It’s been a long while since we’ve had nine childrenunder three years old at Treasures of Africa Children’s Home. Many times, the infants arrive with paperwork from the hospital or Welfare Office with little, if any, information. Often babies arrive without even a name. This was the case for seven of the last nine little ones mentioned above.
We always pray over these unnamed “treasures” and ask the Lord for an appropriate name. It’s quite a privilege to have the solemn responsibility of naming a child. It always brings a sense of destiny and purpose. This was especially true in the case of little Destiny Joy.
Destiny was older than most of our recent arrivals. She was 19 months old when she came in August of this year. Originally, we were told she was being placed at Treasures because her mother was underpsychiatric care at a local hospital. But then one of the social workers at the hospital changed course and allowed the child to be released to her mother or other family members instead.
After that, the truth about what happened to her over the next month is unclear. How she was released and into whose custody we don’t really know. One story is that she was living on the street with her mother and another rumor was that some extended family members took her for that time. But what we do know is that after a monthhad passed, we were contactedagain –and asked if she could come and live at Treasures of Africa.
To put it simply, during that “missing month” she was physically traumatized according to her hospital records. She was not walking and barely able to stand in August even though she was about a year and a half old. She also underwent surgery to repair the damage done to her. It breaks my heart to think that she could have been with us during that time andcould have been spared the early memories of pain and suffering she experienced.
I thank God that she is with us now and on the mend spiritually, physically, and emotionally. She’s a beautiful little girl and the first of our children to have silky long hair. It’s possible that her father was Italian according to initial hospital reports from her mother,but no one can say for sure. As far as we know, her mother is back in the psychiatric hospital. Whether she was released and then re-admitted is still unclear.
After about three weeks at Treasures of Africa, Destiny was walking like a sailor on deck in rough seas but making great progress. Her follow-up visits at the hospital are nearly complete with no lasting physical damage expected.
She had a very rough start in life but that has since turned around.We know she has a destiny in Jesus that is life changing.
A new little baby girl arrived at TOA a few days ago. (See page 7) She’s about two and a half months old and officially brought usto the total of nine little ones. The nursery is full for a while – unless Jesus wants to make some more room in the house!
