A Fellow of the Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria, Mrs.Regina Ezenwa’s unflinching love for the emotionally-wounded knows no bound. Hence, upon receiving a green-light signal from God, she founded the Roses Ministry, a faith-based non-governmental organization that has since 2007 brought solace to  many lives. The MD/CEO of Rozec Pharmacy in Lagos, Mrs.Ezenwa, recently shared with Vista Woman the activities of the Roses Ministry. Her words:

The Roses Ministry
The Roses Ministry started in January, 2007, following a vision and revelation from God to me. I want to thank God because He did not just give me the vision; He also raised helpers with the same vision.

So, we have been able to work as a team, having in mind, Matthew 25 which says “When I was in prison, you visited me; when I was sick, you came to see me; when I was hungry, you fed me…” These are practically what we are doing in the Roses Ministry; showing God’s love to the hurting. In fact, there was a young girl that just came to the front of our office and collapsed. Since then, we’ve been taking care of her and her baby, and she cannot tell who the baby’s father is. Showing God’s love

We also go out weekly to the ‘’Heart of God Orphanage’’ to take care of orphans as a sort of volunteer job. We do go to Kirikiri Female Prisons regularly, and some of the girls whose lives we’ve touched are even with us  presently. I mean, we’ve rescued many from prostitution and crime. By the grace of God, we have been able to rehabilitate them, help them secure accommodation and empower them to start a trade.

Mrs.Ezenwa...widows should be treated with love

We also have a vocational training department for women and girls where we train them on how to produce liquid soaps, petroleum jelly, insecticides, etc. We actually intend to set up a full scale vocational institute. We also have some elderly  people who we are assisting.   We conduct counseling sessions every day in our office in Lagos, and God has been doing marvelous things through our counseling programme.

Recently, we opened a charity shop here in Lagos. Unlike the charity shops which we find in developed countries where things are sold at almost the same rates as the market price, but whose proceeds are given to charity, we sell at half the market price so that the poor can afford them. All the proceeds also going into the ministry to enable us fund all we are doing.

Two years ago, we donated beddings and mattresses to the Kirikiri Female Prisons, and those items are still serving the inmates till date. Now, we’re focusing on rehabilitating the inmates, not just in the area of finance, but taking that prison mentality off them.

This is because many of them come out of prison with a purpose of still continuing with those things that sent them into prison. So, our focus is to draw them out of the prison mentality and help them know the Lord Jesus Christ first, and then they can be established after that. We are doing this in liaison with a home that also rehabilitates commercial sex workers.

We also have a medical arm through which we work in the area of health, and also organize health talks for young people. Sometime ago, we held one with undergraduates at the University of Lagos.
Treating widows with love

I want to use this medium to appeal that widows be treated with love and honour, and not with disdain. It’s a great pity that some  in-laws and relatives of a man become hostile to his widow as soon as he passes on. If we look at people and know that God made each man and each woman in His own image, and understand that we should see God in every person we come across,  we’ll take things a lot more lightly and be humane in our dealings with our fellow human beings.

The religion that the Lord says is undefiled is taking care of widows and the fatherless. Hence, let us continue to show love to them, no matter the circumstance. Let us also learn to live in peace with them.  It is for the purpose of cheering-up widows that the Roses Ministry decided three years ago to bring widows together annually through our Annual Widows Day programme.

At the last Widows Day which we organized in November 2010, we had over 200 widows. We annually use the platform to assist indigent widows with food items and clothing such as a bag of rice each,  vegetable oil, salt, wrapper, gift of frames, and other beautiful things. But much more than whatever physical thing we are giving them is the spiritual gift which will help them be more grounded and be able to stand with the Lord as their husband, and not depend on any man or woman.

We actually bring them together to show them God’s love because what God has truly called us for is to show forth His love. This is one of the basic components of what we do in the Roses Ministry. These women(widows) are hurting; they need love. Many of them have no food to eat or give to their children! Our plan is that we will be able to establish them. For that, we definitely need sponsors; but we’re not going to look at our sponsorship in terms of human beings because if we do, we’ll derail. God founded this ministry, and we’re relying on Him. We believe He will use whoever He wants to use to assist this ministry. We have some of these widows as members of the Roses.

One of them is actually spectacular.

She came to our Widows Day which we held in 2009, and at that time, she couldn’t put food on the table for her children, and she had no roof over her head. But right now, she has a roof over her head. For the first year, between that period and now, we paid her rent and we’ve also established a business for her. I was speaking with her a few days ago, and she told me that right now, she can pay her rent herself and also take care of her children!

There are some that we have given as little as fifty to sixty thousand naira to start up something, and they have been able to come out of starvation with just that. So, what these women are looking for are not necessarily huge sums! We go through a lot of counseling with them to be sure that we just don’t give them resources which they will end up wasting.  A lot of these women were doing nothing when their husbands were alive.

Many of them have no qualification or skill! So, they end up not knowing where to start once they lost their husbands. But as we do the counseling, God mercifully and graciously reveals to us what He wants them to do! I also think women should know that they don’t have to give up everything just because they are married. There are things you can do within a short time every day; even if it’s when the children have gone to school.

We don’t have social security in this country. You know, abroad, it’s easier for a woman to remain at home doing nothing because even if her husband dies, she has social security to take care of her and her children, but here, we have none. Our government needs to put in place a social security system.

My background
I am the Coordinator of the Roses Ministry. I hail from Anambra State, and I hold a Masters degree in Pharmacy. I worked first with the Rivers State government as a production pharmacist in their manufacturing laboratory before I left for NNPC in Port-Harcourt as a Pharmacist also.

I was there until I had to move with my husband to Lagos. I however continued my work here in Lagos, but somewhere along the line, because I’ve always had that burden to go into community practice to be able to touch lives much more, I started Rozec Pharmacy in 1986. I have a strong solid Anglican background and I’ve also been a staunch member of the Full Gospel Business Men Fellowship since 1988.

These, together with my present church, Our Saviour’s Anglican Church in Lagos, have built me up to be able to effectively carry out my work in the Roses Ministry.’