Our History: Part 2

For part 2 of our history, here's Susan Fry's remembrance of how Eden Children's Village began.

"It was June 1997.  Kevin had a trip planned to Zimbabwe to help my sister and brother-in-law with a plan for the Christian Camp they wanted to build.  We had talked about going to Zimbabwe for a year to work along side my sister, Helen.  We had thought we would go after May 1999, when our oldest son would graduate from high school.  We thought it would be a great experience for our two boys, Joel (then 16) and Ian (then 10).   I saw Kevin’s trip as a good opportunity to check things out and see if our idea was a possibility and for Kevin to give the Begarlys a design for their camp that would help them with their fundraising.

Kevin returned from his trip saying we could not go to Zimbabwe for just a year because there were orphans every where needing help and that a year was not long enough to make a difference.  I got a chance in February 1998 to go to Zimbabwe to bring my mother back to the U.S.  She had been visiting my sister for several months, recuperating from a broken hip and needed help to travel back home.

I was in Zimbabwe for a couple of weeks.  Every day was jam-packed with things that Helen and Mark wanted to show me.  Every night I was so tired, I thought for sure I would sleep, but I couldn’t.  It was like the Lord just would not give me any peace.  One of our visits was to Doma, a very rural farming community, where Neil and Kirsten Kluckow lived.  Mark and Helen would travel to Doma once a month for Mark to preach at the Doma Christian Fellowship.  I learned on that visit that Neil and Kirsten and a couple of other people in the Fellowship wanted to start an orphanage but had no money to fund the project and had no idea how to run it. 

Kevin and I had begun our marriage at Cookson Hills – a home in Oklahoma, run by Christian Churches.  Later we helped open a group home in Bedford, Indiana for The Villages, INC.  Because of our experiences in these two settings and our work experience, I knew we could help them.  That was when I realized that Kevin was right; we needed to make a permanent move to Zimbabwe.    

While in Doma, I met a family who had a safari lodge who said they would give Joel at job at their lodge if he could be there January 1999.  I also found out that because the school year in Zimbabwe started in January, in order for Ian to have a place in the school, he had to be there to begin the school year in January.  So I called Kevin to tell him that he was right, we had to make a long term move, but it had to be by January 1999, not June.  This meant Joel had to graduate a month early, from a school where early graduation was frowned upon.  When the school learned why he needed to graduate early and realized he had enough credits, they were very cooperative. 

I returned from Zimbabwe in March 1998.  Kevin and I would go out every weekend we could book to speak to churches to raise our support.  Because of our many years of working, we had business contacts in many denominations.  We spoke anywhere anyone would listen.  We both continued to work full time and prepare for the move.  In July we got a call that a farm the Neil Kluckow had pointed out to me on a map of Doma was actually for sale.  He had told me that if the farm ever came up for sale we needed to buy it because it came with a lease on 350 acres of farm land that we could use to feed the children.  Now that farm was for sale!  The bank was foreclosing and we had a week to come up with $85,000.  We did not have even $8,500!  Kevin called the bank where we had our home loan and asked about buying a second home.  He gave the details and was told they could write us a check immediately.  When God moves, it is amazing!  We transferred the money and when our brother-in-law went in to pay for the 10 acres and home we were buying (note we had never laid eyes on the place!), there was a spike in the exchange rate that saved us $11,000!  That money was waiting for us when we got to Zimbabwe so we could start the sewing business we needed to open in order to work toward permanent residency.    God is so awesome.

Throughout the months we were raising support to go and the years we have been there, God has revealed himself to us in many ways.  There were so many confirmations that we were supposed to move to Zimbabwe.  We raised our support and worked up until the end of November and then prepared to vacate our home.    We left the U.S. on December 22, 1998.  We had managed to raise enough support for our family of four and the money needed to start up the sewing business and orphanage from March – November.  We didn’t realize until later that most people preparing to go to the mission field take much longer than this to raise their support.    We didn’t know that and just worked to raise our support, very focused that God had called us and he would provide, but we had to do our part by telling others.  We arrived in Zimbabwe on December 24^th, in time to spend Christmas with the Begarlys. 

What a journey it has been!  God has revealed himself to us over and over in the almost 15 years we have been in Zimbabwe.  We have been blessed beyond measure.  We have never regretted our decision to be obedient to God’s call.  When we look around and see all the children who are alive because we said, “Yes, we will go”, it is quite humbling.   We don’t know why God called us, when it seems others might have been better qualified, but we thank God that allowed us to be the ones to begin Eden Children’s Village which has grown into Eden Ministries (orphanage, school, medical clinic and farm). " 

Our History: Part 1

  The story of Eden Children's Village originates in a short missions trip taken by Kevin Fry in June 1997. Here's our story in Kevin's words!

"I went to Zimbabwe on a business trip in June 1997 to assist Mark and Helen Begarly with a master plan for a Christian camping facility south of Chinhoyi.  I was a registered landscape architect, and at the time I was working in a large architectural firm in Indiana.  I did master plans and large-scale land planning as a part of my job, and I knew that I could save the Begarly’s tens of thousands of dollars in fees while generating all the plans and illustrations to assist them with fundraising and construction.  In my mind, my trip to Zimbabwe was going to be a two-week long whirlwind of planning and drawing.  Father God had other plans, however.

Everywhere I went, I encountered orphaned children in dire situations, and it appeared that there was no real safety net for them.  I met dear saints who were trying everything to reach out to children-at-risk.  Derek and Aurell Olivier, from Chinhoyi, had two little boys living in their garage, who had been repeatedly molested by their uncle.  They had nowhere else to put them out of harm’s way.  Over and over again, I was brought face to face with children who needed immediate help, but were not getting the help that they needed.

As the trip unfolded, I became more and more appalled at the plight of the average AIDS orphan in Zimbabwe.  God was in the process of breaking my heart.  Prior to my trip, I had no concern for AIDS victims whatsoever, and I had no consciousness of the little ones left behind.  I had never had any desire to go to Africa even for a visit, let alone moving there!  God was working me over in a big way!

By the end of my trip, I knew that I could never live with myself if I did not do something for AIDS orphans in Zimbabwe.  Because Susan and I started our marriage in therapeutic group foster care, we were very familiar with the things children go through when Mom and Dad are permanently out of the picture.  We knew the deep pain that children experience in the loss of the biological family unit.

Susan and I had a skill set that would be valuable to children-at-risk in Zimbabwe.

It was slowly beginning to dawn on me that God had been preparing us for our divine assignment in Zimbabwe for over 40 years.  Everything Susan and I have ever learned would be useful in an orphanage setting.  We were discovering the reason we were born – a rescue mission for some of the most vulnerable children on this earth."

Our History: Part 2 Coming Soon!

Our History-Introduction

Eden Children's Village has existed since 1998, when Kevin and Susan Fry moved to Zimbabwe, Africa to found it. Few know the full story of how this orphanage, now caring for 165 children, developed out of nowhere, by God's design. So, in the next several posts, we are going to share our testimony of God's faithfulness and vision at Eden. Thank you for taking the time to read and praise God for all He's done in and though this place!