Cambria

Colorado, United States of America

Born to two missionaries, Cambria was raised as the youngest child and only daughter.

She spent the first four years of her life in Vienna, Austria, where her parents were working as missionaries at the time. Her parents ran ministry in the Eastern bloc during the cold war as they trained church leaders in the underground church. When the Berlin wall came down, Cambria’s parents made the decision to move back to the United States. At this time, Cambria was four and her oldest brother was ten.

Growing up, Cambria was free spirited and adventurous, with dreams to travel the world and get out of the United States. She dreamed of an exoctic and adventurous life, a dream which soon came true. She soon moved to Kona, Hawaii to work as a missionary, which led to her traveling to over 30 countries with Youth With A Mission (YWAM), and traveling to over 50 countries in total.

While working as a missionary at YWAM Kona, Cambria led an outreach team with a co-worker M. Not long after, Cambria and M started dating, but just as Cambria was planning on transitioning and moving to Cape Town, South Africa. In January 2013, Cambria packed up her bags and moved, while M followed after four months. They were engaged soon after, returned to the states for their wedding, and then moved back to South Africa right after, where they had been invited to do a community ministry plant with 12 others. The people they had joined were also all in a transition phase of their life, either pregnant, engaged, or newlywed.

“The person who loves their dream of community will destroy community, but the person who loves those around them will create community”. — Dietrich Bonhoffer, Life Together

After coming to South Africa with ideals and visions of life as a community and ministry, Cambria and the others soon faced the challenges of the transitioning that comes with moving across culturally and internationally. As a group of all white Americans, the 12 became exclusive with each other, making it challenging to feel like they fit into the community around them. They were all slowly confronted with what missions actually meant, and came to realize how the idealism of community can’t be created and isn’t always realistic. Within a year, every one of the 12 people had moved away from South Africa and the missions, except for Cambria and M, as well as one other couple.

After the others had all left, Cambria and M were taken into a meeting with their YWAM Base Leader and was asked why they wanted to stay while all the others had left. Their response was that they had fallen in love with South Africa and the YWAM in Cape Town. They had also truly felt life God had told them to stay where they were and continue doing ministry.

Since then, Cambria and M have run a missions training school together, which helped them continue to learn more about South Africa and the people, while falling into a rhythm. Cambria and M have now lived in South Africa for ten years, and have three sons. They have created a wonderful, supportive community, and while they often still miss their family and community back home in the United States, they’ve also become happy and blessed in South Africa, which now feels more like ‘home’.

Ontario, Canada

2007. Just like many other nights in their marriage, Anna and P were reading the “Today Daily Devotional’ together. On this night, the author was telling the story of his daughter and son in law’s process of adopting their own daughter from China, and ended the devotional with a challenge to all readers, challenging them to all consider and pray about adoption to see if it’s something God may be putting on the readers hearts also! Not long after, Anna and P read another page in their “Today Daily Devotional”, and this story was titled “Risk”. The author confronts his readers two main things, “How big a risk has God ever asked you to take?” and “Fear paralyzes us and keeps us from risky discipleship, ‘but perfect love drives out fear’ (1 John 4:18)… it is our love for Christ that allows s to move out of our comfortable spaces to experience the risk — and exhilaration — of serious obedience.” After praying for signs and for clarification, Anna and P decided to start the adoption process for a little girl from Ethiopia, one of the few countries the local adoption agency worked with.

The next few years were filled with countless challenges, including the adoption agency going bankrupt and getting restarted, paper work, home studies, fingerprint and biometrics, and even more paperwork.

January 17, 2010. In Canada, Anna’s oldest son J is playing video games with his friend when a bird hits the living room window. It falls to the ground with an injured wing, as Anna and J feed the bird and wait for it to recover so that it can fly again. In Ethiopia, a beautiful little girl was born in a small northern town, a girl who would be put up for adoption and need a family and parents to help repair her ‘injured wings’.

