​Something Happened to Daddy

“Daddy, what happened?” Peace asked. “You are coming home early. You are now a different person.”

By Andrew McChesney

Thousands of children are homeless in South Sudan. A girl named Peace Evelyn Joseph sometimes saw them on the street when Father picked her up at the airport.

Peace and her older brother, Boniface, studied at a boarding school in Uganda, far away from their home in Juba, the capital of South Sudan. The children knew that they were special. Only children from rich families could afford to study in Uganda’s capital, Kampala.

Their father was rich. He worked as chief-of-staff for the governor in South Sudan. Every time Peace and Boniface came home for a two-week vacation, Father had a fancy new car. He drove them in the car from the airport.

But other than a few words, Peace didn’t see much of Father when she visited home. Father rose early in the morning to go to the office. After work, he drank with his friends. Peace usually was asleep when Father returned home. Peace missed Father, but she didn’t worry about it too much. She had everything that she could possibly want.

Then during one vacation, Father announced that he needed to have a serious talk.

“I’ve lost my job,” he said. “I can’t afford to pay for your school in Uganda. You will have to stay here in Juba.”

Peace burst into tears. She liked studying in Uganda. All her friends were there.

“Daddy, why?” she said.

“I don’t have the money,” he replied.

“Can you borrow from your friends and repay them later?” she persisted.

Father looked sad.

“My friends have refused to help,” he said.

Peace cried harder. It didn’t seem fair.

Father did some odd jobs but never made enough money to feed the family properly. He also couldn’t afford to pay school fees for books and other things at public school, where Peace and Boniface were now studying.

Finally, Peace and Boniface started staying home from school. Many days they went hungry because they had nothing to eat. Father seemed to have lost interest in trying to find work and instead drank with friends from morning to night.

Mother encouraged Peace and Boniface to move to Grandmother’s house in the village. They could eat from Grandmother’s table and study at the village school for free.

Peace sometimes visited home from Grandmother’s house. She heard that Father got a six-month contract working for the United Nations, but he spent his salary on alcohol and parties. When the contract ended, Father didn’t know what to do, and he borrowed some money from a friend. That Friday evening, instead of drinking, Father came straight home. Mother was surprised to see him walk in the door at 6:30 p.m.

“Welcome home!” she said.

Father said nothing and sat down. Mother brought some food, and he ate. Then he called Peace’s little brother, 7-year-old Junior.

“Please bring me the radio,” he said.

Father tuned the radio, and the first channel he heard was Salvation FM, a Seventh-day Adventist radio station. Father listened intently as someone sang, “Stand Up, Stand Up for Jesus.” Then the presenter invited a pastor to preach.

Father listened to the sermon. The pastor spoke about God’s love for people and what He expects from His created human beings.

When the sermon ended, Father whispered, “Why am I wasting my life when Someone loves me so much?”

He called an Adventist cousin on his cell phone.

“Peter, tomorrow I am coming to the church with you,” he said.

When Father returned from church, he enthusiastically told Mother how he and Peter had prayed for the sick at a hospital before church.

“I have always been healthy and wasted my life. There, people are suffering,” Father said. “I’m very sorry for how I have lived.”

He invited Mother to visit the hospital and church with him. Soon both were baptized.

Peace is now 14 and happy to live at home. She can’t believe how Father has changed. She often asks him, “Daddy, what happened? You are coming home early. You are now a different person. You have changed.”

Father is studying to be a medical missionary, and he works with an organization that helps homeless street children. The first time he took Peace with him to help the children, she was shocked.

“When you were drinking, Daddy, this is the suffering that we went through,” she said. “We were like these children whose parents don’t provide for them.”

Father knew it was true, and he thanked God for giving him a new life.

“I didn’t know what I was doing,” Father said. “But now Someone is directing me, and that Someone is God. Follow me, and you will be like me. You will do better things with Jesus.”

Peace’s father, Joseph Kenyi, describing his children’s surprise about his new ways. (Andrew McChesney / Adventist Mission)