Hunger Needs a Voice Reaches Out to Nicaragua’s Needy
Nine-year-old Fabiola spends most days digging through piles of trash at La Chureca—Managua’s dump. Her hands and feet are dirty and cut up from working in the garbage. She chews on plastic to dull her hunger pangs. Her eyes are dark and pain-filled, from living through things no nine-year-old should experience. This day, however, Fabiola has a change in her routine. Thanks to the Richard Roberts team of Hunger Needs a Voice, led by Jordan Roberts, Fabiola takes a break from her labor to get a medical check-up.
As a doctor examines her feet for cuts and bruises, she examines him. For a long time, she remains wary. But eventually, she starts to smile. It is a short yet peaceful moment for a child who experiences harshness every day. It’s also proof that God’s love can invade even the most oppressive places.
This April, with the support of our friends and Partners, Hunger Needs a Voice visited the destitute in and around Managua, Nicaragua…sharing food, medicines, and the healing love of Christ with hundreds of hungry and hurting children like Fabiola. Hope in the Midst of Destruction The view overlooking La Chureca is devastating.
Hills of garbage extend as far as the eye can see. Carrion birds circle overhead. Here and there, small fires burn decaying trash set aflame by the 90-degree sunlight. Bitter smoke fills the air. La Chureca is a place of destruction. More than 1,000 precious people make their home within the dump. A rough and rocky road leads through the filthy piles of trash to their small huts.
They work in the garbage heaps, searching for items they can eat, use, or sell. Conditions are so disease-ridden and unsanitary that many of the people who live here suffer severely from coughs, asthma, lice, parasite infections, HIV/AIDS, and sicknesses caused by vitamin deficiencies. These people also suffer in their souls. Many struggle with pain and shame resulting from sexual, physical, and verbal abuse, prostitution, drug use, and other evils often brought about in desperate situations such as this one.
They are rejected by many people in Managua. So when help of any kind comes to La Chureca, her inhabitants respond with both surprise and pleasure. As the people of the dump gathered to receive medical care and food, they shared how grateful they were to have Hunger Needs a Voice, the humanitarian division of Oral Roberts Ministries, come to their aid. “I’m so happy you’re here,” one woman told Jordan, “because I’m getting help!”
Another woman was moved to tears when she realized HNAV had food to give her. She arrived at the medical clinic with her two youngest children. Her three older children were not with her. They were forced to live in an orphanage because she didn’t have enough food to feed them.
With Easter approaching, the woman explained, those three children would come home for a visit, but she didn’t have anything for them to eat. Jordan and the HNAV team reassured her that they had plenty of food for her to take home. The woman began to cry in relief. Now she would be able to feed all of her children.
Another very special moment occurred when Jordan stopped to visit with some families waiting to see the doctors. A little girl caught her eye the same child who had so touched Jordan’s heart when she first visited the dump last December.
Her encounter with that little girl, along with so many others, had encouraged her to come back with food to La Chureca. Now, the little girl was in line with her mother and her brothers and sisters…waiting to receive the food promised from Hunger Needs a Voice. Jordan shared, “We promised to come back here, and that’s what we did!
Thanks to our Partners, we came back with medicine, food, doctors, and the salvation message. And now this little girl has the food we promised to bring, and she’s in line with her family to see the doctors.
Thank you, Partners!” Compassionate Care for Managua’s Orphans In addition to helping the people of La Chureca, Richard Roberts and the Oral Roberts Ministries medical team and HNAV visited ten orphanages in and around Managua. In the course of a single day, more than 300 children received medical exams, food, vitamins, and a lot of love.
The most common physical problems these children face are simple ones, yet ones for which they have no ongoing help colds, coughs, headaches, infections, and vitamin deficiencies. For that reason, the Airborne immune-boosting vitamins donated to Hunger Needs a Voice are very useful to the orphanages. “We’re so grateful to our Partners, who helped us provide vitamins, food, and other supplies to these kids,” Jordan noted. HNAV also donated two washing machines to needy orphanages…one of them a small, two-room building where the workers had previously been washing the children’s clothes and diapers by hand.
This simple gift will help stem the flow of bacteria transmitted to the little ones and allow the workers to spend more time with the precious children they care for. More than anything, these orphans need encouragement. Many of them once lived in the streets. Others were removed from abusive situations. And some were simply abandoned by parents who couldn’t care for them. These children struggle with sadness and discouragement. Yet God has planted big dreams in many of their hearts.
They want to be scientists, civil engineers, teachers, doctors, preachers, and evangelists. Jordan and the team prayed for the children and encouraged them to hold on to God, the One who can someday bring their dreams to pass. One Million Meals…God’s Love Made Real to “the Least of These” Matthew 25:40 says that the things we do to help those in need “the least of these” are things we are doing for Jesus Christ Himself. By the end of the weeklong outreach in
Nicaragua, Hunger Needs a Voice provided one million meals to people in need, along with vitamins, medicines, and loving-care. “We made sure that everyone walked away with bags full of food,” Jordan said. “That’s what Hunger Needs a Voice does. We make sure everyone always has food to take home to their families.” HNAV accomplished its mission to bring humanitarian aid to people right where they are at. The lives of countless Nicaraguans were impacted by the food and medical care they received…as well as a personal experience of discovering how much God truly loves them. Thank you, Partners!
