Street children prayer requests, Fred and HenryHenry

Fred in the programs

Fred

Fred Natovu

 Fred is a small boy. He says his age is ten but he looks to be maybe seven at the most. What he lacks in size he makes up with spiritedness. He seems to hold his own fairly well with the other boys at program although he is definitely smaller then them all. This is part of his story.

My mother's name is Coleen. I have never known my father. I came to the streets of Kampala sometime in April and I have been living on them for a month now. I ran away from home because of my mother. She used to beat me and sometimes deny me food. When I left my home in Waskiso and started traveling to Kampala I was helped by a man. He was on a boda boda and he let me ride with him to Kampala. My plan was to visit my uncle. He lives in Kampala. The problem was that when I got to his house it was locked and no one was there. The neighbours told me that my uncle was in prison but they didn't tell me why. I didn't know anyone in Kampala other than my uncle. I came to the streets because I have nowhere else to go. I do not want to go home. Life on the streets is not good. It is hard to get things to eat. I don't have clothes like I did at home. I sleep on the ground with other boys and sometimes we get chased away from where we are sleeping at night.  When this happens we have to walk in the dark to find another place to sleep.

Please pray for me. I want to go back to school. I also want to have a safe place where I can live and be happy.

Before he came to the streets Fred reached primary 3 in school. When he grows up he dreams to become a teacher. He explained that teachers teach people new things and help them become what they dream of through education. 

Henry

Kiyemba Henry

Henry says he is 12 years old. He has started coming to program in this last month. He cut his foot and heard about the clinic through a friend. Since getting treatment there he has been coming often to the street programs. He is a friendly and engaging boy with a quick smile. This is part of his story.

I have no interest in remembering my parents names. They are both living. My father is living with my step mother. My mother lives in Kampala. I was living with my father and stepmother. We used to live in an area of Kampala called Karerwe. My father decided to move from the city to the village. The village we moved to was called Kiti. When we moved there I lived with my family for three months but all this time I did not go to school. In the morning I would do my chores but then after that I would have nothing to do. I was bored so I would walk around and often go to visit my aunt who lived not too far away. When I came back home I often found I had missed meal time. My family never kept any food for me.  I would ask why they didn't leave anything for me but they would never reply to me. Instead they would tell me to get water. Sometimes I had to fetch water three times a day. often my family only ate one time a day so it was not a good situation for me. I was hungry so I would looked for jackfruit in the bushes.  My father and my stepmother sometimes threatened to send me to Kampiringisa because I was stubborn.  One day I was out with some friends. I stayed out too late and when I came back I found that my house was locked and my family was all asleep. I was afraid to wake them up since I knew they would be very upset with me. So instead I made a makeshift bed using a sack and string. I hung it in a big tree near our house. In the morning my father was very angry with me. He beat me with a stick that also had wire on it. He also hit my foot very hard. My foot was hurting me a lot and it took some time to heal. I waited some time after this at my home but things were not getting any better. I decided to come back to Kampala. My mother lives in Kampala, although I do not often see her. When I came to her house she was angry at me for coming to her and told me that I needed to go back to my father. She refused to let me stay with her. I did not want to go back to my father's house so I stayed on the streets. I found a plastic container and started fetching water to make some money. Slowly I learned more things about street life and how to survive. I met a boy named Big who brought me to Kivulu.  I did not like Kivulu though so I did not stay there. I have been on the streets of three years now.  Right now I sleep in Wandegerya in front of a restaurant called  Chicken Tonight.

Please Pray for me. I have an injured foot right now. I would like prayer for healing. I would also like prayer for an opportunity to go back to school.

Street child prayer requests

Thank you to everyone who prayers for our children still living on the streets, periodically we meet with two of the street children in our programs, ask about them and how we can tell other people to pray for them. We then pray with that child and try and encourage them. Here are the prayer requests from two children in our street children programs. Also, David and I are going back to Uganda in just a little over a week and one of the first things that we want to do is bring in more children into our homes. Please pray that God will guide us, from the many children in our street programs, which children He wants for us to bring into our home!

Ssekamaya  Patiya

I was at home when my dad did not want us to go to school, he would make us work in the gardens  and he would wait for the time of harvesting so that we can sell of the surplus to the market, we did what our dad told us but all the money we got he used it for personal things and he told us we can dig again but all it was in vain. It was one day that my elder brother came and took me to stay with him, he told me he is going to take me to school and as soon as we reach his home. I waited for some time to see my brother fulfilling his promise but as I was waiting he came up with an idea that we should plant rice and we can earn good money from it then your dream will come to pass. We cleared the land, planted rice in it and I was told to look after it, I used to go there a lone from morning until evening because I had to prevent birds from destroying the rice but some time I felt tired and rested but whenever, he could find me resting or the birds in the plantation I was beaten badly.

