September is Blog Month at Compassion International, and this year’s goal is 3,160 children sponsored by September 30, 2013! As a Compassion Blogger, my goal is to share my heart for children in poverty and encourage others to change lives through child sponsorship. If you’ve ever felt called to sponsor a child, I strongly encourage you to take a leap of faith and check out all of the children waiting for a sponsor on the Compassion International website!

Sweet girl.

You just turned two, all cute and cuddly in that Daisy California Fruit box. Grandma’s been canning cherries in mason jars, and you don’t know it now, but you’ll never forget those rows of canned goods in her basement.

But don’t get too cozy in that box.

You see, for a while, in fact, for way too long – life seems best in that box.

You do as you’re told. You do what’s best. You obey and you listen and you stay right in that box on the straight and narrow path.

You’re a good girl.

But after a while, sweetheart? Staying in that box, doing what you’re told, doing what’s best becomes a game of people pleasing. And you’ll never win.

You’ll find yourself stuck in that box, and you’ll want to break free. You’ll want to tear it to shreds or cut it up into tiny pieces or just throw the whole thing out the door. And you won’t be smiling anymore either, little one.

The voices will tell you –

Do what’s right.

Do what’s best.

Do what everyone wants you to do.

Do what you think everyone wants you to do.

Stay in. the. box.

Whatever you do. Do not get out of the box.

But if you listen to those voices? If you let them rule you, guide you? God’s call on your life will be drowned out. You won’t be able to separate His voice from theirs.

So little one, step out. It’s ok. It really is.

Take my hand. Take His hand. Let Him guide you, and forget the rest.

Because His plans, His purpose for your life is out of the box, off the beaten path.

Your heart will beat louder, your smile will beam longer, your days will be brighter – if you trust, and step right out.

Millions of children around the world find themselves in the box of extreme poverty. Bound, constricted, limited – because of their circumstances. Seemingly stuck for a lifetime.

Wondering where the next meal is going to come from.

Sleeping on dirt floors with nothing more than a tattered blanket and flattened box for a bed.

Drinking dirty water, diseased, plagued with diarrhea and malnutrition, no medical care in sight.

Education a luxury, expensive, inaccessible.

And hope? Some days, it’s barely detectable.

But all it takes to help ONE child step out of the box of extreme poverty is ONE open heart. ONE individual, ready, willing to take a leap of faith and say YES to child sponsorship. By sponsoring a child through Compassion International, you help ONE child leap into the promise of hope waiting for him, for her.

Thousands of children are still waiting for a sponsor. Let’s rally around Compassion International’s goal and get 3,160 children sponsored this month!

And one little reminder – you don’t have to sponsor all 3,160 children.

You’re called to sponsor ONE. Or maybe ONE more.

So sponsor a child today. I promise you won’t regret it. The blessing you’ll receive will far outweigh any monthly cost, and you’ll rest easy knowing you offered your hand to a child in need.

But Jesus called the children to him and said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.” Luke 18: 16

Amy 

I was folding laundry, a medium load with lime green polka dotted pajamas, Hawaiian print sundresses, and neon pink shorts. My 8-year-old popped in wondering what she could do to pass time. “I don’t know what to do,” she said. Suggesting creativity was in order, I asked her to think outside the box.

Moments later, I walked upstairs and looked right to find her wiping down the toilet. I figured she was up to something, but continued my mission of getting laundry back on hangers and in drawers. Before long, she came into our bedroom, asking “can you get all of this stuff off of your dresser? I want to make this all clean. I’m going to clean our whole house in case my friend comes over later.” I praised her for her initiative, creative effort, and hard work, and a while later she invited me to see all of cleaning she had done.

The entry way was spotless. She removed what she called “a big mess!”

Her bedroom of cotton candy pink and celery green was perfectly picked up. On top of her bed was the cozy fleece blanket she once noted our sponsored child Bethchaida would love.

And as for our dresser? She managed to displace the clutter elsewhere (which also prompted me to fix a ripped board book that had been sitting there for weeks).

The baby was sleeping, so she put all of the baby’s belongings outside of her bedroom door.

Brother wasn’t home and his room was a wreck, so she shut the door so “nobody would see” or “maybe no one would even know there’s a room there.”

