2016 Sierra Leone Trip Journal: The Text Message That Changed It All

On my first trip to Sierra Leone, we met a native gentleman named Charles Yimbo. Charles is a school teacher who has a passion for Christ and the vulnerable street boys. These boys, some as young as seven years old are living on the streets trying to survive. Charles had a vision to be the hands and feet of Christ to these boys. He started his own ministry called Cave – Care for Vulnerable Children. With the help of Tom and Becky Brockelman (American missionaries living in Sierra Leone), Jefferson City FBC and 25 Project.org collectively they were able to develop a program to get these boys off the streets. They are now in homes, going to school, learning about Christ’s love for them and they are succeeding. This past month on a 25 Project mission trip 12 boys were baptized. God is doing great things through Charles and his partner ministries.

While planning my fourth trip to Sierra Leone in December 2013 with our team from McKinney FBC, we began to explore what God might have us do. We had mostly been helping with construction projects but many of the past team members said they were interested in working with the street girls. We were told there are plenty of street girls but they only come out at night. So I reached out to Charles with the text message above. It was after I received that text message that God had planted this seed in my heart. It was over the next three months that I began to feel that God wanted me to something about His precious daughters that were being abused and forgotten. That was the catalyst for the vision for Princess Project.

Sadly, we had to cancel that June mission trip four days before we departed because the Ebola Virus outbreak started to spread across Sierra Leone. This will be my first trip back since February 2014

Would you pray tonight for the following things for me today?
1. That God will show me what to pray for while I’m on this trip.
2. That God will lead us in the direction He wants us to go and make it abundantly clear.
3. That God will prompt us with the questions that need to be asked to understand how to help these girls.
4. That God will protect these precious girls as they try to survive one more night on the streets.

Thank you friend!

In Christ,

Mike Di Leo