After we harvested the rice we got a lot of money and my brother told me that next week I was going back to school. I dreamed about going to school, and I started drawing pictures how school looks like and how I could look when am in the school uniform. Two weeks passed and I reminded him, he told me can we plant rice one more time and I accepted but in pain. He did the same thing again by having me work and harvesting the rice but using the money for himself and not helping me.   I ran to my uncle's home, he welcomed with both hands and I explained to him why I had come to his house, he told me his family was already too many and too big a burden. He told me he could not afford to take me back to school,  but that if one day he can become rich, he would take me back to school. The following day I was told to go to the garden and dig, water the crops, I stayed there for some good times and I had given up on my dream because every time I could look at my uncle's children going to school, tears became my drink. One day we were having lunch my elder brother came and he told my uncle that he wanted me to go with him, we reached home and I was punished heavily, he gave me orders of cooking food but I was not supposed to eat until he comes home. I was starving and my big brother would beat me anytime he saw me eating. I was told to work. Life became hard and I felt that I was not loved but instead I was forced to work for others gain. I made up my mind and escaped from there, I walked day and night for three days until I reached Kampala.

I have many things that I would like for people to pray for me for. Please pray for me to have a place to stay and be safe. Please pray that I will  find people who can treat me as if am their own child and love me. Please pray that I can go back to school and that my dream of studying will come to pass. 

God bless you. 

Street Child Prayer Requests #2

Juma Madangi

My name is Juma. I am nine years old, my mother died and I stayed staying with my father who married another woman. We were staying with my with my step brother called Mendy his mother went to Juba in Sudan but did not come back. 

We were told to fetch water yet we could find a big line of people waiting to get water, this delayed us, we had to go home late at night and when we reached home she used bad language to abuse us  and every time saying," I wish you had died with your mother and that could make me feel at ease", every time she used to remind me of my  mother who died and I felt soooooooo bad.

We used to go to school but as soon as we reached home, we were told to go to the garden dig, look for fire wood and from there we were told to fetch water, we could not stomach that and one day my step brother ran away from home, as we were in our holidays I fetched water and sold it to people that was the money I used to escape from home. I go a taxi from Mukono to Nakawa and I slept there until morning and walked to Kampala.

Please pray for me. Pray that I will have hope and that I will have a good life off streets. I also want to go back to school, because it is through education that one can have a better life, please pray that God will find a way to make that possible.

We will continue to pray and to reach for more

"We are paralyzed in a poverty of hope because, first, we underestimate the value of what God has given us to transform lives. Second, we underestimate the value of a single life. And third, we underestimate God’s determination to rescue us from a trivial existence if we just free up our hands and our hearts from unworthy distractions and apply them to matters that make a difference in someone else’s life. …Likewise, when our grandchildren ask us where we were when the weak and the voiceless and the vulnerable of our era needed a leader of compassion and purpose and hope – I hope we can say that we showed up, and that we showed up on time. And that the very God of history might say, 'Well done, good and faithful servant.'”

Gary Haugen, Terrify No More

street child prayer request

Patrick

Name : Kanyerezi Patrick

Age    : 9 years

 I live on streets, the things I like most are playing soccer, riding a bicycle and I enjoy eating rice and chicken. The reason as to  why I ended up on the streets is that my mom divorced my dad. My dad is a drunk, he would always be drinking and then he would come home and beat me. My mother left him because he beat her too much. I then lived with my stepmom who also mistreated me. She used to deny me food, gave me heavy punishments like fetching water and I had no time to play with my fellow children. One day my dad was very angry and was trying to kill me using a machete so I left home and came to the streets. I cannot go back home.  My prayer request is,  I would like you to pray for me to go back to school and make sure I finish school in order to get a good job so that one day I can be able to help other street children.

Prayer needed

David and I would greatly appreciate your prayers for a boy named Moses that is a street child in our programs. We know that God wants him in our home. Today, the day before we were going to bring him in into our home a friend of ours, Heidi got a random call from his dad (who she does not know at all) saying he was coming to Kivulu to get his son. 

Moses dad is an evil, evil man. Moses ran away from his father because he was going to sacrifice him (cut off his head and other body parts in order to get "power") at one of his shrines. 

