Racheal is 18 now and just finished the 9th grade (very common in Zambia). Her mother had remarried and Racheal has 3 younger brothers. Last weekend, Racheal’s mother passed away. The family gathered for the burial and all of the aunts/uncles/older cousins met to discuss where the children would go. The sister of Racheal’s stepfather took the two youngest boys and moved them to another part of Zambia. Another sister agreed to take the other brother to the capitol city. And that left Racheal.
A man approached the family and offered to pay them a small bridal price to marry Racheal, but after discussing this, the family opposed due to the fact that she hasn’t finished her education. Mulenga, Racheal’s cousin, mentioned New Day to the family. The family quickly agreed that Mulenga could take her and try to get her a job there or just put her in school somewhere, as nobody else wanted her.
So Racheal arrived at New Day today. The goal and vision of New Day is not to take 18 year old orphans; however, in this case, we felt that God wanted us to help this girl. She will be staying with a woman near the orphanage land until the end of January when she receives her Grade 9 Exam scores. If she did well, she will head to a girls boarding school near us and return to New Day on term breaks to help with the younger children.
Racheal’s story is the norm in Zambia. As Racheal climbed into bed last night and asked me to leave the door open, I knew that it was the first night in her life that she would sleep in a room by herself. She immediately bonded with Cambree and later told me that her youngest brother is the same age as Cambree. It will probably be years before she sees him again.
Though New Day is not set up nor has a goal of taking in older orphans, we do know that God has called us to Zambia to help hurting kids, and it feels like we have begun…
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