My Brother's Keeper

Genesis 4:9

Then the Lord said to Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?”

“I don’t know,” he replied. “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

I walk on rocky dirt paths and pass huts made of the clay that also paved this road. People call out to me, delighted to see a visitor, and say, "Greetings, sister!" 

Sister Emily. I know this title and give friends similar ones. Brother Francis. Sister Ruth. Brother Lawrence. 

"Greetings, sister," I say warmly to the mother who has lost three small children from preventable diseases. 

So long ago, Cain asked, "Am I my brother's keeper?" We echo this day-by-day. 

Brothers and sisters in Syria, Nepal, Congo, Haiti, Mexico. Our brothers and sisters in Christ and of this earth - but do we keep them? Do we intervene when access to basic human rights have fallen away? Do we even care to intervene? Will these be questions of accountability from God one day? 

I am my brother's keeper. I may fail at this duty often, but the responsibility has been given to some degree. A union set forth by God and His tender heart for His children. James 2:16 says, "If one of you says to them, 'Go in peace, keep warm and well fed,' but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it?"

Ultimately, the Lord is our keeper and our provider, but He has charged us with the task of feeding His children, of loving His little ones. 

Are you your brother's keeper?

Riavo: Changing a Community

Riavo is a Kenyan village located 20 minutes outside of the larger city of Kitale. Several hundred people live in Riavo. Many are refugees to Kenya. Several years ago, they crossed the border from Uganda during the Lord's Resistance Army's infiltration of their country. To keep their families safe from murder and becoming child soldiers, these families moved within the border of Kenya and have set up a village here. The village farms a shared piece of land several acres in size. As a community, they farm this land and share the produce.

There is no water well in Riavo. The closest water source is 3km away, so most people have dug shallow wells in their backyard. These holes are nesting grounds for parasites and contamination. The nearest school is 12km away, so no child in this village is receiving an education.

A Kenyan woman named Mama Rose was compelled to help after hearing the stories from Riavo. She moved to this village, built a hut, and painted it pink so her home would be welcoming to small children. She took in 10 orphaned children into her own home. Every night she sets her table onto her sofa and spreads mattresses on the floor so that these ten children have a place to sleep.

Mama Rose was still disturbed by the lack of education available to this community, so she personally hired a preschool teacher and formed a class of 44 preschool children. These are the only children who live in the village of Riavo and get to go to school. They have no shoes, no uniforms, but their teacher is qualified and teaches them well. The older children often sit outside and listen to the lessons.

Currently the school is being held in a small church building. This church is located 1km from Mama Rose's house, so the small children must gather together, take hands, and walk barefoot between Rose's home and the school three times a day. The community has seen the danger this walk poses for the little ones, so they have been saving up what little they have to built a classroom for the children. They have managed to construct two iron sheet rooms and are hoping to hire a second preschool teacher since there are so many children ready to learn.

Mama Rose realized that children were unable to learn when they were malnourished. Most of the preschool children who were attending her classroom had rust-colored hair and were physically stunted due to hunger. She has begun feeding these children twice a day. They receive millet porridge and four slices of bread in the morning, and rice, beans, and kale in the afternoon. Mama Rose spends long hours each day farming an acre of land in her backyard to come up with most of the food that feeds these children. She buys the rest with some support from CRF.

The biggest need of this community is water. I spoke with a little girl named Joy who lives on the outskirts of Riavo, only 8km from the nearest school, so she is able to walk to school sometimes. She says she is out sick from class three days a week due to water-borne illnesses. One water well has been drilled in Riavo in June, but ideally we will drill another a few kilometers away for those who live on the outskirts of the village, like Joy. The cost of a water well is $5,000.

A future need for Riavo is a school. When so few children are attending school in a community, the cycle of poverty has been cemented for the next generation. No one can read. No one is learning trades. Putting children in a school environment would equip them to transform the community themselves in the next several years. A related need is a boarding section for this school that will serve as a respite center for at-risk girls. Many orphaned girls in this area are becoming pregnant due to sexual abuse from their foster fathers. Girls without living relatives would benefit from a location to stay during school holidays. The cost of a school that includes a small boarding center is $70,000.