As soon as David heard his father was coming to Kivulu to "get his son" David raced to the slum where Moses was staying to find him before his father did. He located him and took him out to eat. It is generally known by the other kids why Moses is on the street but David felt he needed to talk to him before doing anything next. 

Sobbing  the entire time, Moses told David of his father, (who was in jail for two years for murdering someone) about how he uses cocaine, does witchcraft, has many shrines, beats mercilessly him and his other brothers and sisters and all of the women he brings home, and how his father would rape his sisters at night. Moses is one of the sweetest, most responsible children. In fact, when David had found him, he was cleaning the small shack where he slept with a bunch of other street kids. It breaks our heart how much he has gone through.

Because his father is an evil man with a lot of money and power (it is no coincide he was only in jail 2 years for murder) looking for his son, we have to report the case so the police and get official custody of Moses before we take him to our Forever Homes. That way we can have a case against him and immediately call the police if he ever steps foot anywhere near our village. Working with the police here is not always an easy or a straightforward thing. David reported to the police near where our streetchildren programs are but tomorrow he has to go with Moses to report to the police in Moses' home village, (where his sisters have already reported on his father for sexually abusing them, and the police also know that he went to jail for murder).

Please please pray...

1) That the police will give us quick custody of Moses

2) That God will either change his father's heart or stop him for hurting more women and children

3) For safety for Moses from his father who could try and track him down and seriously harm him for leaving him or even kill him

4) For healing of Moses' heart that has gone through so much

Thank  you so much for your prayers, we could truly not do what we do without all of you beside us!

Romans 8:31-35 So, what do you think? With God on our side like this, how can we lose? If God didn't hesitate to put everything on the line for us, embracing our condition and exposing himself to the worst by sending his own Son, is there anything else he wouldn't gladly and freely do for us? And who would dare tangle with God by messing with one of God's chosen? Who would dare even to point a finger? The One who died for us—who was raised to life for us!—is in the presence of God at this very moment sticking up for us. Do you think anyone is going to be able to drive a wedge between us and Christ's love for us? There is no way! Not trouble, not hard times, not hatred, not hunger, not homelessness, not bullying threats, not backstabbing, not even the worst sins listed in Scripture.

Briggan and Howarli Prayer Requests

We were trying to take prayer requests each week by asking the kids in a group, but it wasnt working as well since they got kind of goofy so we decided each week to take out two children, talk with them, find out what they would like people to pray for them for, pray for them, and then send the requests on to you all! Here are the prayer requests for last week:

1. Briggan Mabilizi asks people to pray for him to be able to survive, grow up and be able to have a job so that he can provide for himself and so that he doesnt have to stay on the streets. He also asked if we can pray for him that he can get off of the streets and go back to school, he loves to learn and misses school a lot, he also sees it as a way to get a job when he grows up. 

2. Senyendo Howarli asks if we can pray for him about going home. He wants to go home but he is nervous and does not know how he will be received. We are going to take him back home (because that is what he wants) but his family are alchoholics and do not take care of him. He lived with an aunt who he is hoping to be resettled with. His dad passed away, he was knocked by a car and killed but he was in the army. Because Howarli's  dad was a soldier he would like for people to pray for him so that he can go back to school, study, and also become a soldier and protect people like his father did. It is never easy to resettle children home with their families because children never run away from a great family, they are always running away from something at home, and sometimes taking them back can be extremely painful for us, and for them. Please pray that the family will repent and be able to properly love and take care of their child. 

The last boy that we resettled with his family last week, was kicked back out of the home, they refused to feed him and told him to return to the streets since he was able to survive there without being a burden to his family. 

Street Children Prayer Requests

Yesterday in the programs we shared with the boys that there were many people in America that cared about them and that are praying for them and that every Wed we were going to take prayer requests from the boys. Since it was the first time taking them, the boys did not give the most personal requests but the things that they wanted most (to get off of the streets and to find a better life for themselves)

All of the boys asked if we could pray for them that they can get off of the street and into a good place.

Kawuki Mathias and 25 other boys are asking that we pray that they are able to go back to school.

Enoch Wabulembo, Kabeka Ronald, and Mukisa David and 50 others asked that we pray for them that they will be able to get off of the streets and have a good job such as a pilot, singer or doctor so that they can get off of the street and make an income for themselves and their family.

Mukisa David had a prayer request that one day he could play on a children's sports team along with 8 other children. 

Subuga George and 10 other children asked that we pray that God can make it possible for them to go home to live peacefully with their families, and we are talking with all of those kids to see how possible they think it is. One boy, Bogere was successfully resettled today as well in Eastern Uganda from our programs. 

Thank you all for all of your prayers!

God bless