New Year, New Beginnings
Happy New Year!
Ethiopia’s new year has been in full swing for almost a week, with New Years Day falling on September 11th. Ethiopian New Year is an exciting celebration that brings everyone together to recognize community and family. The day is usually filled with songs and dancing, a traditional meal of chicken stew and injera, and continues through the night celebrating around a bonfire, ending at sunrise. As always with a new year, at Moriah, we have to take this opportunity to express our gratitude for our simple beginnings, as well as excitement for our new beginnings!
Small, Yet Powerful, Beginnings
The ministry that we all know today as “Moriah Kids Ethiopia” looked much different at its beginning. It all started when a group of college students felt the Lord prompting them to do something to help the devastating amount of children and mothers living on the streets in their city. Scraping together what they could from their own pockets, these students were able to help feed and care for many of these kids and mothers, little by little. Today, Moriah has counseled, fed, clothed, and disciplined thousands of children living on the streets of Addis.
This eventually grew into a physical home where single mothers and their children were welcomed to live in, with the focus being discipleship, empowerment, and life training with self-sustainability being the end goal.
Today, Moriah is a family of 27 kids that live on the compound with our amazing nannies and staff, and 7 neighboring families that are also being cared for by the ministry. All 34 children, as well as siblings from the sponsored neighborhood kids, are being cared for wholistically.
Moriah kids are receiving:
Consistent food provision, ensuring vital nutrition is received
The good news of Jesus being shared daily, leading to life-changing decisions to follow Him
A family with many siblings and loving house moms and dads
Healthy connections with Christ-like father figures
Renewed hope being restored as the kids are encouraged to believe in and built a brighter future for themselves
Bringing truth to the saying that it “takes a village” as many help with the development of the mountain property.
A New Start
Over the years, Moriah has been presented with many challenges, but has seen even more powerful victories. Starting out as a ministry supported solely by college students’ pocket change, Moriah now has over 100 supporters, from prayer warriors, to financial backers, to life-long relational commitments. Moriah’s reach now extends from Ethiopia to the United States, and beyond. With the help of these supporters, Moriah has acquired land of its own on one of the most popular mountain tops in the capital city of Addis Ababa. With this incredible gift, Moriah has started developing the property little by little, in the hopes of bringing our kids HOME within the next year!
Looking Ahead
In light of Ethiopian New Year, we are excited to continue to see our Moriah kids grow. Day by day, the younger kids show new characteristics and develop more skills, the older kids take on more responsibilities at home and school as they grow closer to adulthood, and all of them continue to grow into the men and women that God has created them to be. At Moriah, we already have little preachers, teachers, mothers, construction workers, artists, foster dads, and nurses. It’s exciting to see what God is developing in each one of them, and we can’t wait to see what he does next!