How We Serve

By Samuel Mwesigwa – Kerith Ministry, Uganda

The Kerith Ministry family and our community would like to thank God for His protection over us and for using you to support us during this trying moment. In the midst of all the challenges that come with COVID-19, we want to let you know that we are doing well health wise and spiritually.

Through HIM donations, we have been able to support more than 300 families during this time with food, salt, and soap.

Halima (seen here with Mercy Mwesigwa) is a widow who lost her husband to HIV/AIDS. She lives a few blocks from Kerith in a grass thatched house with four of her grandchildren. We were able to help her with food that will last her two weeks. Halima has challenges to sustain herself and her grandchildren since she does not have a piece of land to cultivate her own food. Halima has taught us to have faith in the Lord even in the hardest times like these. Halima received Christ three years ago after having been a Muslim all her life. We ask that you pray for her that the Lord will meet the needs of her life.

 

We were also able to assist Goretti, a widow who lost her husband six years ago. Her family lives in a ramshackle, grass thatched house; and she singlehandedly struggles to educate and feed her three teenage children. I met Goretti during our community outreach on Parenting God’s Way for single mothers. Like many other widows, she cannot earn any money because of the lockdown. We were able to provide food for her family. Our long-term plan for Goretti is to employ her as a trainer of our teenage children, women, and single mothers in tailoring and sanitary pad making. We are trusting God for five sewing machines to be used in the training. If we get the machines, we will be able to train more women like Goretti.

Kerith Ministry is also providing counselling and prayer to families that are facing hard times feeding their families and paying bills. Others are facing domestic violence due the challenges in the families. Because of the restrictions of movement, we do this by making calls, and those we cannot reach by making a call, we make a short visit.

Kerith Health Centre is also providing medical support to people that are facing health challenges and cannot afford the costs. We have also provided free maternity services to the delivering mothers to help reduce the maternal mortality rate, which is on the rise due to the lock down.

We want to thank God for His unending love, care, and protection to all our friends and ministry partners.

New Fish Farm

We are excited about our new fish farm project. Fish production is the third largest income generating activity in Uganda. Over the last two years, we have been studying fish farming to see if our land is suitable and if it would generate both food for our children’s home and some income for self-sustainability of our ministry. Our findings gave us the encouragement to embark on this project.

We are employing locals to help in the excavation of the land and construction of the farm, giving them new skills they can use to provide for their families. Once the farm is yielding, we can easily move to a larger scale operation since the property is adjacent to wetland.

Our objectives with this project are to improve the living conditions of our community, to promote biblical values of work and conservation of the environment, and to contribute to the income of Kerith Ministry. To that end, we anticipate that we will sell approximately 75% of the fish raised, while the remaining 25% will be consumed in our children’s home.

 

 

Kerith Ministry

We want to thank you so much for your continued support and care. As Kerith ministry, we would have completed so little without you, but we are so grateful to God for you. Your continued prayer and support has enabled us as a ministry to accomplish all the Lord has enabled us accomplish.

In the same way, we want to let you know about the projects that we are embarking on for the betterment of the community and our orphanage children.

School Block Roofing

There is a tremendous need for a primary school in the place where the ministry is located due to a large number of children. We have studied the expenses from previous years in terms of gas for transporting the kids to and from school in town, school dues, and health risks. As a ministry, we thought it wise to start up a school project to cut down all those expenses and meet the general community need of a school. God is faithful! Through your support and prayers, the first three-classroom school block was built and roofed, and it is already being used.

Most of the second phase, a four-classroom block, has been completed. We have a great need to roof this building which will enable us to accommodate the anticipated number of children in the next academic year, which starts in January 2019. We are believing God for a total amount of $3,800 to have that project completed so that we see the school being used at full capacity.

School Furniture

With the increasing number of children in the school, there is a need for more desks. We would like all of the children to be able to have a place to sit with their books to study. Currently, we have a need of about 20 desks. Each desk costs $25 for a total cost of $500.

Skills Training Center

In the past, we successfully trained 14 women in tailoring. They are currently using that skill to earn a living and sustain their families.

Our community is faced with a large number of young adults who have had access to partially attend secondary school, but have not had money to take them for higher education or to attain a skill which can take them through life. This makes the young people opt for early marriages, which has resulted in having irresponsible young parents. Because they have no skills or way to support their family, we have a substantial number of street kids in the community. Our ministry has observed this need and started up a skills training project where we are equipping people with tailoring skills. We started with four sewing machines. There were so many that wanted training, but we could not meet the number of students needing training. Because of limited sources of funds, we are finding it hard to pay the trainers on a consistent basis. This results in a lapse in the training and increased time to complete training. It will cost $100 to pay for the trainers for one semester. Due to number of students, we would also like to add five more sewing machines which would cost $600.