This is a first!

Check it out! If you look closely at the attached picture of Augustine (Administrative Assistant) holding a giant check you will see that it is made out to the Mzuzu Crisis Nursery. You will also note the amount—MK 750,000.00. That not only sounds like a lot of money, it is a lot of money (around $5,000.00 more or less).

Local congregations and individuals in Malawi have made generous donations to the Nursery from time to time. These gifts are usually in the form of dry goods (flour, sugar, beans etc.) and occasionally some hard to raise Kwacha. Several U.S. funded NGO's in Malawi are also providing grants for our operation. However, the great percentage of our support has come from abroad, especially Presbyterian Church U.S.A congregations.

For the first time a Malawi based business (National Bank of Malawi) has stepped up and made a significant donation to the Nursery on behalf of the orphaned babies in our care. We are thrilled! The occasion was the opening of a beautiful new bank building here in Mzuzu. Bingu Mutarika, the president of Malawi, was invited as the keynote speaker. He personally presented the check to Augustine. When told that we should attend the ceremony to receive a donation, we imagined (at best) that we would receive a few 100 pound bags of maize. That’s why the man in the picture is smiling!

Our hope and prayer is that this donation will be a sign of the future. The more the Nursery gets known around Malawi for its outstanding crisis care for orphaned babies, the more support we will receive from Malawians. This can’t help but strengthen our partnership and secure a bright future for God’s most vulnerable little ones.