LAND OF JUDAH, AN AMAZING PLACE -- March 25, 2011
About 9 o’clock this morning Steve Bakos from the Messiah Project picked me up and took me to their facility called Land Of Judah which is possibly the only orphanage in Nicaragua that takes children with disabilities. Their 7 acre site is just the nucleus of many projects they have going. Currently they have about 25 children from age 6 months to 6 years but some are older as they are growing up at LOJ.
Messiah Project is a faith based mission that is not associated with any denomination or other organization. Steve runs the day to day operation and Scott runs the office from Austen, Texas. To all appearances they are well funded, but not so much. Much of what they have is a result of simple dependence on the Lord for help. They are what I would call a FAITH based mission that supports 52 churches (only 4 of which have buildings, the rest meet in homes, parks or other places); they have feeding programs that provide about 3,000 meals a day to children and they are building 6 new 2,000 square foot houses they call Noah’s Arks.
Steve is a former builder so he knows how to construct a proper house and these are really nice and will house another 40 children or so. While the government doesn’t like to admit there are children who are starving, abused in any number of ways, abandoned, etc. Land of Judah is taking in more kids and Steve expects they will fill up the arks and are prepared to build 6 more.
Running the facility is difficult and costly. Staff in their pre-school and dorms have to be licensed teachers. The government wants the children to be raised by people who know about child development even though other kids are raised by parents who are completely illiterate. They have a psychologist and social worker too.
Steve showed me some of the special need’s kid. One girl was 19 with severe cerebral palsy. She came to LOJ severely malnourished and unresponsive. She cannot communicate verbally but has gained weight and smiles when approached. Another boy was about the size of a 4 year old although he was 9 when he came. Severely malnourished he could not walk. Now he is 11 and can walk with assistance.
The government does not want children to be adopted. Their position is that even an abusive home or one where children are literally starving to death is better than an adoptive home.
I got a lesson in agronomy there too. I saw my first pineapple plan and saw firsthand the importance of drainage and how little it takes to make a difference between a successful crop and total failure.
What is most amazing about Messiah Project is how the funding comes. They have a website but for many years didn’t even have that. They don’t have a real newsletter. They don’t do speaking tours in the U.S. But somehow people hear about them and they open their hearts and wallets to contribute. Teams are coming in increasing numbers as their reputation has grown through word of mouth. As the funding increases they strategically increase their projects but all the while Steve is careful to train people to take over when he is not there. He is literally working himself out of a job as he knows that some day he will not be able to be there. Evidence of this is the Arks. Some people heard about Messiah Project, learned that they wanted to build these 2,000 square foot houses at a cost of $25,000 apiece and a few days later they received a check for $50,000 to build the first two and money for the other four soon followed. Steve’s experience as a builder allowed him to work with a welder to construct steel trusses to support the metal roof. A painting crew was finishing the inside of one of the arks while I was there. The owner of the paint store belongs to a local church that wanted to help and basically donated almost all the labor for painting.
As I said, Messiah Project, like so many of these orphanages is a FAITH based ministry.
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