Founder's Profile
"PEARLS is the heart of God and those it draws are drawn to the heart of God."
The Birth of Pearls & Treasures Trust
Aketch Aimba Founder & Director
PEARLS’ was birthed in my heart in 2003 after compromising my sexuality and trying to get my identity from worldly standards. At the age of twenty, I got involved in a wrong relationship and lost my purity. I got pregnant and opted to have an abortion after the man showed no interest for the responsibility.
In the year 2000, I gave my life to Christ but kept my then, second relationship with an unbeliever, and not knowing the biblical standards of purity, I again got involved with him sexually, got pregnant and had another abortion. It was during this time of intense pain and guilt that I started seeking the truth about God’s love and purposes for my life. I wanted complete healing for my heart, mind, spirit, body and soul. I knew that only God could give me that.
With the help of my former Pastors, Ron and Wanda Sommers, I found my restoration, forgiveness, love and acceptance of God. It is then that I have begun to have a deep hunger for the word of God. I longed to know what God says about me and about my sexuality. God has begun to teach me that sex is sacred and an act of worship when done in the right place, at the right time and with the right person. He also showed me that my body is the temple of the Holy Spirit and that I should offer it to him as an act of worship. I knew then that there were ladies out there who have gone through or are going through what I did. I desired to reach out to them and give them what I had received from God. God started giving me so much love and compassion for them. All I wanted to do was tell them that God loves them unconditionally, just the way they are, even if they have nothing to offer back to Him.
One morning as I praying I had an encounter with the Lord through a vision I had. The vision confirmed my ministry towards single ladies. I began to write down His heart as the spirit spoke to my heart. That is how the name PEARLS came about and how the vision was born. I can boldly say that PEARLS is the heart of God and those it draws are drawn to the heart of God.
When God gives one a vision it has to go through stages and a process before it can be carried out. When I got PEARLS I thought that I could start it immediately, but God has and is still taking me through the process. He began to expose me to places where I began to teach on sexuality under mentor-ship. I got more information on sexuality and learnt how to minister to different ages, people of other faiths and many other settings before I could launch on to my vision.
In the months of June and July 2004 I was involved in a mission with Student Venture Kenya and USA – a ministry of Campus Crusade for Christ. We ministered in over thirty High Schools in Nairobi and the outskirts, and in Nakuru. During this time, God gave me an opportunity to minister to the High School girls. Purity, abstinence and identity were some of the topics we tackled in the schools.
In the year 2005 I went through training on sexuality by Crisis Pregnancy Ministries and got involved in their ‘Worth the Wait’ abstinence program. I taught abstinence and sexual purity in different High Schools and churches in Nairobi for one year. It was an eye-opener for me because I was able to run a class for six weeks taking them through different topics on sexuality and challenge them to stand for abstinence and sexual purity.
In June 2006 I attended another abstinence training program by Tanari Trust and begun to volunteer with them in teaching ‘Creating Positive Relationships’ – which is their abstinence program. Just like Crisis Pregnancy’s ‘Worth The Wait’ Program, CPR is taught in schools, churches and other organized groups, but also targets ages 9 -14-year-olds. Here I was exposed to the younger age group, which I had never taught before. In December 2006 I was taken in at Tanari as a Program Assistant.
In April 2007 Family Media approached me to speak on Sexual Purity and share my testimony on the ‘SHE’ program on T.V. This opened doors for me to teach CPR on family radio for two months. Through this, some ladies who have procured abortions opened up and sort counsel. This also opened doors for me to teach in other forums. With the Lord’s leading, I resigned from Tanari Trust to launch into Pearls & Treasures in 2008. I began by going around intuitions teaching on sexual purity from my personal testimony, what God has taught me through His word and from the knowledge I had acquired from these organizations.
At the end of 2009 I attended a Post-Abortion counselling training by Crisis Pregnancy Ministries Kenya. This, I realized, was the piece of the jigsaw puzzle that was missing because soon after that I launched into the post-abortion counselling and running support groups, a forum that is so close to my heart and so timely in Kenya.
So far we have seen over 100 post-abortive women who have found their healing, forgiveness and reconciliation. Over 30 have gone through our mentorship program since we began April 2010 and have reached to schools, churches, universities with the message of life and sexual purity. We are able to get other women to come through our programs by sharing our personal stories in every forum we go to.
Out of this we have been able to sensitize people on the effects of abortion on different forums as well as the local and international TV and radio stations, and print media as well. About 30 babies have been saved through our crisis pregnancy intervention forum.
The main challenge we have faced in the Post-abortion ministry in Kenya is that the Post-abortive women are unable to come out for help because of stigma. So we decided to launch a campaign dubbed “Breaking the stigma of Abortion”. In April last year, we held an open day where we invited women church leaders to come together and help us intervene in this situation. We wanted to create awareness on the Post-Abortion ministry in Kenya, but also to invite them on board to help us break the stigma of abortion by asking them for opportunities to go to their churches and speak about it or to have them speak about in their churches. This bore fruit because we were invited in some of the churches represented at the open day to talk about abortion and its effects and to call out the post-abortive women, and also we were able to run the campaign once a week for four weeks on a radio station owned by one of the churches. We thank God for these opportunities.
My mission at Pearls and Treasures Trust is to create awareness on the effects of abortion. My desire is that people may know the truth they are not told by doctors about abortion. To reach out to post-abortive women and help them find forgiveness, healing and restoration. To walk with a woman in a crisis and help them find a suitable solution other than abortion. To help women make responsible choices on relationship matters, in matters of the heart and self-image, and most importantly their sexuality, and helping them find healing in the same. I am grateful to God for His faithfulness so far.