Amecet started really in my heart in 1999, when I met Sarah. Sarah was a very small, sick little girl, who lived in the village, where we came with the Mobile Clinic. I was working that time with FACE, a programme of Youth With A Mission Soroti, The programme was reaching out to the people living with HIV/AIDS in the villages. This was long before the ARV's were available. ARV's are medicines which slow down the growth of the HIV virus in the body. FACE had a Mobile clinic which could only help the people with the opportunistic infections they had, because of being HIV+.
Once we visited the home where Sarah lived, she was 2.5 years old, she was very weak and could not stand on her legs. She touched my heart and I knew God wanted me to do something for the Sarah's of Teso. There in that far away village, Amecet was born in my heart....
It took time to think, to pray about and to share with my Ugandan colleagues. But during that time I kept visiting Sarah. I had asked her uncle to bring her, every 3 weeks to our Mobile Clinic, which we held in the center of their village. But he told me that he wasn't wasting his time and his bicycle to this "dead thing"..... can you image, he called this little sick girl, a dead thing.....
I also visited my friends and family in the Netherlands and I shared with them what was in my heart and people were touched and enthusiastic to help. Funds arrived and I was able to buy a piece of land on the Lira road, one of the main roads in Soroti, so an easy place for people to find us. I went to share with the Health authorities in Soroti, the health officer was very supportive and referred me to the Probation Officer (child protection unit) and I shared again my story with them. They were also very supportive and encourage me to go ahead, because there was nothing in Soroti to help children in need.
I made a drawing for the house, which was later changed into a real building plan and the first stones and rocks where brought to the land, as you can see on the picture above. I was very excited, but also very scared, because I didn't know what was all in store for me and could I manage everything?? But in my heart I knew that this was God's plan, I should trust Him and obey...
When you build a house in Uganda, you are the one to provide all the materials, the stones, bricks, cement etc. etc. I have never build anything, so that was the first problem and God brought the first solution of the many times that I needed help. Kees v.d.Vinne, a Dutch guy, builder from profession, worked with YWAM in Jinja and he was willing to "come over and help us"... He came to oversee and lead the building process. I was very happy, because I knew that without him the building would have cost twice the price and have not been build the right way. The building of Amecet started in January of 2001 and we moved in the home in December 2001.
During the year 2001, I had contact with Helen Wardill from the UK. She had been in Soroti during the time I was still dreaming about Amecet and she came in October 2001 to help me to set up and start the Amecet Ministry. She was an enormous support, there was so much to think of, to visit and talk with the authorities, to set up the system and the administration, to choose the furniture and get all the things for the house. We had most of the beds and furniture made locally in Soroti, this was a challenge, I don't know how many times we had to go and visit the little workplaces where they made them...
We found 2 Ugandan girls, who were willing to come and help us and we moved all in Amecet house . One side of the house was still not yet finished, but on December 18 2001, our first child arrived: Sarah Akello!!!
She had been my inspiration from the beginning, used by God to build the Amecet Ministry, my prayer was that many other children would follow and that Amecet would be a hiding place where they could be safe and where they would start shining again. Knowing that there would be also children come who were so sick and close to death, for those we will pray, love and care and be the doorway to Heaven...
TO BE CONTINUED....
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What an inspiring story Els, if you find the time, please keep telling us more about the special way God led you... God bless! - Gerard & Rebeca in Madrid
Wat een moedige keuze van je.
Ik heb ontzettend veel bewondering voor jou en je collega's, veel succes en zegen met jullie prachtige werk.