Another need is uniforms for the children. In Kenya, uniforms determine whether a school is really a school. For shoes, socks, sweaters, shorts, skirts, and jumpers, the cost of a single uniform is $30. With 44 children, the cost of uniforms is in total $1,320.

A final need is more sponsorships in this area. 10 of the 44 children at this preschool are sponsored, and currently their support is stretched to help the others. More sponsorships in Riavo would be a tremendous blessing to this needy community.

You can make a difference in Riavo. www.christianrelieffund.org

Victor

Victor's abdomen was taut and round. I've never met this little one in person, but he is a child who I've been able to help with my career at Christian Relief Fund. A little boy with a tremendously large tumor in his abdomen, causing loss of appetite and excruciating pain. It endangered his life.

Michael sent me Victor's photograph along with a picture of his house - a crumbling mud hut with a grass-thatched roof. "Is there anything we can do for this child?" he asked.

Victor was only six. He didn't have a sponsor, but it was not hard to find him one with a single post on social media. Within two hours, Victor had his very first sponsor and we were planning a route to his medical care.

So many people donated towards Victor's life-saving surgery. Gifts of $50 or even $200 that helped cover an expensive procedure that would have cost several years of Victor's parents' salaries.

Soon I received a photograph of little Victor with a hospital gown. Sleeping in a cot, an IV hanging from his arm. Playing with a toy car for the first time since his major surgery. Wide-eyed and hurting, but eating a mandazi and drinking a cup of milk. And then Victor sitting up for the first time, standing, even walking by himself.

And within a week, Victor was able to walk out of the hospital on his own. His clothes fit him. His incision was well-healed. He smiled from ear to ear. No more pain, no more tumor, no more life-threatening illness. Victor was healed.

Victor is in his very first year of school now and often keeps busy writing his sponsor letters and showing off his skills at drawing and writing the alphabet. His tumor was not cancerous and is not believed to grow back ever again.

Because of generous donors, his sponsor, and Christian Relief Fund, little Victor Kiplangat now has hope for his future.

Sponsor a child like Victor today. www.christianrelieffund.org/sponsor

Magic

Glow-stick jewelry illuminated the faces of 150 orphans at the Tarakwa Orphanage. Their dark eyes widened at the sight of the glowing bracelets and necklaces. Their faces reminded me of my own reaction the first time I saw glow-stick jewelry. I was the age of many of these little ones.

Passing out glow sticks is like passing out magic.

We danced together that night, dressed in light and color. Our voices raised together to the heavens. Even teachers joined in on the fun and stacked glowing bracelets up their arms like royalty.

When we moved from the auditorium to outside, I saw little girls spinning in circles with ballooning skirts and smiles brighter than their jewelry. Wheels of light stretching around them as they danced, hectic shapes in the darkness. The boys tossed their glowing jewelry like magical frisbees that trailed light and color.

A security guard with a long sword came over and took some glow-sticks for himself. A grin marked by missing teeth, lit by the light of these gifts.

A sleepover at Tarakwa Orphanage turned into a ball. We danced into the night. We were dressed in glowing light. We laughed. We sang. We spun in circles.

And that night, hundreds of glowing bracelets were left dangling on the bedposts of a hundred bunk-beds, illuminating the dreams of children who had finally had an experience of a very normal childhood.

The Most Beautiful Sounds

What are the two most beautiful sounds to wake up to in the morning?

The creaking of a water well pump and the laughter of children. 

I woke bright and early. I had spent the night in a cot at the guestroom of Tarakwa Orphanage, and now sounds echoed all around me, trailing in the room through the my window pane.

