Back to Africa: Sherri Gerecke is joining Project Canaan in October

Sherri Gerecke is leaving her job of 20 years, selling her house and moving somewhere warmer, but she isn't retiring.

Gerecke is planning a move in October to Swaziland, a South African country that has the highest incidence of HIV per capita in the world and where around 75 percent of people live off subsistence farming for less than $1.25 per day.

In Swaziland, Gerecke said she plans to live and work on a self-sustaining farm called Project Canaan, a missionary project sponsored by the organization Heart For Africa. Gerecke's love of children and a Christian calling has inspired her decision, she said.

On a recent trip to a Swaziland orphanage, Gerecke met a young African boy named Ndumiso, whom she developed a special bond with immediately. On the first day of the trip, she was taking a bus to a nearby town to distribute blankets with other missionaries when the boy boarded, and his caretakers let him go along for the day.

"He came straight to me and sat on my lap," Gerecke said.

She became the boy's sponsor, and hopes one day she will be allowed to adopt him, she said.

Gerecke began her Christian missionary work about 15 years ago. She made her first overseas mission trip in 2004 doing street ministry in Aberdeen, Scotland. She later traveled to Croatia, where she lived with a husband and wife missionary team and worked as a member of a prayer team.

Her job, she said, has been a large part of her involvement in Heart For Africa. A few years ago, John Bardis, the CEO of MedAssets, began e-mailing employees about the program and made the organization an initiative for the company after he heard about it from a speaker at his church. He encouraged employee involvement, Gerecke said, during the company's "Heart and Soul Days," in which employees are allotted 40 hours per year equal to vacation time to be used for a cause to help others.

"As I read these e-mails, my heart was just breaking," Gerecke said. "I thought, 'I have to do something about this.'"

Gerecke said at a meeting one evening in Swaziland, a missionary she didn't know approached her and said she Gerecke would come to live in Africa. At that moment, Gerecke said, she knew what her calling was, and began making preparations for her move.

She said family and friends, including her sons, Ryan, 26, and Kyle, 22, have been supportive of her decision.

"This has been in the making for quite some time," Gerecke said. "Everyone knew I would eventually move somewhere else to be a missionary."

Because she hopes her main focus will be working with children, she said, she can foresee being a caretaker to the many orphans of Swaziland. She will also work on the 2,500-acre farm, she said, and teach local people about what she can, because she was raised on a farm.

She said she knows she has a mission to fulfill, which is to love and help children.

"I raised my boys as a single mother and got them to where they need to be, which is what I think God would have wanted me to do," she said.

Now, she said, it is time to move on and help others.