As my daughter led me through the tour of our home, now meticulously cleaned for her friend who might come over, my mind jumped to Angie Smith’s blog post from the November 14, 2012, Compassion Bloggers trip to Peru titled “Esperanza.” That post has lingered in my mind since the day I read it:

She is wiping her brow, and her expression tells me our arrival is a surprise.

The door is wide open and she is welcoming us in, but her other arm motions to the ground, points to the pile of trash, and ends up on the unmade bed on the far side of the room.

I know what she is saying. I’ve done it many, many times myself.

Come in, please…come in.

I wish I could have made it more beautiful for you.

I begin to shake my head before the translator gets a word out, and as he confirms my suspicions I smile and nod at her, assure her that her home is beautiful and we are grateful to be in it.

She wipes her hands on her shirt, explaining that she was just about to leave for the market. I wonder if they forgot to tell her we were coming, or maybe, like me, she’s just lost track of time.

In any case, it doesn’t look messy to me. It’s dotted with stray posters advertising popsicles and bargain prices. Most of them are in English, and she explains that she doesn’t know the words but she wanted to have color on the walls.

She strikes a match and lights a stick of incense, and immediately the room fills with a musty, perfumed scent. She waves her hands, willing it closer to us as a smile finally drifts across her face.

Her son Anibal is 12, and he has the kind of grin that will no doubt make girls weak in the knees one day. I can tell he has a little mischief in him, which I love. He is undeniably charming, gentle in his mannerisms, and shy enough to make you work for sustained eye contact. In other words: a challenge I accept.

His mother begins talking about his animals, and I decide I won’t make the same mistake I did yesterday, when I urged my girls to look at the precious guinea pigs caged in the backyard, only to then have to explain that they aren’t so much “pets” as they are “ the main course.” (continue reading Angie Smith’s post here)

And later in Angie’s post…

She pushes the window open, and then the door.

She’s still apologizing with her body language, no matter how many times we reassure her. She tells us about her other son, a younger boy, who is also in the Compassion program. He receives special services for what they believe to be severe learning delays, and she tells us she doesn’t know how she would do it without Compassion.

One of the other team members begins to ask about the boy’s sponsors: Where are they from? Do they write? What are their names? Does he save the letters?

She motions to the bunk bed where the three of them sleep. I don’t know how long it has been since their father was there, but years at least. She walks quickly, tapping Anibal on the back and urging him in the direction of the bed.

There are moments where you watch with your eyes and know that later, in the quiet, you will hear with your heart.

Her fingers move swiftly, raise the top mattress, and reach deep underneath. Clenched in her hands come letters, one on top of another, and she smoothes the pile and hands it to her son. (read Angie’s whole post here)

Esperanza, a mama in Peru, embarrassed by the lack-of-cleanliness of her home when unexpected guests arrive. Me, my daughter, tend our house like it really matters how clean other people think it is. There’s something that ties us, binds us together across the miles. We’re human, we’re family.

Esperanza, she posts advertisements of popsicles and bargains on the walls of her one-room home for color. And now that I know, I look twice through the magazine I was about to throw in the recycling just to get it out of the way. What pictures might bless our sponsored child, our correspondent child, their parents? What windows of hope might I provide by sending pictures of colorful bugs, a mountain top, a flower-filled valley?

Esperanza, she has her sons hide their sponsor letters under the mattress so they won’t be stolen. I take note, whole-heartedly, and I get it. For the dreams, the secrets of my own heart are hidden away in spaces no one knows but me. And special letters from loved ones? They’re tucked away in those same places. So when I haven’t written our sponsored child or our correspondent child for a while, I remember how precious that contact really is, and I write.

Later that morning as my daughter and I drove in the car, she rambled on and on about her cleaning adventure. She exclaimed “I would love to clean the whole world! First I would clean the insides and then I would clean the outsides.”

She knows knows I’m saving for a trip to visit our sponsored child, but shares that she, too, wants to save her money to visit our correspondent child. In a debate between saving for a manicure and a trip to visit our correspondent child, she decides she’ll do both. “I already have $2,” she says.

It’s true what they say. Once you’ve heard, once you’ve seen for yourself real need, you can no longer live blindly as if the need doesn’t exist. That need? It permeates your being, it changes the way you see, it changes the way you live your life. Because once you know better, you want to do better.

