Six of our boys at Bethesda have now taken their National Primary School Examinations (NPSE).

Bethesda Orphanage was founded by The Connexion to provide support and education for a large number of children who were previously living on the streets of Sierra Leone, and also orphans whose family cannot be traced.

Primary schooling in Sierra Leone stretches over six years, educating children between the ages of 6 to 12. The curriculum is typically designed to provide core fundamental skills in reading, writing and mathematics, and it is necessary to pass the NPSE in order to move up to secondary school education.  

Pictured from left to right are: Bernard, Alansan, Moses (Jnr), David, Joseph and Mohammed. The results of their examinations are expected in 2-3 months.

We offer our prayers for all of the children at Bethesda, and ask for these young men to receive positive results for their exams, which will open new doors for their futures.

Among his many roles, Magnus Bendu has been leading bible study sessions for the children at Huntingdon Secondary School in Kola Tree, Allen Town. 

Early last year the school benefited from a generous donation, raised by Shoreham Free Church in West Sussex, which enabled the purchase of built-in mini PA systems. The staff and pupils were hugely appreciative of the donation, and the equipment has been an invaluable asset for the school. 

Abdul and Mariatu

Abdul and Mariatu are the two oldest children at Bethesda. They were rescued at a very young age from the streets of Freetown by Magnus Bendu and brought to live at Bethesda orphanage, where they became part of the Bethesda family and received a good education.

Both students have worked hard and demonstrated responsibility: Abdul was been appointed Head Boy and Mariatu is Student Chaplain. Their hope was to progress to higher education, Abdul hoping to study law and Mariatu planning to study medicine. Following an appeal made at the end of last year, God answered our prayers with a generous donation to cover the costs of their academic courses.

We now ask that you will pray for these hardworking teenagers again as they prepare to take their Final Examinations in July and August.

FuFu Water

The new school building at FuFu Water now has its roof. With 340 children attending the school, they were literally bursting at the seams, and badly in need of extra space. Work began on the building extension three years ago and will house three new classrooms. Having limited funds, folk from the local communities have been carrying out the work, purchasing materials as and when funds became available. It has been a slow process, but when completed it will massively help the education of the children and reduce the pressure on teaching staff.

Prayers for the Health Centre

We give thanks for a further donation of £2000 towards the completion of the new Health Centre in Brama. Progress has been slow, and Magnus has not yet been able to source beds for the Centre. Possibilities of procuring the beds from the UK are currently being investigated. We ask for prayers that this difficulty may be overcome and for the speedy completion of the Health Centre.

Donate

If you would like to make a contribution to the valuable work in Sierra Leone, please click on the Donations button at the top of the website page. This will take you through to the SLM donations account.

We are delighted to welcome Marie and James to Bethesda as replacement staff for Aminata and Sallay, who are now moving on. 

Bethesda Orphanage supports a large number of children in need who live on the streets of Sierra Leone, and also provides a safe and loving home for orphans whose family cannot be traced.

Aminata joined the orphanage at the beginning in 2013, and has been known as the 'house mum.' She cooked for the children and was there for them as a friend, confidante, nurse and Christian example. Aminata has now gone to live with her son to help look after his child. She was finding her work at Bethesda increasingly more difficult in her advancing years. She rose early every morning to prepare meals for the children, and found the heat of the fire very intense, also visiting the market each day to buy food and make sure that every child had their needs met.

Sallay started working at Bethesda in 2016. She is a trained teacher and each day after school she would continue the children's education. Sallay was very much 'in charge' and took responsibility for the general discipline and good behaviour of the children. She has recently taken up a new teaching post that is away from Bethesda, but her son Andrew has chosen to remain.

Their commitment to the children at Bethesda was exemplary, giving 100% to their work, and putting their personal lives on hold to care for the children. They are two wonderful Christian ladies who will be greatly missed.

As Marie and James take up their new posts, we send them our best wishes and prayers for a rewarding and happy future at the orphanage.

Young members of The Connexion, Charlotte and Esther, have created some inspired recordings, focusing on the history of the Countess of Huntingdon's outreach and early churches in Sierra Leone.

Click on the links below to view their videos (parts 1, 2 and 3) about the origins of the mission:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Today the Sierra Leone Mission (SLM) supports a wide range of projects as well as helping to provide education through Connexion schools, including funding assistance for teachers’ salaries and training. SLM also gives support to the work of our churches in Sierra Leone: contributing to ministers’ wages, providing funding for ministerial training, and building and maintaining churches. 

To make a donation to support our work in Sierra Leone

Click on the Donations button at the top of the website page. This will take you through to the SLM donations account. If you would like your donation to go to a particular project, please state.

By Bank Transfer: 

Barclays Bank
Sort code: 20-16-08, Account number: 30799076, Account name: Sierra Leone Mission 

By cheque: 

To: Sierra Leone Mission. Postal address: Janet Foord, 2 Cheyne Close, Church Milton Sittingbourne, Kent, ME10 2SQ 

All donations received go to support our communities in Sierra Leone. 

New church at Mile 91

The congregation at St Marks Cathedral joined a service with the community at Mile 91 for worship in the new church building (not yet completed). 