A child's shriek was what woke me. It was a shriek of laughter - the pure, uninhibited joy that only children can have. The stomping of footsteps running beneath my window. Shoes against dirt. Giggles. Ever-constant creaking as a water well was pumped again and again. The rush of fresh water against metal dishes and plastic jugs.

Tarakwa Children's Village is a rarity of a CRF program because CRF doesn't really do orphanages. We like to promote and encourage family structures. It is typically healthier for a child to be raised in a family than by an institution, so if there is any living relative or foster family who is willing to take in a child and raise him, we support that environment through sponsorship.

But sometimes there isn't a living relative. Sometimes there isn't a guardian family who is willing to take a child not their own. Sometimes a child is entirely, completely alone. These children go to live at Tarakwa.

The children of Tarakwa have harrowing stories. Jennifer was sold into marriage at age fourteen to get her out of her uncle's care as soon as possible. Susan wandered into a director's home at three in the morning, barefoot, cold, malnourished, and alone in the world. Ronnie and Roonie were found locked in a dark room where they had lived for so long that they had created their own language that only the two of them knew. Fillary has Down Syndrome. Nicholas and Vincent were abandoned and went three weeks without eating anything at all.

The stories are powerful and astonishing. These children are survivors. They've gone from enduring the worst living conditions imaginable to living in an environment that is love-based and Christ-based. They eat three meals a day. They sleep in beds. They have shoes to wear. For the first time, they are drinking clean water instead of roadside water. For the first time, they are running and playing in the morning before school because they have the strength and the freedom to do so.

Staying at Tarakwa, surrounded by children who have been through the worst and now live in beauty, I woke up to the most beautiful sound in the world. I heard sounds that confirmed that those who were forgotten are now known. Those who were unwanted are now chosen and sponsored. Those who were neglected and abused are now nourished and loved.

The creaking of a water well pump and the hysterical laughter of these 120 playing children, right outside my window. There is no sound more beautiful than these.

Lillian

Lillian's story broke me.

At six years old, this child is a total orphan who will never remember her parents. They were slaughtered during the brutal war on Mt. Elgon. Lillian lives with her elderly great-grandmother, a woman in her nineties, and many other small children. The family was starving to death, so a CRF field worker named Peter photographed the children to enter the sponsorship program.

When it was time to take Lillian's photograph, Peter paused. This child was naked from the waist down. Her family could not afford a skirt for her. She could not afford underwear or shorts. She was naked in her poverty.

There is poverty, and then there is total poverty. Lillian fit into the latter. She was desperately malnourished. She was not expected to live past early childhood. No one had bothered to clothe her after all of the years she had wandered around the village, hungry and lonely and so, so young.

To preserve Lillian's dignity, Peter borrowed a neighbor woman's leso cloth and wrapped it around the little girl's waist before he took her sponsorship photograph.

It took less than an hour for someone to choose to sponsor Lillian after I shared her story on Facebook. The support she would receive from sponsorship would provide her with daily food, basic medical care, clothing, and education.

Soon after Lillian was sponsored, I received a new photograph of her. No longer did Lillian stand with sunken eyes and ashen cheeks. She was smiling and already so much healthier than she was before. Best of all, Lillian stood in a crisp school uniform, covered by clothes that proclaimed her modesty and dignity and status as a valuable child, as a loved child, as a nurtured child.

I was so eager to share this photo with Lillian's sponsor, but unfortunately, she had passed away only a week before. This woman felt love and compassion for Lillian, even as she struggled with her own battle of breast cancer. In her last days on earth, Lillian's sponsor lived out Isaiah 58:6-9. She has left a legacy in Lillian, who is now sponsored by this woman's husband.

“Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
    and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
    and break every yoke? 

Is it not to share your food with the hungry
    and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
    and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?

Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
    and your healing will quickly appear;
then your righteousness will go before you,
    and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard.

Then you will call, and the Lord will answer;
    you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I."

Lillian's story broke me, because even with my job as the Kenya Director of a nonprofit, I forget that there are little girls walking around who do not even have a rag to cover themselves. I forget about the forgotten and the voiceless.

