Choices.....

            As most of you know I was back in Uganda with a team in April. It was a great trip with several very memorable moments for us all.  The reality for Uganda is that it’s poor country and full of dirt and disease; offering up very few comforts. For a Christian on mission in country there is very little focus placed on the environment or at least until it becomes a direct hazard to the people who live there. Yes, we would like to see the Ugandans healthy and happy, but our mission deals more with their soul. Ugandans are wonderful loving people who for the most part provide more blessings for us than we do for them.

            4 HIM IN AFRICA Ministries started because of the children who attend the church run schools that we visit while we are there. Prior to starting our non-profit corporation we realized there was a need, but we felt we already had our hands full with the work we were doing. It was coming home from each trip with the stack of letters given to us by the different widows and orphans asking for their children’s school fee’s that caused things to change. Maybe it was just a soft heart that set all this in motion or maybe it really was God speaking to my heart about doing more. I would like to think the later is true and that we are on a mission ordained by God for the purpose of changing the future of the children in Uganda. I have spent a lot of time there and I can believe it is time for a change.

            Can you imagine what it means to a child who lives in a village deep in the interior of Africa to hear that a person they don’t even know, who lives on the other side of the world wants to give them a chance, a future, hope? It sounds a little dramatic but that is what happened for some of the children we were with in April. The team was able to sit them down and say your school fees are being paid. For several of them they were handed a gift from their sponsor and then they got to write that sponsor a letter. Something that really does not seem that significant to us ($28.75 a month) makes a world of difference to them. The sponsor has given them a uniform, is giving them lunch at school each day, and the school supplies they need. The schools we work with are Christian schools and the children learn to pray and they learn to thank God for meeting their needs. How cool is it to think God has blessed you by providing your needs and you have blessed a child by providing theirs?

           Every child wants an education and we have a lot who would love to go to school. Unfortunately, this plan has not gone the way we had hoped. Yes, we are grateful for those who are sponsoring children, and somehow I doubt they fully understand the magnitude of their generosity. The issue is we are not getting enough sponsors. We are struggling with our efforts to get the word out about the opportunity to be a sponsor. It was our plan that we would form an organization and then create a web site where people could go to pick the child they wanted to sponsor and pay the school fees at the same time. We had hoped that once a person sponsored a child they would encourage their friends to do likewise and soon everyone would be doing it. It did not happen quite that way, although it did in a couple of instances. Then we tried using social media and the internet to promote our corporation including a twitter account that I still don’t fully understand. Through these efforts we have picked up a few more sponsors, but we still are not on track.

            Our goal is 400 students in the year 2013 and we are still hopeful that can happen. It is all a matter of how you look at it. Some people hear us say that and say wow!!!! While others say is that all? And we feel the sponsors are out there if we can just find them and give them the message. I do not know anyone who could not afford a dollar a day to give a child a future. The price of a bottle of water or the hope given to a child who cannot afford an education ….it’s not a hard choice. I realize may people are already giving that dollar in other places and I really am thankful for that, but those people could tell a friend about this opportunity and help make a difference by finding a sponsor.

            Just like the ripples made by throwing a stone into a pool of water your help with this mission can reach further than we can imagine, first a child, then a country, then a continent, and then who know maybe the world. Won’t you help us by sharing our mission? Sponsor a child or tell your family and friends so that we can reach our goal 400-2013.  

400-2013