By Kirk Schauer, Executive Director for Seeds of Hope International Partnerships (SHIP), Zambia; with Leslie Hawthorne Klingler

In Africa there’s an attack against the family. An entire generation of parents in their 20s though 40s is being wiped out by AIDS, waterborne diseases, and conflict. In a population of 11 million there are over 600,000 AIDS orphans. Children are becoming the country’s workers and parents. (It’s not uncommon for a 13 year old to have a child.) Children are Zambia’s present and future.

In Zambia, school children suffer for lack of safe water. Several of the schools where we work had to be closed because the well had broken and the children had to walk long distances to get water. At another school, dozens of children were infected with schistosomiasis after fetching water from a contaminated pond.

In partnership with Lifewater and UNICEF, Seeds of Hope is working in Kasempa and Ndola to provide 38 schools and their surrounding communities with safe water, sanitation, and hygiene training. The average school size is well over 500, so our work is helping vast numbers of children.

Zambian schools are an ideal place to work to bring hope and change to a community. When young children learn to use sanitary latrines and good hygiene, this raises the standard of what they expect at home. In addition, education is so valued in Zambia that parents are open to being taught new health practices by their educated kids.

Lifewater is an ideal partner for SHIP in our work with children. Lifewater’s participatory training method is critical. The method helps people to see that both the country’s problems and their resolutions belong to them. And the method works, because intertwined in Lifewater’s teachings are God’s principals. People’s lifestyles change and the changes influence others. I have seen many mothers going out and sharing health and hygiene skills with their neighbors and friends.

I am committed to this work because I truly believe there is an open door of opportunity. Christians inspired by God’s compassion need to hear the cries of the children and reach out in every way God directs us. Others can help the poor—it’s inherently a good thing to do—but it’s an uphill battle unless you combine it with the Gospel of Hope. Those who love and follow the Lord bring his hope with them. Take a little hope and plant it like a seed, and amazing things will happen.