Compassion Tanzania Team

Sorry for the radio silence, life has been really hectic lately!

I’m late at getting to this, but I just wanted to share about Compassion’s Tanzania Blogging team who are in Tanzania this week (until Friday). If you click on this link here you can see who the bloggers are and read their posts from the week; such as The Resourceful Mommy’s post about meeting her sponsored child, Gussy Sews journey to Gidionis home and the giraffe that made Nester cry.

You can also follow the team on thier Twitter feed

If you click on this link here it will take you directly to Compassion’s website and will show you the children in Tanzania who are currently needing sponsors. I can’t tell you enough how much I highly recommend child sponsorship. Not only does the child sponsored receive an education, but it changes their families life and the lives of those in the community where children are being sponsored. We have two sponsor children and I am so grateful to be able to sponsor them. It really is life changing.

 

Help Children in Poverty and Get a Free T-Shirt

Starting yesterday, until Monday 9 April, Compassion are teaming up with Sevenly to help spread the word about Malaria. Sevenly exist to “harness the power of art and community to build sustainable awareness and funding movements that support charities in their efforts to change the world.”

Here are two ways you can support Compassion

Option 1 – If you sponsor a child with Compassion, between now and Monday 9 April – ending 9.59am PST, you will receive a free t-shirt from Sevenly. Please use this link for this offer.

Option 2 – if you buy a t-shirt from Sevenly, between now and Monday 9 April – ending 9.59am PST then $7 will be donated to give a life-saving Mosquito net to a child in Rwanda. Please use this link for the t-shirt.

A child dies of Malaria every 30 seconds. Compassions Malaria Intervention Fund intervenes by providing children in poverty with mosquito nets – now that’s worth sharing and supporting.

 

 

Compassion

I’m a huge fan of the work of Compassion. I think, if financially able to, everyone should consider child sponsorship. It makes a huge difference to the life of a child who would otherwise not receive an education. As well as educating the sponsored child, they also get other basic necessities, such as clothes, blankets and food. It doesn’t end there though, sponsorship helps transform the child’s family and their community. When you sponsor a child through an organization, like Compassion, it means that they are on the ground there in that child’s community, making a difference. I am in awe at what they do. Everyone has a dream job in life, and my dream job is working for an organization like Compassion. I’m hoping that once the kids are older I will fulfill that dream.

Amy, at Make Me a Mary, has written a great blog post today called Top 10 Totally Selfish Reasons to Sponsor a Child Through Compassion. I only recently came across Amy’s blog, through Sisters in Bloom, I love her heart and the things she writes about.

1. I get a thrill clicking that “Sponsor Now” button. It’s not every day that you get to add a child to your family, and once you’ve met your new love through the Internet it seems you can’t write to him/her fast enough. And you can hardly wait to hear back from them.

2. It helps me learn geography. Of course the first thing I do is look at a map to see where he/she lives. I always learn something because I’m not very good with geography and I don’t know a lot about other cultures. I love how Compassion provides lots of great information about each child’s family, community, and country. It’s so interesting!

3. It keeps close to my heart Jesus’s command to care for the poor and needy. As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve neglected this huge part of the Gospel my entire life. But reaching impoverished children and their families with the message of Christ’s love is at the heart of what Compassion strives to do—and they do it well.

Continue reading here

 

Compassion Bloggers

Currently there are a group of bloggers in Ecuador on a trip organized by Compassion.The trip is for the bloggers to witness firsthand (and blog about) Compassion International’s ministry to children in the highlands near Quito and the Amazon basin. Ann Voskamp, a very gifted writer, whose blog I read is there, along with her husband The Farmer.

I’m not able to blog about this trip as I am away at a conference for a few days. However, if you’d like to follow along, then please go to Compassion’s Bloggers page to view the blog posts. You can also follow along at Twitter.

If you are not currently sponsoring a child through Compassion, please would you consider doing so. They do amazing work. Many children, who would otherwise not get an education, are benefitting from sponsorship, as are their family and the community in which they live.

Unwinding

I feel a real sense from God to return to a call He placed on my heart several years ago, social injustice. Before we went on vacation I finished reading The Missional Mom by Helen Lee. This book was full of stories showing how Mom’s have intentionally moved out of their comfort zones and into missional living through callings God has placed on their hearts. For example a couple of families moved from very affluent areas in the US to more impoverished ones, such as Compton, California, to live, be part of the community and seek the Kingdom of God. This book was the beginning of my unwinding.

On vacation I read Global Soccer Mom by Shayne Moore. Back in 2002/2003 God started to move her life in a new direction. Shayne found herself involved with raising awareness about the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Africa and became one of the original members of the ONE Campaign. I found her story compelling. I knew all the facts, all the answers. You see, back in 2002/2003, I was trying to get a HIV/AIDS awareness program off the ground in the UK. However, this was around the time that our pediatrician announced that our son was not developing as she would like. I found myself thrown into the world of hospital appointments, outpatient appointments, tests and hence the program was pushed to one side never to be picked up again. As I read Shayne’s story I felt like she was doing what I had failed to do all those years before. It was almost like I was reading what my story could have been like, only it was not my story.

Now, I am reading The Hole in Our Gospel by Richard Stearns. He heads up World Vision USA. The story begins with him honestly giving his account of why he did not want to become the president of World Vision, all he did to avoid the job and how he finally surrendered to God’s will. The rest of the book is to do with situations on the ground that Richard has experienced plus stats on extreme poverty etc.

I highly recommend all the books above, but I can guarantee that you will not be the same after you have read them all.

So, what do these books have to do with me? Well, God is reminding me of who He made me to be. You know sometimes you just know that something makes you tick? For example, maybe you are a worship leader and you know that God has put that gift in you, to lead others, write music etc, it just seems so natural? Well, this is how I feel about social injustice. It breaks my heart that so many children die each day due to lack of food and clean water. Knowing there are so many children out there that are orphans due to AIDS torments me. Ten year old children should not be trying to raise their younger siblings, it’s just wrong. Girls shouldn’t be trafficked so that their family has some money for food. They shouldn’t be denied the same rights and opportunities as their brothers.

Now I’m in the process of trying to hear and discern what to do with this. Where do I go next? There are a few organisations which I feel drawn to World Vision, Compassion and Plan Canada Because I Am A Girl. How will all of this look with pastoring the church etc. How is this going to work? As ever, I am a work in progress!