Follow the Compassion Bloggers June 18-22 as they travel to Nicaragua, online at http://compassionbloggers.com/trips/nicaragua-2013/ or on Twitter @Compassion and #CompassionBloggers.

And if you’re ready to make a difference in the life of a child in poverty, sponsor a child through Compassion International by clicking here.

Amy

I was running. The sun had just risen, and light was coming through the palm trees like a bit of heaven on earth.

But as I turned that corner where the invisible boundary between Santa Monica and Venice Beach becomes oh so clear, a homeless woman stumbled in front of me on the path. Her face was beautiful and she was blonde, she was even dressed up but her feet were bare and she was talking to herself. The floodgates of healing opened wide as Plumb’s “Need You Now” played loudly on my iPod.

I had to stop, catch my breath, let the tears stream quietly. For nine years ago, dear sister was lost and in trouble on these streets of Venice Beach. We got on a plane and spent days here, hoping and praying, walking and running, following and chasing, desperately trying to entice sister back home and save her from destruction. But our efforts failed, and it was six years of trauma and drama before there were any signs of hope.

For me, the wounds from Venice Beach and the six years that followed had healed as best as they could this side of heaven. That’s what I thought.

But God alone provides the right time for real healing to begin.

Two hours ten minutes of running the first day, and one hour thirty minutes the next, that’s the time I spent on the path to, through, and out of Venice Beach over a week ago.

I could have stayed comfortable in the hotel workout room, but my soul needed healing. My soul needed to see, to experience the sights and sounds of Venice Beach again, this time in a new light.

So after crossing paths with that stumbling homeless lady, I decided I would face the pain straight on. Rather than run on the outskirts of Venice Beach on the winding path, I’d run straight through. I’d stare down the store fronts forever etched in my mind, I’d look right into the eyes of the homeless residents, I’d let every image seep in and every old memory leak out as it may.

The further I ran, the more I was healed, and by the time I got back to the room I was physically exhausted, but filled with peace I would have never known had I remained safe in the hotel.

And through the healing came another message quiet, but clear  – we’re all homeless without a Savior.

As I ran, I saw glimpses of all humanity in the homeless.

Hollowed out, dried up.

Shuffling around, wandering aimlessly.

Playing it cool, putting on a happy face.

Wasted. Used up.

Seeking, hiding.

Sleeping the day away, riding the wave.

Bent over, worn out.

Abandoned. Alone.

Desperate.

Whether we’re homeless on the streets, or homeless because we have no idea where we’re going, what we’re doing, or where our real home is, we’ve all faced emptiness, uncertainty and desperation in our lives to some degree.

Perhaps all of life makes more sense in light of Easter. A God bigger and more powerful than we can even begin to imagine sent his son, Jesus, to dwell on earth as man. Perfect in every way, He lived in a land that was not his home. He experienced and therefore understands all of human life, the good and the bad. And though it’s hard to believe or even fathom since we didn’t see it happen, He died and rose to offer us redemption and perfect life in eternity. And while we’re here on earth, He heals, He directs, He guides, He offers peace and clarity, and He creates something beautiful with our lives and days – if we’re willing to listen, if we’re willing to believe, if we’re willing to follow.

It’s a gift, and we have free will to accept that gift or not. For me personally? When I find myself in the midst of complete confusion, chaos, and dissatisfaction, I remember this reality, and it’s the only thing that makes sense.

“If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.”  C.S. Lewis

 

He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away. He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”  Revelation 21:4-5

Amy

It’s Friday, which means it’s time for another Meet Me At This Moment for Five Minute Friday post! I spend the last hour of Thursday chatting it up with a group of authentic and inspiring Five Minute Friday bloggers on Twitter (#FiveMinuteFriday #fmfparty). One minute past midnight EST Friday, Lisa-Jo Baker gives us a single word prompt and we all write a blog post centered around that word. We write for five minutes, and five minutes only! In the wjords of Lisa, this is “unscripted. unedited. real.” You meet me at this moment in time…my thoughts and opinions, my joys and sorrows, my dilemmas and dreams. And I receive one of the greatest gifts ever…a regular outlet for processing and expressing my thoughts without constantly editing myself. This is my life, my perspective, unfiltered.

