The Proudest Day of Their Lives: 10 Tailoring Girls Graduate!
This year, we graduated ten more girls from our Tailoring Program. Many of them told us it was the proudest day of their lives! The ceremony lasted over three hours on a hot day, but who would have known. Everybody relished every moment of their triumphant day.
It all began with the girls singing:“You raise me up, so I can stand on mountains, You raise me up to walk on stormy seas. I am strong, when I am on your shoulders,You raise me up to more than I can be.”
The girls sang the words with all their hearts, and afterwards stepped forward to testify of how much God had done in their lives. They didn’t even look like the same girls who had entered the program fifteen months earlier. They were more beautiful, confident, and full of the joy of the Lord.
Betty told us, “I thank God so much for what He has done in my life. I never dreamed that I would be given such an opportunity, but today, here I am. I couldn’t go to school and all hope was gone, but God reached down and picked me up. I give God praise for giving a future to me and my friends.”
After the commencement speeches, the girls came forward to receive their certificates. Every one of them knelt down as the long-awaited pieces of paper were placed in their hands. Then the hoopla began . . . the girls were hoisted up on their friends and families’ shoulders and danced around the room with everyone singing. It was indeed a day they will never forget!
When the celebration finally came to a close, the girls were loaded up in our vans with their sewing machines and taken to the various places where they were going to begin their work. But before they left, Monica shared, “We all lived in hard situations and didn’t know we could reach here today. But being here has taught us how to follow Jesus and how to use these machines to make a good future for ourselves. God has done a great thing for us, and I pray that we are going to help other people who are like we used to be.”
God has truly done a great work in these girls’ lives! They have already opened successful businesses and are serving their communities as ambassadors for Christ. And sixteen more girls have now joined the program, all learning about the goodness of God in their lives.