Life Lines: North Dallas Family Celebrating Christmas with their Newly-Adopted Nigerian Orphans

A north Dallas family, The Abebefes, are introducing their two newly-adopted children from a Nigerian orphanage to their first Christmas celebration in the United States.  Dr. David Abebefe, along with his wife, Karen,  and volunteers from their church, Grace Outreach Center, led two medical missions trip to the Ministry of Mercy orphanage in Nigeria, providing free medical care to 900 patients.  And, as a result of their trips there, the family decided to adopt two of the orphans.  The children, ages two and four, arrived here at their new home in November.

The Abebefes have four other children, and are showing their new daughter and son a different way of life.  The orphans were used to a life foreign to any North Dallas family.  At the orphanage, 250 children live together, with half of them sleeping on the hard floor each night.  The children rise at 4:30 a.m. to hunt bugs they will eat for their first meal of the day.  The Abebefe family will show their new family members how to celebrate the true meaning of Christmas, a celebration of Jesus’ birth, along with the principle that it is better to give than to receive. The emphasis at this home will not be on gifts they hope to receive, but how they can give to others, this season and all year long.  

The Abebefes are members of Grace Outreach Center, an interdenominational church in Plano, Texas.  Grace Outreach has supported the MoM orphanage through church-wide efforts:  the teenagers purchased 200 backpacks; the children’s church bought 105 sleep mats for orphans who sleep on the floor; volunteers provided a generator to supply electricity to the orphanage; church families traveled to the orphanage to help and teach their own children about serving.  One family gave up their annual ski trip to go to the orphanage instead.   

Also members of Grace Outreach, the Aguilera family is in the process of adopting four children from the orphanage.  Dan Aguilera and his wife, Miesa, who have three children of their own, just returned from Nigeria two weeks ago.  Dan and Miesa got to hand out the sleep mats to the grateful children at the MoM orphanage. 

The spirit of the season is shining bright in these Plano homes where families have opened their hearts to those who need love the most. 

Grace Outreach Center is an interdenominational church in Plano.  Pastor Gerald Brooks founded the church in 1982.  

See CBS 11 coverage of the Abebefes here