October 2010. After three years of paperwork, and months of updates and photos of their daughter D, Anna and P were given the phone call that D’s visa to Canada was approved, and they were able to fly down to Ethiopia to bring their beautiful daughter into her forever family, where she had three older siblings anxiously awaiting her arrival, all ready to give her more love than she had ever known before.

2013. Although they were happy as could be, Anna and P still felt like their family wasn’t quite complete, they still felt like something more was missing. They soon began to pray about their family, and prayed again about the possibility of adoption, and started the process again before the end of the year. This time they hoped to adopt a boy, and were willing to adopt a child with “correctable physical challenges” as the form says. Not long after the process had started, they were given an email with a photo of an adorable young boy, who had Down syndrome. Anna and P were told to pray and consider the adoption and the challenges that come with raising a child with special needs, before giving the agency a firm answer.

March 2016. For over two years, Anna and P were given photos and updates of their son in Ethiopia, as they waited for updated paperwork and court hearings, and as they prayed diligently for their son they couldn’t wait to meet. They prepared their home and their other four children as best as they could as they waited to bring home their son with Down syndrome, and in early March they received that long awaited phone call that their son S’ visa to Canada was ready, and they were allowed to come to Ethiopia to bring him to Canada to his forever family who had waited and prayed for him for years and years.

Within nine years, Anna’s family went from a family of five to a family of seven, a family complete, all because God spoke to her and P through an ordinary devotion, and they were brave enough to take the risk of saying ‘yes’ to their Lord. Through the adoptions, Anna and her entire family were challenged to constantly trust in God’s timing and His plan, learning to be patient during the challenges, and courageous when the doubt and fear seems to creep in.

Anna says “I had all things figured out and planned since Grade 7, but again, God had other plans; He sees the final, big picture, and I need to keep trusting in Him, He is faithful!”

Jacinta

Machakos, Kenya

At age 16, Jacinta began experiencing extreme pain, tremors, and numbness within her body. She was brought to a local hospital, Kenyatta hospital, where the doctors worked hard to find a reason for her pain. She was soon diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis (commonly known as MS).

In 2012, things for Jacinta changed for the worse. She became hospitalized for long periods of time, was given a wide variety of medication, and was forced to quickly come to terms with what it means to live with Multiple Sclerosis in small town in Kenya, and had to learn to accept her new reality. While learning to live with her own disability, Jacinta’s eyes were opened to the mothers of children with disabilities living in her community, as many of the mothers are forced to carry their child on their backs while navigating the challenges of parenting a child who isn’t able to sit, walk, feed, or talk. As her eyes were opened, Jacinta was deeply touched and impacted by her own experience, as well as watching those around her.

During this time, Jacinta began to face serious discrimination due to her condition and challenges, she lost her job and began to lose her close friends as well.

As time went on, Jacinta’s condition continued to worsen. Over time, she completely lost her voice, her ability to hear, her ability to stand on her own and walk, and learned to solely rely on the use of her wheelchair to complete tasks. As her MS became more intense, completing daily activities on her own became almost impossible, and Jacinta was forced to quickly learn how to depend on others for constant help.

Despite everything that she went through as she battled MS, Jacinta was determined to come out on top and grow from every experience she went through. This growth and strength led her to the next stage of her life: following her lifelong dream and passion to help the vulnerable in her community.

In 2015 DECAS, Disability Empowerment Capability and Sustainability, was founded. Jacinta started DECAS with the goal of advocating for people with disabilities and mobilizing mothers of children with severe disabilities through support groups and creating a safe space for those with disabilities in her community. DECAS’ vision is to enable people with disabilities living in socially and economically difficult circumstances to overcome limits that hinder them from realizing their full potential, through mobilizing the caring power of society to advance the common good and accelerate social impact. On March 8, 2022, International Women’s Day, Jacinta was awarded with the Hera Award in recognition of most women impacting the community through women and girls empowerment, especially those with different disabilities and life challenges.

