If you’ve spent more than five minutes looking at the news, reading an update about international mission, or in an underdeveloped context…you’ve felt it.
How will a difference EVER be made? Add financial strain, student loans, being a student yourself, and life in general keeping your pockets seemingly empty – and it’s overwhelming, so you move on to Buzzfeed for some more uplifting news.
Here’s the thing, though. One action now – financial or not – has all kinds of ripples for the future.
As I try to work with our team to encourage people to break cycles with us and join child sponsorship without simultaneously making all my Facebook friends block me for the sake of annoying updates, I started looking at old pictures.
In 2012, there was no presence at all in Canaan. Now a boy that I personally have known since that first 389042_1685448822574_1933458636_nday is sponsored, along with two of his siblings (a big help to a family of over 10 people), and his mother is now active in church and just got baptized.
In the same photo album I see a malnourished, tiny, quiet, sad girl. I remember her. She was either silent or softly crying the whole time we were in the community. This same girl is now unable to be missed as she skips and giggles around the community, has a healthy size and adorable braids, and goes to school through the sponsorship program.
You’ve met Dalinsky if you have been to Haiti. Called “Trouble” so often that he says the english phrase himself all of the time now, he is like a sour patch kid with an intense sweetness right after being playfully rotten. He turned 11 this year and is always around – but only after school, because he is sponsored. He has family members who have accepted Christ and a mother who is SO warm as you walk up to their home – because she knows you are FOR her family. He, too, was around in 2012…caught trying to throw mangoes at a team! As we have grown up together, I am always amazed at the opportunity Breathe has to truly be an influence in this boy’s life as he is growing quickly into a young man – that’s a big opportunity. Sponsorship only opens the door wider.
539674_651534388249_2145576985_n4 years ago, these names only brought tears. “Not enough,” “we can’t help them,” “they are stuck and we are flying home.” These were the thoughts, emotions, and tears cried.
But those are lies. Ones that have no place here.
We gave TIME. We gave PRESENCE. We gave PRAYERS. We gave COMMITMENT – we came back. And when our pockets were empty – God brought even more partners to come give time, presence, and commitment – and the partnership of SPONSORSHIP.
Every team has been a drop. Every prayer has been a drop. Every return 282657_1685450822624_1260625456_nvisit has been a drop. Every share on Facebook HAS been a drop. GOD brings those drops together and all of a sudden, it’s a LOT of liquid. And He continues to bring more drops – and more cycles are broken.
To those of you that feel you can’t do enough…..I get it. I wish I could solve it all before even coming to social media with all of these opportunities. But that’s the thing…they are opportunities for ALL of us to take part in.
Can you be a part of “I remember the year 2016”? Can you commit to share and make conversations about breaking cycles through child sponsorship? We want communities to be impacted, enemies to be loved through sponsorship, pastors to have more and more families pouring in and hearing living water truth for their soul. Your drop isn’t as small as it seems……your words will be the drop God can use to bring more sponsors.
2015-11-08 19.47.34This is an invitation to join us. Time, presence, prayer, words – these drops add up quickly friends.
Before you know it…..your drops will be seen in kids turned teenagers, in families living with new breathe in their souls, with communities impacted by an educated and discipled generation.