The Lebanese author of this story is known to me. She prefers that both her name and the name of the center where she works be withheld, not for her own sake but to protect the privacy of the refugee children whose stories she tells. In these two stories, the focus is on the children, but we see also the heart of the worker who in humility tries to understand and meet their needs.
Learning to Love a Troubled Child
I am not going to tell you her real name for reasons you can guess. Let’s just call her Lara; she is 6 years old. Two years ago, she fled to Lebanon with her grandmother, after her father and her mother disappeared in mysterious circumstances in Syria. The father’s death was later announced but the mother’s fate was never revealed. As Lara’s grandmother says “at least I have a death certificate telling me that my son is dead, but I know nothing about his wife. Is she dead, is she alive? Must I keep hope, must I lose hope? I don’t know”.
To make matters worse, their house in Damascus was hit in the shelling and little Lara’s leg was injured. After she came to Lebanon with her grandmother and her auntie, she got better and was able to run and play again. One of the churches in Lebanon reached out to the family with aid and words of faith, and so the family turned to Christ. It was at that time that one of the Christian missions in Lebanon decided to start its operation among the children of Syrian refugees in the area where I live. Lara’s grandmother learned about us from her new “brothers and sisters” in the church, and she enrolled her granddaughter in our center. And so Lara became one of our students.
If I ask you to describe Lara’s character, you would probably get it wrong! No, she is not stunned neither stupefied! She is not calm neither timid. Actually, she is a trouble maker! She creates all kinds of troubles in the classroom. She calls her classmates names, she disobeys her teachers and she hits the other children during recess. Last week was the worst for us at the center with Lara, because she did everything she could to give us all, teachers and students alike, a hard time. I have been trying to deal with this child, sometimes by giving her advice and sometimes by keeping her with me in the administration office when I am working there, so that she doesn’t hit the other children. But on that impossible day it suddenly occurred to me: all that Lara is doing is just screaming for help. This child is in great pain, and this is her way to express it. Some of the children whine and cry and complain. But this child’s pain took another route, that of refusing any kind of authority or routine.
And when her three closest classmates came to me at once complaining that she had either called them names or hit them, I asked Lara to sit in my lap and then I hugged her and started singing to her and caressing her hair and kissing her. And all of a sudden, the child calmed down in my arms and for half an hour she was enjoying all the love that I was giving her. It was the first time I got to meet the real Lara!
When we started this ministry, we knew that many of the solutions we were seeking were not written in any book. But we also knew that love has always been sufficient to deal with any problem, to climb any mountain, and to conquer any hardships. And when there is no road, love is our strength and guide to open the new road for us.
Taking Care of Michael
The majority of the children in our center for Syrian refugee children are Muslims. But we have a sizeable segment of about twenty percent who are Kurds and five Christian children, all of them Assyrians. The last year was the deadliest period for the Assyrian community in Syria. The news was reaching Lebanon about the horrible things happening to the Assyrian villagers and we didn’t know how to approach our Assyrian kids about that. We tried to avoid saying anything about it, and to act as if nothing was happening. I was watching their behavior, looking in their faces for any expression that might give me some information about what was happening in those children’s minds and hearts. And finally during an Arabic session, one of them drew a cross and gave it to me. I saw the opportunity to open a conversation and perhaps to learn about how I could help.
As soon as I asked them about the news they were hearing about the Assyrians in Syria, they started telling me about relatives of theirs, people they knew who got killed in the latest battles. They looked a bit sad and disturbed, but they were not devastated! They weren’t crying and they weren’t terrified. But they kept repeating the word “Haram”(pity!), while talking about their relatives, whom they had lost. I seized the chance to sing an Assyrian song for them, which I had learned many years ago from old Assyrian neighbors. They joined me in singing, and it was like a refreshing moment in the middle of the dilemma. After that I assured them that since they are the descendants of a great ancient civilization that overcame a lot of difficulties throughout history, this difficult time shall pass too. And God bless their hearts, they believed me!
A few days later, I saw Michael (one of the five Assyrians) without his glasses, and when I asked him what had happened, he told me that he accidentally broke his glasses and that new ones are being made for him. Days passed and he was still without the glasses. Here I saw the chance to show that we are by his side and that we care. When the father came to pick up Michael, I called him to my office and I gave him some money and told him to get the glasses for Michael as soon as he can. Two days later Michael was wearing a new pair of glasses and we received two nice pens from the father as a thank-you gift! Answering the needs of these children is taking many shapes. But they know that we are by their side, trying to help with whatever we can.
• Many of the children in the center were illiterate when they came, but after only a few months, some of them started to read and write.
• Some of our children didn’t trust us at first and didn’t let us even hold their hands, but now we have around 60 children who are hugging us and kissing us all day long (perhaps they should take a break!).
• Some of our children were scared and did not trust life and now they are confident and happy because they know that here in the center they are loved and accepted and appreciated.
• Some of the parents drop by every now and then. They shed tears in the administration office and they talk about some of the horrible things that happened to them and to their children. We offer them listening ears, we try to encourage them, and we give them a word of comfort over a cup of tea or coffee. But each story enlightens us about the situation of one of our children and helps us to understand the way we should better deal with a particular child.
The road ahead of us is still very long and very difficult; we need prayers.