As a woman with MS, Jacinta was able to understand and relate to the experiences that many other women and girls in her community faced as people with disabilities. Since starting DECAS, Jacinta has been able to create a close knit community in her town, and she feels so much joy when she watches people with disabilities mingling with others freely, especially when she sees children playing happily together without fear of judgement or discrimination. It warms her heart to also see mothers taking their children to schools, bringing their children to church, and having them leave the house without fear of stigmatization or judgment.

Jacinta dreams of a community where differently abled people and their families are enabled to realize their full potential and participate in and contribute to various aspects of life in their society. Through DECAS, Jacinta is able to support and empower people with disabilities, and is able to reach out and connect with many people who have faced similar challenges to her, and people who have similar dreams for their own community. She believes that society should be able to see disability as an identity, and then eliminate the barriers that may hinder people with disabilities from participating in various aspects of their lives in the community!

Jacinta says “We need the communities to embrace difference as part of diversity. I dream of a Kenya where every one will be treated with dignity regardless of her/his physical or mental status, a country where women with disabilities will no longer be facing double discrimination, and a world where we see and regard each other as God’s special creation without violence, a world where each can feel the pain of the other, a world which is fully inclusive”

Sino

Western Cape, South Africa

Sino was born as the only girl into a Christian family, with three brothers. After her father passed away when she was young, she was raised mainly by her grandmother for much of her childhood, as her mother helped as much as she could before moving away. In 2016 one of her brothers passed away, and a short three years later her grandmother passed away. Although living close to many of her cousins, Sino committed to raising herself, and has been doing so ever since.

During her teenage years, Sino began to grow a love for partying, and would do almost anything you could think of — dating around, drinking lots of alcohol, wearing revealing clothing — all while becoming more and more disrespectful to those around her. As she approached her matric (final year of high school), Sino made a plan to find a job and work as hard as possible in order to support herself and overcome her financial struggles.

Despite her partying and drinking during these years, Sino continued to help out at the kids ministry at her local church. It was at her church that a friend told her about a program through Youth With A Mission. Youth With A Mission (commonly known as YWAM) is an international and interdenominational Christian organization that focuses on training young people to know God deeper, and make him known around the world through a Discipleship Training School (commonly known as a DTS). Sino’s friend presented the idea of YWAM to her as a way where she could help people around the world, and travel while doing so! Besides this, Sino knew nothing about YWAM or the organization, and didn’t know much about the costs of attending their schools.

With schools all over the world, Sino decided to join the YWAM school in her home town of Cape Town, South Africa. During her preparations, Sino was faced with many obstacles, creating doubts about what she was getting herself into. Although she faced financial struggles before YWAM, God answered her prayers and provided all the funds she needed to complete the program before the school had even started! After that, she felt strongly about God needing her to be at YWAM during this time of her life, and she has lived in the confidence of God’s plan and will since that day.

Despite being born and raised in a Christian home, Sino had barely ever read the bible before her time at YWAM. The day she came onto the YWAM base, she felt God reminding her of the bible verse Matthew 6:8, which says “Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him”. In that moment, she prayed and asked God “If you want me to be here, I will do everything according to your word and your way, as all I need will be given to me like you said in your word”.

About halfway through her time at YWAM, covid hit and the world began to shut down and everyone at the YWAM base was sent home, and so Sino was unable to complete her program. Struggling with the idea of going back to her “old” life after being so deeply changed, Sino began to beg God for His provision and clarity for her life once again. During covid, it was hard to find jobs in South Africa and money was scarce. Despite this, God continually provided for Sino through friends and through her local church, and provided opportunities for her to raise money for herself through small paid tasks, being able to receive grants, and being able to receive food donations from her church!

After the covid situation in South Africa calmed down, Sino was able to re-join YWAM, where she serves as a missionary to this day. Sino would love to travel to neighboring African countries, and dreams of opening her own organizations to help draw young people closer to God through teaching practical skills, playing games, and running events! She hopes to reach people from a young age, and influence them when they are young, so that they can continue to grow with God as they grow older.

Sino says “I really do believe that God goes into someones life and can change them completely, and He did that to me, He changed my life completely”.