Faith, Hero of South Africa

This is a little guest blog I was asked to write for familiesoutreach.org.  Families Outreach brings hope to the fatherless every day in three primary ways: 1- grants for adopting couples, 2- partnerships with orphan care providers, & 3- mobilization of the church to become orphan care/adoption advocates (e.g., sending this pastor's wife to Africa).  I L-O-V-E- love them.  

About six months ago, my friend Cassie said to me, “You cannot separate human trafficking and orphan care.”  I nodded my head and moved on without any idea what on earth she was talking about.  But her statement stuck in my head, like some kind of algebraic equation that I just couldn’t get my upper-middle-class suburban brain to wrap around. 

Until Jesus took me to South Africa.  And there, I met Faith.*

Orphans of AIDS, Faith and her younger sister and brother were left with their paraplegic grandmother, who could not care for them and asked the church for help.  When the Pastor and his wife came for the children, the grandmother assumed they were only taking Faith’s baby sister and brother.  No hospital would admit Faith because she had full-blown AIDS, and the doctors had given her three months to live. 

But as the sister and brother were scooped up into the couple’s arms, little Faith stood up.  The Pastor’s wife took her by the hand.  The grandmother was confused:  “You take her, too?”  The Pastor answered, “Yes.  If she wants to come, of course we take her.”

Faith is now sixteen.  When she first came to the church’s orphan village, she took 36 pills per day – 18 in the morning, 18 at night.  Now she takes 6 per day – 3 in the morning, 3 at night.  If you had the honor of meeting her in person as I have, you would never, ever know she has AIDS.  She is a beautiful young woman – kind, respectful, and quite funny. 

In 2011, the church underwent a nightmare of a legal battle, and one day while the children were at school, policemen barged into classrooms, handcuffed and took away fifteen children, including Faith and her sister and brother.  While the church fought to get them back, the children were held in custody, where on a typical day they were awakened at 5am to scrub floors and toilets before going to school, and were fed two slices of white bread.  Total.  Per day. 

Finally, Faith took matters into her own hands.  She grabbed her sister and brother and RAN.  And where did she run?  Faith ran straight to the church’s orphan village.  She ran HOME.

The Pastor and his wife leveraged their vocational backgrounds with the police department and the state, and they won the case against the government, regaining legal custody of the fifteen children and documentation to prevent this nightmare from ever happening again.

The night after I heard Faith tell us her story, I lay in bed in my condo on the beach of beautiful Durban, South Africa and tried to process.  I imagined Faith as a little girl about my Callie’s age, knowing she has AIDS, having watched her mother and father die, being told she has three months to live, standing up in the middle of her paraplegic grandmother’s hut, walking to this strange couple and taking their hand to leave.  Against all odds, little Faith took hold of hope. 

And then I imagined Faith a year ago, about my Camryn’s age, lying in that dark, scary place with no food, no medicine, no bed.  Deciding to run.  Making her plan.  Tracing the path.  Using every ounce of strength she had left to grab her sister and brother and run all the way… home.

And then it hit me.  She had a home to run to.  What if she didn’t?

Faith taught me a lot.  One thing she taught me for sure – You cannot separate human trafficking and orphan care.  Until they all have homes.  Until they all have hope.  Because HOME and HOPE are two things worth fighting for.

There are famous men and women who will go down in history as important figures in the freedom of beautiful South Africa.  But for me, for the rest of my life and my children’s, I will tell about South Africa’s hero named Faith.  She is living in victory over AIDS, though it has ravished her body with sickness and disease.  She is feisty, and courageous.  She is humble, but strong.  She is weak, but beautiful.  She is an orphan who is taking hold of hope and fighting for a home.  And – all praise to Jesus – she is free.  She is Faith, hero of South Africa.

P.S.  Faith and her sister were smitten with my pen.  They have pencils and paper, but no pens.  They used mine to write messages for me to cherish in my journal.  I left my pens with them, and I pray they are used by God in those sisters’ hands to write a story only He could write.  Faith’s life is already a beautiful story.  I am convinced it is just beginning.  Would you pray for her today with me?

*name changed to protect the safety of the child