Turning Tables

Despite there being three Orchard Project homes in one Indian state, some children still move far from their homes and families when they are taken to one of Mukti’s Orchard Projects. This was the case for a young boy named Rajesh* who was taken to Orchard Project: Cherry when he was 10 years old. The home is in a large city, so as well as being geographically far from his home in the hills, it was also worlds apart from the village life he was used to. Mr. AP, one of the house-parents, tells Rajesh’s story.

Rajesh found moving to the city very difficult, he especially struggled with his studies and concentrating throughout the school day. Most 10-year-old children prefer not to concentrate in school but after the turmoil of leaving home and moving from the quietness of village life without your family to the jungle life of a happening city, to Rajesh, it felt like an impossible task.

However, despite teachers’ efforts to encourage Rajesh to study, his refusal to do so meant the house parents had to sit him down and tell him that “if he couldn’t cope with his studies, he would have to be sent home.”

Despite feeling lost in the city, Rajesh was more afraid of having to return to the drunken father who beat him daily. The poor young boy suddenly became very nervous.

Yet wonderfully Mr. AP was able to go on to tell how the Spirit led Rajesh to pray for his own studies. Without anybody knowing, young Rajesh was going upstairs every day, away from all the other children, and praying not just for guidance and help in concentrating but that he would become top in his class.

By God’s grace when the next exam results came out, young village boy Rajesh was seated top in his class.

An amazed and almost disbelieving Mr. AP asked Rajesh how he had done so well. His answer, “Every day I prayed and nobody knew, I was praying that the Lord would give me top marks in my school, God only enabled me.”

Through the unseen prayer life of this young boy, God’s name has been glorified and the tables have been turned in Rajesh’s life. The boy who was beaten and nervous now stands tall in front of his peers, no longer at the bottom of the pile.

If the story of Rajesh’s school life didn’t glorify God’s name enough, Rajesh also regularly visits the hospital where through his prayer and sharing of the good news, patients are being healed.