Lifeway Christian Academy

In one week I will be getting ready to get on a plane and go to Zambia!!  I cannot wait and am so excited!!  The organization that I go to Zambia with is Family Legacy Missions International (FLMI).  FLMI was founded in 2000 by a man named Greer Kendal.  The movement that God started in him at that time was to go to Zambia and love on the orphans for a week and then come back to the states.  Little did Greer know, God was going to move him out of a very nice cooperate job and into full time missions.  Thankfully out of the obedience of God’s movement, Greer left that job and took a leap of faith that has become an amazing ministry and blessing to so many children. 

Zambia has 3 different types of schools, community school, government school, and private school.  All of the schools cost money to attend and so you are considered blessed if you are able to attend school.  The problem lies in the community schools because the families are using the little money that they have to send one or maybe two of their children to school (even if that means they can’t eat everyday), but the teachers “might” have a seventh grade education and they may attend school with 200 other students.  You can see rather quickly that these children are not learning what they need in order to be ready for the exam they would have to take in 7^th grade to qualify for government school and continue their education.  This is where our amazing God has given FLMI a vision.  In January, FLMI opened 12 private Christian schools in Zambia, called Lifeway Christian Academy (LCA) which are located in the compounds (communities) the kids live in.  Through Family Legacy, they have a child sponsorship program and the children who have American Sponsors attend these schools.  They are slowly opening the LCA’s as they have them sponsored throughout all of the areas in Lusaka, Zambia where these kids live. 

A community school

Their classroom

Overcrowded with children

In Zambia, you are considered wealthy to be able to go to a private school.  None of these children are wealthy on this earth, but they are rich in their Father’s eyes and God has favor on them.   It is an amazing blessing to be able to go to school because God can use this to change their future.  In the states, we sometimes take for granted the great free public schools that we are allowed to attend filled with lots of books, materials, computers, and well educated teachers who are up to date on the latest research that is most beneficial to their students.

                       2010 in one of the Lifeway Christian Academies.

The teachers who are employed by Family Legacy are certified and have a college education, but their training is about 20 years behind where it should be.  There are two ladies who have left teaching here in the US to go over and live in Zambia and work with the teachers and help them to become more up to date in their teaching.  This is a big task and will take time, so they have asked for teacher volunteers to come and help mentor a teacher.  I definitely feel like God called me to this and I also have a friend that I taught with last year that is going as well.  Since I will only be there for two weeks, I won’t be able to share a ton with the teacher I am working with but my prayer is that God will lay it on my heart exactly the teaching strategies that He wants me to share and that the teacher will have a fresh outlook on ways to teach the concepts the kids need to learn.  I have come accustomed to having many different resources at my finger tips and while there, I will have to solely rely on what I can come up with using nothing. I am nervous about that aspect but I am believing that God will equip me with what I need to do. 

When I was in Zambia in 2010, they had opened a few LCA’s and a school at the Tree of Life Village.  I had previously been in some of the community schools, which was absolutely heartbreaking because they weren’t really schools at all.  As I entered the LCA’s and saw the desks and white boards, tears filled my eyes and my heart was overwhelmed.  This was an overwhelming feeling of hope for their futures.  Hope for a better life for themselves, for their future family, and for the future of Zambia.  Not only are they getting an education in these schools, but they are also being discipled and are safe and secure while in these walls.  I can’t tell you the amazement of hope that I have for them as I can’t even imagine what else God has planned for them. 

Please pray for the financial resources needed to keep these schools running as well as the other schools that they need to open.  Pray for the teachers who some have to travel an hour to an hour and a half just to get to work and have that same journey back home every day. Pray for that teacher’s passion to give all they have to these kids. Pray for the education of these children as well as for their spiritual development.   God is so good!!

“You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.  You anoint my head with oil; my cup runs over.  Goodness, mercy, and unfailing love will follow me all the days of my life, and through the length of my days the house of the Lord and His presence shall be my dwelling place.”        Psalm 23:5-6

Visit Family Legacy's Website to learn more about what they are doing in Zambia: http://www.familylegacy.com/