Dear church family, God is great and greatly to be praised!
We wanted to thank you for your continued support of our mission to Malawi and share
some highlights with you. Villages in Partnership- VIP (villagesinpartnership.org) is a Christian
organization that was started by Reverend Stephen Nelson and his wife Liz while they were
living and serving in Malawi in 2008. They were moved by the extreme poverty in the Sakata
region, and what they thought Biblically was there responsibility (1John 3:16-17) to the people
there. There are an estimated 14 million orphans in Malawi and it is the 4th poorest nation in the
world, with an average income of less than a dollar a day. VIP seeks to move entire villages out
of poverty by addressing what they have identified as the 6 key areas of poverty simultaneously.
Those areas are food security, clean water, healthcare, education, infrastructure, and economic
development. We currently are partnered with 26 villages. The closest city is Zomba. The people
we serve are mostly farmers, living off what they can grow. We became involved with the
mission through the University of Virginia’s School of Nursing where Liz’ sister Lucy is an
instructor. In addition to ministering to the people in Malawi we have opportunity to share Christ
with many who go on this trip as a medical mission, not a Christian one.
There were challenges since we were last there in July 2014, but there have also been
many movements of God and the people have remained encouraged. The major challenges were
rains and finances. You may have read about rains and flooding in Malawi over the past few
months. Many of our people lost crops. We met a widow raising her granddaughter, an orphan,
who had only harvested 1 bag of corn which would need to last them for 9 months. Many houses
have washed away as the villagers make their own bricks, and because they are not fired
properly the rains caused them to disintegrate. We met a young man of 18 who has been caring
for his 3 younger siblings since they were all orphaned when he was 9 years old. One sister is
blind and another has a baby, they have to work in other’s fields to survive. They all live in one
room because the rest washed away. Giving to Malawi overall is down 40%.
God is moving though and through all the hardship VIP has started community Bible
studies. We were able to attend one where about 100 people showed up to hear a pastor read
from the Bible and discuss what it meant under the mango trees. There were many faith
backgrounds represented including Muslim, Mormon, and Jehovah’s Witness. It was an amazing
experience. The Sunday we were there was harvest Sunday. In addition to the monetary offering
the people brought forth literally their first fruits and poured them out on the altar. Some goes to
the pastor and workers, but the majority is distributed to the poorest of the poor. The primary
school now has over 400 students and new teachers and the government is so impressed with
what VIP has done there they built them an administration building on the property. There are
plans for a secondary school in the near future. Fred and Harry, the medics we sent to school,
have graduated and are doing their internship at Zomba Central hospital, and will be serving at
clinics in the villages for the next 5 years when that is completed. We have also hired a mobile
medic and bought a motorcycle so he can visit people who are too sick to get to a clinic. We took
a man from UVA who works in telemedicine that is trying to connect us with our medics over
satellite with tablets so they can get further education or consults through UVA. People are
finding other sources of income since the maize mill opened as there is electricity at that site.
Those that have received seed from VIP also return a portion of their harvest which is stored
there for times of great need, and the wells, chicken, and goat distribution programs have saved
the lives of many.
We had a very large team this year of 23. We had 2 doctors, 2 NPs, a PA, nursing
students and support staff. Because we had so many people we were able to add a fourth clinic in
a very remote region where some of the newest villages have been added. Although our dentist
could not return this year the Malawian dentist worked with us so we again had that service
available. At the time of this writing we do not have a final patient count, but are estimating we
saw about 3000 people in clinics plus our home visits. We did not run out of vitamins or soap
this year. The amount of supplies was amazing, and we were able to give gifts not only to
individuals, but to the hospital and the school as well. We saw miraculous healings and comfort.
We remained healthy and knew we were covered in prayer in every activity we did.
We want to be sure everyone at our church knows that VIP has several friendship trips in
addition to the medical trip every summer. You can get information about how to sign up on
their website. We are prayerfully considering our return next year. Please keep our brothers and
sisters there in prayer. Some specific names: Mr Malaboo, Mr Matolooloo, Daniel, Joe, Fred,
Harry, Frank, Issac, Grace, Emma, Vi, and Bridgette. We thank you and love you, Frank and
Jynn Albano