told you about a unique and innovative model, pioneered by World Relief, that fulfills this very vision? A beautifully biblical and thoughtful process by which communities are truly being sustainably changed from the inside out. Where the cycle of poverty is being broken, and communities are beginning to experience a fullness of life unlike anything theyâve ever experienced?
Here it is. Itâs called the Church Empowerment Zone (CEZ) Model. And it changes everything.
Pioneered by World Relief in Rwanda over the last 7 years, our CEZ model is a powerful, unique model that adopts best-practice thinking on âmoving from [interventions] focused on community deficits and professional-client relationships to a model that empowers the community by building on local assets and professional community partnerships.â [1] We do so by establishing local ownership from the outset, focusing on leadership development and capacity building, and building upon our core tool: a transformative curriculum that works to eliminate the underlying causes of poverty and end the vicious cycle once and for all.
World Reliefâs âTransformation Tree Curriculumâ (TTC) focuses on better equipping local pastorsâinspiring and faithful servants of the Lord, who are genuinely called to serve with all their capacity and might. They are resourceful, and their strength and enduring spirit blesses their communities abundantly. And so we stand with and alongside them, sharing in our knowledge and resources.
Our TTC grounds these leaders in the scriptural calling to care for and shepherd all people. It addresses foundational beliefs concerning Godâs compassion for the poor, the root causes of poverty, and our call to love and serve one another. We teach pastors that in order for the vicious cycle of poverty to truly end, value systems, beliefs, and ultimately behaviors must change. We demonstrate that in order for holistic physical transformation to take place, spiritual transformation must first lead the way.
Impact is catalyzed as these leaders are brought together and equipped, not just as a distribution mechanism, but also as change makers and kingdom champions. They are developed as true leaders. They are inspired. They learn to shepherd and, in turn, teach others to be shepherds. They are equipped to transform their communities. And they themselves are transformedâas leaders, teachers, community activists, neighbors, wives, mothers, husbands, and fathers.
But it doesnât stop there.
Once foundational beliefs and values are in place, and World Relief staff have served as initial trainers and catalysts, we equip hundreds of âordinary peopleâ to take part in this great kingdom work. Through our Outreach Group Initiative, we use local church volunteers to reach their neighbors and communities, enabling us to address the deepest of issues that extend beyond the âfront doorâ of the home. Lessons begin with biblical teachings that provide spiritual building blocks for our technical interventions. Parents are taught about the obligation to care for their children as a blessing (Psalm 127:3; 1 Timothy 5:8), farmers about the honor and privilege of tending to land (Genesis 1:28, 2:15), families about the importance of saving and sharing money (1 Corinthians 16:2, Proverbs 13:22), couples about respect and support for one another (Hebrews 10:24, Ecclesiastes 4:9), and many more.
With the building blocks laid and beliefs and values instilled, technical interventions become rooted in powerful scriptural support, and adoption for long-term behavior change becomes possible. We then see the gospel work powerfully through the servants, initiating transformation in their communities because the gospel has become powerful in them and among them.
Evidence of change is not simply anecdotal. Not only did our most recent evaluation reveal significant progress in health behaviors and economic standing (the use of clean latrines up 55.4% from 4.4%, and the expansion of income generating activities up to 90% compared to 67% outside our intervention areas), but also in family strengthening and relationships. 84% of beneficiaries claimed their spousal relationships had improved significantly, and 96% reported better relationships with their children. 75% of couples responded that they now made joint decisions, as opposed to 47% in the comparison area, and attitudes toward domestic violence changed drastically, with less than 15% of respondents justifying wife beating as opposed to over 45% prior to intervention.[2] There is no doubt that these numbers showcase visible, tangible transformation in our targeted communities.
Troshaâs story is one example of the powerful narratives of transformation behind these statistics. As I sat with him in a small community in Bushenge, Rwanda, he told me his story:
âMy wife is HIV Positive. I am HIV negative. Three years ago, we were barely surviving. The conflict at home was unbearable. There was no peace. The issues of HIV in our home led to fighting so bad that we were close to killing one another. So the church came to us, and volunteers invited us into World Reliefâs Mobilizing for Life Program. I began to learn how to treat people with HIV/AIDS, how to support them and give them hope. I began to understand my responsibility for taking care of my wife, and began to care for her and help her with her medicine. After 11 years of pain, we began to live together in peace. Since then, weâve discovered many of our friends are facing similar issues, and weâve gone to over 6 homes to share our lessons and council friends. Now, we join together as happy homes, transformed through our churches and this program, and in community together.â
I met Trosha and his wife sitting on a small wooden bench under a tree, just down the road from their home. At the end of our time together, Trosha invited us to see his humble home before we began the long trip back to Kigali. As he led the way through a small opening in the trees, a clearing came into sight, upon which stood several buildings. On this once small, rented plot, he had created a beautiful, thriving home. A house for his family, a kitchen garden for their food, an animal paddock for their livestock, a clean latrine, an outdoors space for friends and family. This was a little slice of Godâs kingdom, here on earth, blessing Trosha and his family with riches, both spiritual & material, far greater than they could ever have imagined. Whatâs more? His neighborâs homes were beginning to look strangely similar⊠And it was a beautiful, inspiring picture.
Troshaâs story is one of hundreds coming out of our Church Empowerment Zones. The evidence of visible, tangible transformation occurring across multiple domains of intervention, and the corresponding change in belief and value systems, are contributing to truly transformative outcomes in the lives of leaders, volunteers, and beneficiaries alike. Our CEZ model is empowering hundreds of local churches to begin building a legacy of hope, generosity, and self-reliance that sustains progress long after we depart.
âJesus is the one that started the work we do, and we are told to do it. This is why I am doing it – because it is like Jesus.â â Outreach Volunteer
[1] J.P Kretzman and J.L. McKnight: Building Communities from the Inside Out: A path towards finding and mobilizing community assets. (Evanston IL: Center for Urban Affairs and Policy Research, North Western University 1993.)
[2] Integral Mission Outreach Groups. Pilot Project Final Report Evaluation. Bugesera, Rwanda. May 2017. World Relief.
Francesca Albano currently serves as Product Development Lead at World Relief. With a background in strategic marketing communications, she connects her interests in brand strategy, audience engagement, and storytelling around her passionsâchildren, disaster and humanitarian relief, human rights, and poverty alleviation. Francesca best describes herself as a storyteller, writer, foodie, globetrotter, and humanitarian.