With St Marks providing the majority of support, construction of the church began last year using local materials and the roofing has also now been completed.  

New nursery and churches in northern villages

The new Christian nursery school at Kamakontheke, a Muslim dominated village in the north of Sierra Leone, is now up and running and has the regular attendance of a small fellowship of children. With the nearest primary school being three miles distant, it is the first time children have been able to attend a school in their own village.

Last weekend also saw the laying of foundations for a new church building at Kamakontheke. Local materials and labour will be utilised for the development, and the village Imam joined in prayer for the dedication of the land and building. 

In addition, work has begun on the construction of another new church at Mathoir, which is also a Muslim dominated village in north Sierra Leone.

Message from Magnus

‘We are so thankful for your prayers. It takes faith and passion to step out, mobilise and venture. These villages are poor places with some of the poorest people, and so many things become a blessing for them. For instance, food provided for workers clearing the land, is what they depend on for their daily meal. We have no option but to provide as much as we can, hoping we can feed a whole village each day with relatively decent food.

‘Also some of the shipment tablets we have received, eg cocodamol and a few others that I buy, are taken to serve the many village people who do not have access to good medicine. We have a lot of fake medicine in Sierra Leone. 

The children are so happy with encouragement that we give them, because many cannot find this love elsewhere. I know that our country has always had these problems, and also that we can't do everything. It takes a well-organised system to prioritise what is needed in addition to our focus on major projects like the Health Clinic.’

How to make a Donation

Click on the Donations button at the top of the website page. This will take you through to the SLM donations account. If you would like your donation to go to a particular project, please state.

By Bank Transfer: 

Barclays Bank
Sort code: 20-16-08, Account number: 30799076, Account name: Sierra Leone Mission 

By cheque: 

To: Sierra Leone Mission. Postal address: Janet Foord, 2 Cheyne Close, Church Milton Sittingbourne, Kent, ME10 2SQ 

All donations received go to support our communities in Sierra Leone. 

Work on the new Brama Health Centre, Sierra Leone is continuing to make excellent progress, with windows and doors installed and plastering on the exterior of the building taking shape. The clinic is situated opposite Bethesda Children's Home and will serve communities from 35 villages. 

Generous funding enabled the purchase of land in 2019 and the necessary building materials to take the development this far. There is a great need for health facilities in Sierra Leone and this centre will primarily serve children, babies and mothers. Once completed the project will be self-funded, but additional funds are still required to reach the point of completion.

Click on the YouTube link below, to view how the project has progressed:

How to make a Donation

Click on the Donations button at the top of the website page. This will take you through to the SLM donations account. If you would like your donation to go to a particular project, please state.

By Bank Transfer: 

Barclays Bank
Sort code: 20-16-08, Account number: 30799076, Account name: Sierra Leone Mission 

By cheque: 

To: Sierra Leone Mission. Postal address: Janet Foord, 2 Cheyne Close, Church Milton Sittingbourne, Kent, ME10 2SQ 

All donations received go to support our communities in Sierra Leone. 

There have been two new outbreaks of Ebola in two weeks; the first in the Democratic Republic of Congo, followed by Guinea. Health teams are trying to contain the spread of the disease by increasing contact tracing and providing medical support to local authorities. 

Guinea declared an Ebola epidemic on 14 February after three people died and four others became ill in the rural southeast of the country. It is the first reported outbreak in West Africa since a region-wide pandemic ended five years ago after claiming more than 11,000 lives.

The initial case in Guinea’s new outbreak involved a nurse in rural Gouéké who died on 28 January, and the six other reported cases were people who had attended her 1 February funeral. 

This current outbreak is very close to the border of Sierra Leone and there is a real threat and fear that it will spread. Ebola is a virus which spreads through contact with body fluids. It does have a much higher death rate than the Coronavirus, but is not spread by asymptomatic carriers.

Sierra Leone’s President Julius Maada Bio has reportedly flown to Guinea to consult with Guinean President Alpha Condé.

Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia bore the brunt of the 2014-2016 West African Ebola outbreak – which began in Guinea – and killed 11,300 people. 

Aid agencies are warning that speed is key to containing the spread of the virus, and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) and the Guinean Red Cross say teams that include more than 2,500 volunteers have been activated in Guinea to provide contact tracing, psychosocial support, water, and sanitation.

Magnus Bendu asks for prayer for our communities in Sierra Leone

• Please pray for our brothers and sisters in Sierra Leone and for the grieving families of those who have died from the disease. 
• Memories of the 2014-2016 outbreak of Ebola are still very fresh in the minds of everyone. Please pray that this one will be quickly contained.

Thank you for your financial and prayer support for the Sierra Leone Mission, it is deeply appreciated.

Sources: The New Humanitarian

Graphic: Designed by gstudioimagen/Freepik

Foofoo Water School is in urgent need of funds for enlargement. The school is currently bursting at the seams, with 340 children attending.  

The Sierra Leone Mission (SLM) supported the original construction of the school, but with ongoing projects requiring additional funding, the folk in Sierra Leone have come together to build a new extension themselves.  

