“Some days we didn’t have food to eat. The children would be crying from hunger.”
Hunger beat down like the sun as Tutu pressed cassava stems into dry ground, praying something—anything—would grow. Her husband lost his job, and they’d been forced to move. Now she was planting borrowed stems on borrowed ground, hoping for a miracle.
“It started small, but it helped us feed the children. And I just trusted God.”
“We had nothing. Some days we didn’t have food to eat. The children would be crying from hunger,” she said, recounting how she’d stepped outside and began working the soil. “It started small, but it helped us feed the children. And I just trusted God.”
Then Josiah, her son, fell ill. They spent three months in the hospital. She thought she might break.
“Even when I turned away,
God never turned away from me.”
“Back then, things were so hard I stopped going to church. I felt ashamed because I had no offering to give,” she said. “But even when I turned away, God never turned away from me. I would pray every night, asking Him to connect me to a helper.”
Hunger and malnutrition are constant threats in Liberia, with few safety nets to catch families when they fall. Here, in one of the poorest nations on earth, parents often face incredibly difficult choices.
We praise God that Tutu listened to His voice amid her trying circumstances.
“I felt the Holy Spirit speak to me: ‘Get up—something is happening outside.’”
“It wasn’t something I heard about on the radio or from town. It was God who brought me to it,” said Tutu about her initial meeting with a Samaritan’s Purse Eden team. The Eden Project is an urban gardening and livelihoods initiative to help vulnerable people build economic and food security.
“One day, I was in the house lying down when I felt the Holy Spirit speak to me: ‘Get up—something is happening outside.’”
She hurriedly ran barefoot across the road where she saw people gathered. She normally would have been hesitant to join such a crowd, but this seemed different.
“I prayed, ‘God, if they pick ten people, let me be one…You are working on my behalf.’ ”
“They talked to me kindly, and that encouraged me to stay,” Tutu said. A Samaritan’s Purse staffer asked her some questions, and she told him, “I want to be part of this organization.” He took her name down and told her someone would call if she was selected for the program.
“I prayed,” Tutu said, “ ‘God, if they pick ten people, let me be one. If they pick five, let me still be one. You are working on my behalf.’ ”
A Harvest of Blessings
When she saw it all—all the wonderful gifts God had delivered to her—her eyes widened.
The Samaritan’s Purse team brought shovels, hoes, rakes, a wheelbarrow. There were also seeds for lettuce, tomato, beetroot, pepper, and cabbage.
“I had never seen a garden with all these things. That was new to me.”
Our team showed Tutu how to build raised garden beds, how to space her crops for sunlight and airflow, and how to grow vegetables in sacks—a method she’d never seen before but one critical for avoiding erosion and soil diseases.
“I already knew a little about planting cassava—that’s a common food here—but I had never seen a garden with all these things,” she said. “Especially one growing in bags. That was new to me.”
“Even if your land is small, you can still grow a lot.”
She was taught to manage soil health by feeding it proper nutrients—including compost and compost tea—and by shading young crops from the sun using palm fronds. Our team also walked with her step-by-step to prepare the beds, plant at the right depth, care for fragile seedlings, and harvest at just the right time.
“Even if your land is small,” she said, “you can still grow a lot.”
Now a year later, garden beds envelop her home. Because Liberia’s tropical climate provides a year-round growing season, she harvests the plants every few months, providing multiple opportunities to sell produce throughout the year.
“That encouraged me. So instead of just 400 beds, I made 650.”
She’s learned how to conserve water and rotate her crops for better yields. “From my first harvest, the lettuce gave me more money than even the okra,” she said. “That encouraged me. So instead of just 400 beds, I made 650.”
The Eden Project has also taught Tutu how to run a successful small business from the proceeds of what she grows. This includes getting fair prices for her produce, saving money, and reinvesting into the business for future growth.
“After I harvest, I sell most of my lettuce directly from my garden.”
Farmers learn to let buyers see the produce in the gardens and to agree on a price there.
“After I harvest, I sell most of my lettuce directly from my garden. Customers come to me. There’s one man in particular—he comes often, buys the lettuce, and takes it to the market to resell,” she said. “I prefer that, because if I go to the market myself, the buyers there take advantage. They know you can’t bring the lettuce back once it’s picked. But when people come to the farm, you agree on the price together.”
A Growing Trust in God
“God…blesses the work of your hands. You plant the seeds, you water them, you tend to them and God makes them grow.”
Tutu thanks God for blessing her hard work. She honors Him as her provider. She and her husband are taking the children to church again, as she responds to the encouragement of our teams to trust the Lord in everything. Tutu and her husband are even holding regular devotions at their home. With help from the garden profits, they were able to afford a place of their own.
“God doesn’t come down from heaven and hand you food,” she said. “Instead, He blesses the work of your hands. You plant the seeds, you water them, you tend to them—and God makes them grow.”
God is multiplying spiritual fruit in Tutu’s life as well. She’s now teaching others to grow abundance on their land and in their lives.
“That’s part of how I thank God: by sharing what I’ve learned.”
“There’s a young man who drives a motorcycle taxi. One day I got on his bike to go buy something, and when he brought me back home, he saw the garden,” she said. “He came back the next day and said, ‘Auntie, I want to learn. You need to train me.’ At first, I thought he was joking, but he was serious. So I started training him. And now we’re preparing for his second harvest. That’s part of how I thank God: by sharing what I’ve learned.”
“What I’ve learned is this: if you’re connected to Jesus, you don’t have to be afraid. He will work on your behalf even in ways you can’t understand.”
As a growing Christian, Tutu is amazed at how God has taken care of her and her family. Blessed to bless others, her faith in the Lord Jesus Christ is flourishing just like the blooms in her like a garden.
“What I’ve learned is this: if you’re connected to Jesus, you don’t have to be afraid,” she said. “He will work on your behalf—even in ways you can’t understand.”
If you pour yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in the darkness and your gloom be as the noonday.
Isaiah 58:10
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