We worked alongside Christian Faith Ministries (CFM), which partners with local Muslim communities to see computer centers built throughout Northern Nigeria for peacekeeping and reconciliation. Following the initial terrorism attacks from Boko Haram, this initiative began with CFM realizing that they didn’t know their neighbors, so how could they follow Jesus’ command to love them?
As terrorism attacks have continued in various forms from 2009 to the present time, these relationships have provided a safe space for the work CFM needed to step into – setting up crisis care homes for children and Mara’s house, which was established for women. CFM is located on the edge of the trouble zone, with military presence reminding one of the realities of the context, while the actual location lives up to its name — Wurin Alheri – Place of Kindness.
We were invited to come and train their staff, using our tool, the Celebrating Children Workshop (CCW). Their staff, due to the crisis nature of their work, were not prepared for the reality of working with traumatized women and children. Our team consisted of three Senegalese men, and six ladies from the US, Switzerland, Germany, Kenya, South Africa, and Tanzania. Our participants were those who worked in the crisis care homes, those who worked with the women in Mara’s house, teachers in the school they run with over 900 children, missionaries who serve at some of the 500 mission stations across the Sahel nations and those who train the missionaries and visit them.
This CCW training was unique due to the level of trauma evidenced in the location, region, and participants. And yet the responses from the participants have been so encouraging. People are incredibly resilient and the kind of training we offer is life to people, a moment of sanity and understanding of why traumatized children do what they do. It is also the embracing of some practices to help stabilize the families and start a journey of healing. This was a time of breathing, laughter, crying, and singing. The most beautiful harmonies filled the room as we started each day and after each tea and lunch break.
The commitment of these participants to follow Jesus and serve their communities, to love their neighbors well, to refuse stereotypes of who the enemy is, and to continue to reach out and learn, was humbling for us. Their humility in learning a skill or good practice shocked us. After learning about the brain and how to listen to children, they are quick to change. But not just to think – “Oh, gotta fix that” – the next day we would hear how they had called their children together, apologized for their behavior, and committed to parenting differently.
On every level, this trip was the most strenuous we have ever done. We find ourselves still trying to process what we saw and what we heard. Yet, we plan to return in June for the second part of the training, based on securing funding for the trip. These are the people we are privileged to serve. They serve the most vulnerable in hard places, against all odds. Our strain in the weeks spent there is their ongoing reality. May God continue to give them grace in their work and keep the reality of the suffering of the vulnerable in war and conflict zones around the world on our minds and in our hearts.