Hope Rushes In: Starting the New Year Right

A few days ago, I wrote the following blog about our Christmas child at Hope for Sudan. Today Romano sent me photos of the Christmas child’s first bath, and a brief update (below).

At 1 a.m. on Christmas morning, in the same village of our Hope for Sudan orphanage, a child was born. A son. A firstborn son to a very scared, desperately poor, and extremely young woman. As the child drew his first breath, his mother drew her last.

There was no room for the child; neither was there a mother.

In a land where millions barely escape slave raiders and starvation, legends are created to assuage the raw reality of having no means to care for a motherless newborn. One such legend teaches that a mother cannot bear to be without her child, and so she beckons him to join her in the grave.

The family cannot bear to take the child’s life, neither do they have the means to feed him, and so oft times they leave him alone in a tukel (mud hut) until he “joins his mother”…in death.

Hope for Sudan’s mere presence has begun to rewrite these legends. After an agonizing night alone, this small, newborn-Christmas child was brought to Romano, our indigenous director at Hope for Sudan. Romano received him with joy and named him Cristobal.

Hope is rising up. The entire community is being transformed as dignity replaces depravity and freedom to choose replaces the chains of despair.

Today, Romano reports that Cristobal is thriving—eating, laughing, and sleeping well. His one prayer request is for Cristobal’s caregiver to have the heart of a mother, raising him with the love that only a mother can give.

Romano also told us a bit more about how Cristobal’s mother died in childbirth. It was all so very preventable. Her young life was snuffed out simply because there was no one with any training to tend her. When she didn’t deliver as quickly as those attending her thought she should, they began applying too heavy pressure upon her abdomen. She bled to death. In a land with no hospitals, and scant medical or even midwife training, sadly, it is often left for babies to help other babies to deliver babies.

In a violent attack against death and disease, hope rushes in this new year through our new medical program. Dr. Kim Sweet and Amos (our new Health Manager) will not only lead medical teams to initiate direct care, but also much of their focus will be on training indigenous leadership at each Make Way Partners’ ministry location.  For more information, please contact Dr. Kim at doctorkims@makewaypartners.org or to support this life-saving medical ministry 

Joyful, Joyful New Year to you, our friends,
‎k