Three years ago they started to build three additional classrooms, by raising the funds locally, and they have now finished the walls using mud blocks and cement mortar. To finish the project they need to buy twelve bundles of CI sheets. 

Magnus Bendu says: ‘This is the big giant standing in our way’. 

The amount needed to complete the extension building is £875. This would represent a massive contribution in terms of improving education facilities for the children and reducing the pressure on teachers.

Please pray with us that the necessary money will be raised to complete the project.

How to make a donation

Click on the Donations button at the top of the website page. This will take you through to the SLM donations account. If you would like your donation to go to a particular project, please state.

You can give by Bank Transfer to: 

Barclays
Sort code: 20-16-08, Account number: 30799076, Account name: Sierra Leone Mission 

If you would prefer, please send a cheque to: 

Janet Foord, 2 Cheyne Close, Church Milton Sittingbourne, Kent, ME10 2SQ 

Every pound given, goes to support our brothers and sisters in Sierra Leone. 

Deciding to tidy away Christmas cards in the bookshop at the weekend, Jan Foord found an envelope on the doorstep addressed to her, containing £1000 for the Health Centre in Sierra Leone from an anonymous donor. 

This wonderful gift will be added to a generous donation received before Christmas of £500 and funds generated from a December stall outside Zion Community Church, which totalled a further £500. 

And minutes after receiving Jan’s email, sharing the news of the ‘bookshop’ donation, to her surprise, Janet O’Shea received another donation of £1200 to put towards university fees for Abdul and Mariatu.

Praise God!

Abdul and Mariatu

Abdul and Mariatu are the two oldest children at Bethesda. At a very young age they were rescued from the streets of Freetown by Magnus Bendu and brought to live at Bethesda orphanage. He gave them a home, new brothers and sisters, and ensured that they had a good education and studied hard. Now their time at Bethesda is coming to an end and they are moving on to further education - something they could never have dreamed of doing living on the streets. 

When Janet visited Bethesda in 2018 with Bethany and Esther Green, they spoke to the children about their career aspirations and received many answers: Pastor, Doctor, Lawyer, Nurse, and even Prime Minister! 

Abdul and Mariatu have continued to apply themselves to their studies. Abdul has been appointed Head Boy and Mariatu is Student Chaplain. Both are working towards their final exams, and depending on the results, they will be eligble to go to university. Abdul hopes to study law and Mariatu hopes to study medicine.

An appeal was made at the end of 2020 by the Sierra Leone Mission for financial contribution towards the cost of enabling these bright, hardworking teenagers to achieve their dreams and go on to serve their communities. The estimated cost of Abdul’s four-year course is £542 and Mariatu’s seven-year course is estimated at £620. We thank God for his answer in prayer of bringing such a generous donation to the SLM to help these deserving young people gain access to opportunities that will change their lives! 

With the creation of the new Health Centre, it would be equally amazing if Mariatu will one day be able to work there.

Health Centre

The completion of the Health Centre will make a vital difference to people’s lives, as Magnus describes:

‘The healing ministry in Sierra Leone is a huge need. This is an even greater need for children whose health care facilities in Sierra Leone is one of the poorest in the world. For many years now, we have always been among the worst countries in terms of maternal, infant and child mortality rates. Beyond the statistics, I see this practically every now and then. Many children die of illnesses and diseases that could have been prevented with access to health care facilities. In the location where the new clinic is being built for instance, there is no specialized clinic or hospital for children in over 50 miles radius with very bad roads to add to the problem. The only hospital focused on children which is 28 miles away serves the entire city of Freetown and its environs, which means those from the rural areas will sometimes return with their children dead without going beyond the queue.’

Magnus adds:

‘The new clinic, which has been named the Ralph O’Shea Memorial Children’s Clinic will initially focus on providing primary health care for children and also treat other patients generally. The structural part of the building is at a very advanced stage. This is thanks to the SLM for supporting the initiative and to the late Morgan Pearce of the UK who mainly funded over 95% of the work done so far, yet preferred to be anonymous until his departure to be with the Lord on the day we started roofing. His legacy in Sierra Leone will never die.’

Thanks

The Connexion and the Sierra Leone Mission express huge thanks to all those who have so kindly and generously contributed to these life changing causes. We also give thanks to God for his amazing answer to prayer and need.

How to give to the Sierra Leone Mission 

Click on the Donations button at the top of the website page. This will take you through to the SLM donations account.

You can give by Bank Transfer to: 

Barclays
Sort code: 20-16-08 

Account number: 30799076 

Account name: Sierra Leone Mission 

If you would prefer, please send a cheque to: 

Janet Foord, 2 Cheyne Close, Church Milton Sittingbourne, Kent, ME10 2SQ 

Every pound given, goes to support our brothers and sisters in Sierra Leone. 

We are delighted to receive some photos of the Bethesda children celebrating their Christmas in Sierra Leone!

The children were clearly very happy to receive their Christmas gift shoe bags, which contain treats and toys donated and packed by members of our Connexion churches in the UK. After which, they were able to enjoy an outdoor lunch and a cooling swim in the sea!