Back in July of this year I blogged part 1 of an interview with Byabeca, who is director of Tracy’s Heart Foundation. Brenda Buell is the founder. She continues that role whether Brenda and myself are in Congo or when we are not. She certainly is the heart and soul of Tracy’s Heart and performs each role she carries with commitment, courage and creativity tirelessly. Here is part 2. (Italicized words are the actual translation, non-italicized are my comments)
This war experience and my father’s illness was the turning point in my spiritual life: even though I was born into a Christian family and grew up in the church, it was now that I started to seek the Lord like never before. From then on I entered into a personal relationship with Him and He started to reveal things to me. I learned of His will for me, His plan, and how I could best serve Him. I started by teaching Sunday School.
After the war, life continued to be very difficult. Finding food was very hard, and to pay for schooling was a hardship. I remember we children going here and there to sell anything we had or could find in order to buy food. People who knew my father did occasionally help rescue us during that time and by the Grace of God I was able to press on with my studies until I received my diploma.
In the same year I got my diploma, God gave me UNGA as my fiance and in due time we got married. Before meeting Unga, men came to my father’s house to ask me for marriage. I always said no. But when I met with Unga something was different in him. I felt in him a tender heart and I agreed to marry him. After our marriage I continued my schooling at a local University. I studied Theology plus Peace and Development in the 3rd world. During that time I again experienced God’s Grace and Favor because I had no means to pay. Unga had begun a job as a high school teacher, but in Congo teachers are the lowest paid of all workers. We had nothing for food and were in a bad house. It had been a holding pen for goats. Yet in the middle of that we were filled with love for each other and we learned to be patient.
Hoping to enter my 3rd year at University, I realized I would have to abandon it because of a great lack of funds. I was doing research for a book I was writing on the development of women in the church. For more information I went to see a representative of the church organization I belong to. He gave me some information from his point of view and pointed me to Ed Buell, an American missionary, for more details that he might have. After listening to me he wanted me to meet with his wife, Brenda Buell, who also had plans and hopes for women of the church. From our meeting, (most certainly a God moment!) we decided to work together at Tracy’s Heart, a work she had begun to help the many traumatized women who had been kidnapped and horribly abused during the many years of war. She wanted to love them with God’s love, impart new hope and healing from the invisible scars, and train them to begin microbusinesses, something that would help them for the rest of their lives. So, with Brenda as my chief we began teaching them how to make clothes, baskets, silk flowers and much more. I had taken tailoring in high school so I was able to teach this and many other classes. (Byabeca is a very, very good seamstress, making patterns and designing clothing. NO patterns are available in Congo!)
That meeting was certainly an answer to my many prayers. The first thing she did was give me a salary, then helped me find a better house, also helping to pay for it. I was able to buy food regularly and meet other needs, as well.
Unga and I now have 4 children, 2 boys and 2 girls; Kennedy, Baraka (means blessing), Brenda (named for Brenda Buell) and Babunga (named for Byabeca’s Father) whom we call Babu. We are a happy family and are so grateful to the Lord for all He has done. We also thank Brenda, Jayn, Ray and the people of America who help them work with us and for us.
Would you care to help us bless Byabeca and all our exceptional hard working coworkers this Christmas? We want to give them each a bonus so they can provide food for a Christmas Day celebration plus a new outfit for each of their children, a Congo tradition.
Donations can be made through…
Payal: buildingbukavu4him@gmail.com
OR Snail mail: HFCA the Harkema’s, PO Box 355, Middleville, MI 49333
And THANK YOU!
Under His Wings,
Jayn
Heart For Central Africa Mission, a 401(c)3
Building Bukavu
Tracy’s Heart Foundation