KIGALI, RWANDA - Charles Kabeza was one mile from the border when the death squads found him.

The year was 1994, and Kabeza, then 15, was fleeing the genocide ravaging his home country. His father died when Kabeza was 5, and he lost his mother just months before the killings began. Left on their own, Kabeza and his six siblings were attacked as they attempted to reach Rwanda’s border with the Democratic Republic of Congo.  

Kabeza hid his two younger siblings as the death squads, on a mission to ethnically cleanse their nation, killed his two older brothers and two older sisters.

When order returned to Rwanda, Kabeza and his siblings moved to one of the numerous facilities built by the government to serve thousands of children orphaned by the genocide. Kabeza cared for his remaining family and excelled at his studies. Currently he is working on a dissertation at a university in Kigali.

Caleb and Jenny Beck met Kabeza when they moved to Kigali to work in the Helpers in Mission program, a ministry of the Memorial Road church in Oklahoma City. The son of missionaries, Caleb Beck grew up in Kenya. He befriended the genocide survivor and began discussing ways to help Rwanda’s orphans.

In November Kabeza and the mission workers launched the Xtramiles ministry, taking its name from the extra mile that Kabeza and his family were unable to travel. The ministry provided mattresses, kerosene and 3,000 pounds of food for more than 200 orphans in two government facilities recently, Caleb Beck said.

In addition to meeting physical needs, the ministry seeks to encourage orphans in their studies and “to become family for those who have no family,” said Jim Beck, Caleb’s father and assistant professor of missions at Lubbock Christian University in Texas.

In April, designated by the Rwandan government as the month of mourning for genocide victims, the ministry plans to serve at a third government facility, building relationships with orphans and “telling the good news of a God who longs to be the father of the fatherless,” Jim Beck said.

For more information, see www.xtramiles.org.