Antonina

Antonina.

There was a day last year while in Kenya, Africa that a team of us were visiting and cheering on a church sponsored soccer event in an open rutted field with a team of mostly juvenile slide-sandal players.

I met Antonina.

She was on the sidelines.  A little unapproachable at first, I thought.  But, I made my way towards her choosing to engage instead of watching the recreational play.

She shared she’d been working nearby that day for a family that she housecleaned.  She admitted trying to work enough to earn money to get her children back from her mother who was caring for them until she could afford to do so.  Feeling little worth, she was making mere dollars a day to clean one family’s home.

Through the mission trip we were on, I had been learning how the churches work with their members alongside Life in Abundance to help restore hope, dignity and self-sufficiency to generate more income by offering micro-loans to begin a business.

I had shared with her a woman’s success story that we witnessed who had borrowed enough money to purchase a bag of flour to make and sell mandazi, a fried bread.  The goal for each business is to make a profit that allows tithing back to the supporting church and also create a personal savings program for themselves.  This success story had that woman working her way up one bag of flour at a time that was now operating with 20 bags of flour.  To the glory of God, she was successfully working her way out of the slums in which she lived.

It has been a year since this first encounter.  Our return trip to Kenya was to a church we visited and we were being introduced to the members and their businesses that help support them.  When all the introductions had been made and our time was closing, Antonina came up and asked if I remembered her.

I could not immediately recall this happy, smiling, bright-eyed individual before me.  She told me about our encounter on the soccer field and that she is now a member of this church and selling charcoal to earn additional income to become self-reliant.  She wanted me to know that she remembered my prayers for her.

I was reminded of the success story that I had shared and that I had prayed with her in hopes her future would hold something brighter to generate additional income and bring her children back to her.

This faithful woman of God is enduring life’s trials in present time yet holding on to hope for the future of her children now, but also believing in the greater hope of eternity.

“For God has reserved a priceless inheritance for His children.  It is kept in heaven for you, pure and undefiled, beyond the reach of change and decay.  And God, in His mighty power will protect you until you receive this salvation because you are trusting Him.  There is wonderful joy ahead, even though it is necessary for you to endure many trials for a while.”

Antonina is her name.

It has a meaning.

“Priceless.”

1 Peter 1:4-6