Staff Story
Our paths in life are rarely straight. So it was for Ishaya. He grew up in a Christian home, but in his 30s, he converted to Islam. However, major life events turned the path again and had him rethinking his spiritual foundations, eventually leading him to Hope Walks.
Earlier in his life, Ishaya had studied administration and accounting. His career took him to jobs with an electric utility company and Galmi Hosptial where he worked as an accountant for two years. But things began to unravel with his two failed marriages. His life hit another wall when his older brother died. It was at that point that Ishaya reconnected with God and started biblical studies for two years and eventually remarried.
The right people
No matter how windy the path is, God often puts the right people in the right place at the right time. Ishaya was attending the same church as Pastor Moussa. At the time, Moussa was working for Hope Walks and is now the program manager in Niger. Pastor Moussa approached Ishaya when the role of parent advisor became available to see if he would be interested.
I found out that it was a very huge opportunity for me to share the gospel and manifest the love of Christ to families that I would have the grace to meet at the clinic and during home visits,? Ishaya said.
He?s served many families since taking the parent advisor job in 2016, but one, in particular, stands out in his mind. The father could not bear having a child with clubfoot so he left the mother and child on their own. Once the child was treated and the father saw photos, he traveled to the Hope Walks partner clinic in Niamey to apologize to his wife and Pastor Ishaya. It showed him that God uses the clubfoot program to transform lives physically and spiritually.
Doing the work of sharing the gospel is not always easy in Niger, which has had more terrorist activity lately. This does not deter Pastor Ishaya from leading more children to clubfoot treatment and to a life free in Christ.