The word of the week is CHERISHED.

I dreamed of sponsoring children since I was a child myself.

Years passed, and that dream never faded.

Last August, we sponsored little Bethchaida from Haiti. Knit in her mother’s womb, handpicked by our family to love from a distance.

Last week, we received a packet for little Djino, our sweet correspondent child from Haiti. He has a sponsor, but we have the privilege of encouraging him through handwritten letters sent miles through the mail.

I want to love on these little ones, let them know they are precious, worthy, cherished.

In 2013, I have a goal to clean out my life (literally and figuratively) and start saving creatively for a Compassion International sponsor trip to Haiti so I can visit one or both of these precious children. We landed in Haiti just one day, and I feel a strong call to return. It is time to let these little ones know they are cherished and worth any and every sacrifice.

But many who are first will be last, and many who are last will be first. Matthew 19:30

Amy

Tuesday, October 16, 2012. Our one day in Haiti, the day that changed me forever. (Read full post here.)

It had been a long day. I was not there to sunbathe. I recognized the need, and I knew it with all my heart. God led us down a path that culminated in me scratching names on a little piece of white paper. These names, these men, the needs they had. Two of them needed clothes for their children. And although I could not see their children, could not see their homes or their circumstances, I could feel it. I knew with every fiber of my being they needed these things.

I acted, I moved, I brought my children and we provided. Not nearly enough, but we provided.

We gave.

But sitting on my heart remains one thing. One. big. regret.

I was able to provide for all of these men but one.

Antonio. He needed clothes for his two-year-old boy. I had a nine-year-old boy, and I was not courageous enough to ask fellow cruise ship passengers, random moms on the beach, if they would be willing to give the clothes off their sons’ backs for Antonio’s son. If I could turn back time, I would strip away all of my pride….and just ask. For Antonio.

The not asking has turned my world upside down. Everything looks different in light of Antonio and his unmet need. The sound of his voice, the way he asked not once but three times for clothes for his child, it will all be forever etched in my mind. And although it has haunted me, made me want to set out on a search for a future cruise passenger who can deliver a package to Antonio for me, I know this experience will ultimately be a blessing in disguise.

Since Antonio, because of Antonio, I experience life differently. Every day.

This just one example…

All it took was one foot in this magical place called the Disney store. Antonio came to mind, tears welled in my eyes. Such an unexpected place to experience memories of that day in Haiti.

Joy to the World and Hark the Herald Angels Sing played in the background.

And my eyes landed on this shiny red hat. Although Antonio’s son may never set his sights on this sparkly red hat that symbolizes youth and fun and play, I can give shelter, protection.

Although Antonio’s son may never find a pair of shiny red boots under a Christmas tree, I can give hope for a boy to keep on walking.

Although Antonio’s son may never get a cool Toy Story bowl for his goldfish crackers or a Toy Story boot cup for his juice, I can give food and drink.

Although some little girl will never experience girlish games of dress up, I can give confidence to press on with a brave and beautiful spirit, a sense of worth.

 

And although some little girl may never get to look in a mirror as glorious and as wondrous as this, I can give her the greatest gift, the greatest reflection of all. That she was made in the image of God, knit together for a very special purpose here on earth, that she is precious and beautiful in His sight.

So today my pride is stripped. I come to you on behalf of little children in poverty around the world and ask for you to take a second look, think about what extra you might give this Christmas.

Compassion International has a goal of raising $20,000 from the Christmas Gift Catalog this month. There are 2,000 Compassion Bloggers. If each site raises $100 from the Christmas Gift Catalog, the goal will be met, and thousands of children and families in poverty will be given hope this Christmas and beyond.

Today, I commit to giving through the Compassion International Christmas Gift Catalog in honor of Antonio and his son.

Will you consider giving…

$4 to protect a child from parasites?

$13 to help a malnourished child survive through emergency feeding?

$20 a Christmas gift for a mom and a baby?

$23 help build water reservoirs for children and families?

$25 to help a mom towards a safe birth?

…or more?

Give creatively, give compassionately this year at the Compassion International Christmas Gift Catalog. To help a child, a mom, a dad this Christmas.

Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Luke 6:38

Amy