Brook Hills partners with Compassion International in India helping to provide opportunities for mothers and children to be released from the cycle of poverty. The Child Survival Program helps save the lives of babies and mothers in poverty utilizing local churches to assist mothers of at-risk infants and toddlers. Through prenatal care, nutritious food and supplements, ongoing health care, training for mothers, spiritual guidance and education mothers are able to give their families a chance to be released from poverty all while being discipled through a local church in the area.

These are a few of the stories from mothers in the Child Survival Programs in India Brook Hills gets to be involved with. God is mightily at work in the lives of these women and children. Continue to pray for the work God is doing in the lives of these women.

SNEHA

Sneha was afraid. Her husband had come home from work furious. She knew his anger was for her, and his seething silence put her on edge. She set his dinner on the table with shaking hands and tried to keep their two daughters quiet. It was only a matter of time before the storm.

After dinner he called her into the other room. Soon his screams of anger filled the tiny home. Accusations of infidelity. Hatred toward the daughters she produced, daughters he despised for their uselessness. Sneha barely fought when her husband tied her up. But when he tied up their 3-year-old daughter and began dousing the two of them in kerosene, screams ripped out of her throat.

“Please, somebody save us,” she shouted. “He will kill us both.”

Neighbors answered her cries. They knew what her husband was capable of, and that her fears were founded. Too often they had seen Sneha’s husband beat her in the street, wanting them to watch. They had seen the cigarette burns on her daughters’ skin. Had heard the screams from within their home, night after night.

Later that night, Sneha lay in her neighbor’s house, the smell of kerosene lingering on her skin. Where would she go from here? Her father, a poor farmer, had chosen her husband because his family didn’t require a dowry. It only took a few weeks for her to understand why. She tried to make the best of the situation, hoping that having children would help. When she gave birth to daughters, her husband’s rages only grew more violent.

But tonight. Tonight she finally understood that her husband would kill her and her children. She would have to go home to her parents and admit she had failed as a daughter and as a wife.

The weeks at her family’s home drove Sneha deeper into depression. People whispered when she walked by, first at the sight of her bruises and later at the disgrace of an adult daughter coming to live at home again. For the first time in her life Sneha had run out of hope, both for herself and her daughters.

To lessen the burden on her parents Sneha took a job rolling bidi, a local cigarette. Every day on her way to work, Sneha walked by a church. From inside she heard the sounds of children laughing and singing, and soon her curiosity got the best of her. She stood outside and peered through the window, watching the children play and listen to Bible stories. Her heart ached for smiles like that for her own children.

The next morning Sneha met with the pastor and shared her story with him. She began coming to church every Sunday, and hope for her daughters began to take root again.

In 2010 a Child Survival Program opened at Sneha’s church. She enrolled in the Kancherapara CSP with her youngest daughter, who was 8 months old. But Sneha was still deeply scarred by the abuse she had experienced. For weeks, when mothers would gather at the church for lessons on child care and nutrition, she would sit in the corner and quietly cry.

Slowly, Sneha found joy. She found joy in the Bible studies and prayer times she experienced at the church. In the food and care she could finally offer her children. And in the hope that she was finally able to embrace.

Today Sneha sews all of the clothes for her daughters and prepares healthy meals of rice, lentils, vegetables and meat. She shares the scripture she learns with her family and neighbors, and she is a worship leader at church.

From the ashes of her life, God has brought beauty. And Sneha thanks God for His blessings every day.