Our History
Pastor Isaac Wagaba and his wife Rebecca began the children's home in 1996 with two abandoned children.
During the reign of infamous Idi Amin, when Pastor Isaac was laying on a heap of bodies, shot and left for dead, he heard a voice "Isaac, I have saved your life so that you may save the lives of my fatherless children... Isaac, I will be the father of those children through you."
Strengthened with energy from God, Pastor Isaac crawled from the pit and ultimately God fulfilled his promise, beginning with two abandoned children.
Today, in Buziika, near Jinja, Uganda, Pastor Isaac serves God who saved him to be a father of the fatherless, by directing a growing and vibrant orphanage and home for destitute children — the invisible children of Africa.
Isaac's Story
In his own words—
Canaan Children’s Home was born after the Lord gave me a vision when in a dangerous time and that was the time when Idi Amin was the ruler of Uganda. He closed all spiritual Christian churches in Uganda and he persecuted the Church openly. Most of our churches were burnt down and many of our pastors killed. I was one of the pastors, who were persecuted but narrowly escaped by the Grace of God, because I was invaded three times because I was the District Overseer and my name was on the death list.
On this third time, I was found at home with my family and they started shouting at us, looted my household property, bound me with ropes and I was put on their truck and taken to Kampala where they had a special place for killing people. On that truck I found five more pastors whom I knew and we became six. We were kept in a room at the house which was called the Nile Mansion and the room was stinking with human blood.
When we arrived there we found when they had just killed some pastors including Bishop Jana Luwum of the Anglican Church in Uganda. We were told to stay in that room for three days. On the third day soldiers came and asked us to denounce Christianity and become Moslems so that we can save our lives. Because of torture and hunger, four of the pastors accepted the be Moslems and they were circumcised and eventually set free.
The other pastors and I persisted and after 3 hours we were told to get ready for death. We were taken outside with our faces blindfolded, our hands held backwards and were shot at. My fellow pastor called John died instantly. I was shot in the right hand and the soldier thought that I had died, and then we were left there. They never knew that I was alive so that is how I miraculously escaped death. After that about 25 of us were thrown on the back of a truck and the driver was commanded to take us to a pit dug in Kampiringisa Forest on Masaka Road, then we were dumped in the pit as dead bodies. Late in that evening, I heard a voice calling, "Isaac, I have saved your life so that you may save the lives of my fatherless children".
In that state, I got a vision in which a lot of children were coming to me and these children were hungry and malnourished. In fact they were like naked, moving skeletons and the voice went on to say, "Isaac, I will be the father of those children through you." Immediately I felt strength in my life and stood up but failed; so I crawled on my knees from the dead bodies. I really cannot tell how, but I found myself in the home of a herdsman who was looking after his master’s cows. I asked him to help me because I had come from a dangerous situation. He welcomed me and nursed my wound. He was my Good Samaritan and early in the morning I was taken on a bicycle to a place where I received first aid and that man paid the bill. I recovered after 5 days of treatment in that clinic. I requested my Good Samaritan to go and see my home but when he went there he found everything looted and my house burnt to ashes. My wife had gone to hide at her parent’s home with our children whom we had at that time: James and Samuel. I found myself homeless and I had nowhere to go. So many pastors were escaping into the neighboring country Kenya. I also got an idea of escaping too and the Lord made it possible for me to go into Kenya by train. Within one week I had found my fellow pastors who were already in Nairobi and they took me to the hospital where I was totally healed.
We spent 9 months in Kenya praying that God may give us a God fearing President and God did hear that prayer. The government was overthrown in 1997; we started making arrangements to return to Uganda. The Spirit led me to go back to my Church at Buziika even after my home had been burnt down. I insisted that I go back to that place. I thank the Lord for the brethren in Kenya had contributed some money to help me build a small house to live in. The brethren at Buziika helped with putting up the small house.
In 1982, I had almost forgotten about the vision and the words of the Lord in the forest, but one day a lady came to our church with two children and told us that the Lord had led her to come to our church. She stayed for three days and the fourth day she abandoned the children and escaped leaving the children behind. After 2 days that is when we remembered the vision of becoming the Father to the fatherless. (The two girls are now married.) In 1986, a widower came to us and asked us to help him with his 2 sons because he was sick and old, within a few days the old man died and the children remained with us: one was 4 years old and the other one was 8 years old. We stayed with them and took them to school until they became adults and self-reliant.
CANAAN CHILDREN'S HOME
In 1996 this was the year we found that a home was necessary because of the many children who continued to come to our church with the problem of orphans increasing and abandoned children continued to rise. I remembered the vision in its full light and great conviction came to me to help these children. My wife and I rented 2 rooms near our house for those orphans. We started that home with four children by July 1997 we had received 8 more aged between 4-13 years. We tried our best to clothe and feed them and meet their health needs. To our surprise children continued to come and we could not stop them. By 1998, we had 24 children on roll and I was obliged to open another home at one of our local churches in the village called Seeta. We helped them with the little finances we could get from god. The most difficult problem has been the education of these children but the Lord has been so good, we trusted his providing hand.
1999 Canaan home became a registered Ministry with an orphanage of 30 children and that year was the year when our Ministry was low in finances and we found that we needed some real partners to give us a hand in this work of promoting the vision that God gave me.
GOALS AND OBJECTIVES
- Children are people too and Canaan Children’s Home’s main objective is to bring children out of the street and turn them into good Christians and responsible citizens. We desire that they come out of the life they are leading on the street (i.e. drug abuse and bad moral behaviors).
- It is our desire that the orphans get help, find meaning in life and to belong to the home.
- To help them not to think that life ended when they lost their parents. We desire to be the fathers of the fatherless as the Lord commissioned us.
- We desire that all these children get an education so that they may be self reliant in the future and we want to train them to help other orphans.
- To give these children good health services by building a clinic at the Home and have a doctor available of them.
- To give these children a good education by building primary and secondary schools.