Lillian was remembered. She was cherished. And the fasting of Isaiah 58 was carried out in her story.

Good Gifts

A lot of my job is being a bridge between people and how they can serve in ministry. I don't have the money or the ability to help all of the orphans in Kenya, but if I can bridge the gap between a potential orphan advocate and an orphan, then I do not need to help all of the orphans. There are so many people who can take my place.

CRF children write their sponsors letters at least twice a year, and sometimes children share about struggles and needs in their families that sponsorship can't cover. There are almost 4,000 orphans in my Kenya programs. I cannot personally monitor all of their individualized needs outside of what sponsorship provides, but their sponsors can... and their sponsors do.

So often, a sponsor will call and say, "My child's home is leaking during the rainy season, so I would like to give his family a new roof," or "I want to give my child some more clothes; hers are so ragged," or "My child's family needs extra groceries during the school holidays, so I'm going to give a little more on those months." These orphan advocates step forward and intervene in a needy child's life. They give beds and blankets, medical care when needed, school books, and birthday gifts. And I get to step back and be a simple bridge.

Recently this little love was given a brand new dress for her birthday from her sponsor. Her smile tells the story more than I ever could. This child is an orphan. She never receives new clothes. What she has are hand-me-downs, torn, and ragged... and after sponsorship, she has received a brand new school uniform that she treasures more than anything. But today she receives a dress. A perfect, flawless dress that is almost as spectacular as the smile on this child's face.

Generous sponsors who advocate for their children, whether by simply giving $35 a month, or by going above and beyond when their child has a specific need, remind me of God the Father in Matthew 7:9-12.

“Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets."

We are loved by a Heavenly Father who delights to give us good things. It is an act of worship to Him when you give a gift to one of these little ones. And when you become His hands and His feet and His heart for these precious, precious children, you will be immeasurably blessed as well. 

Do unto others what you would have them do to you. This is what sums up our faith. This is what sums up our identity in Christ.

Edwin

This is Edwin. He is a partial orphan living in Rongo, Kenya. Edwin's dad died several years ago and his mom can't find work, as she is bed-ridden from HIV/AIDS. Edwin has 3 younger siblings. While he lives at the Neema Center under CRF support during the school year, he often visits his biological family to help meet their needs as best as they can.

Last week, Edwin approached his field director, Lawrence, and pulled a brand new school book out of his bag, explaining that he had sold a cockrel this weekend to buy his own book.

From an initial three hens given to him by CRF, Edwin has raised fifteen chickens. He was able to sell one to buy a textbook and this month he also gave three to his widowed mother for food. At twelve years old, Edwin is responsible and innovative. He could have used the cockrel to buy himself a soccer ball or candy, but instead he wanted to pursue his education.

I love this story! When you sponsor a child, you are equipping them to succeed. You are helping refine a child's God-given abilities so they can become providers for their own families one day (or right now, like Edwin is).

Caleb

When I met Caleb, he was thin and quiet. I was visiting the village of Metkei in the Rift Valley of Kenya. Although Caleb was shy, he carried with him an air of determination - and between his explanation and that of the CRF field worker, I heard more of Caleb's story.

Caleb is an orphan. He has been on his own since his early childhood. He was able to find odd jobs to make it through primary school, but high school fees in Kenya are much higher. Caleb passed his high school entrance exam with a high score... but he had to repeat the eighth grade. And he repeated it again.

At the same time, Caleb's nutrition was low. He did not always eat every day, and when he did, he had small portions of sukuma wiki (kale meant to "stretch the week") or rice. He was hungry, malnourished, and he could not complete his education. Caleb was at a loss.

A CRF worker found Caleb making a deal with a local black market doctor. He would sell one of his kidneys in exchange for enough money for some food and his high school tuition.

This doctor was sketchy. Caleb may have died from the incision and the procedure. He may have been swindled out of both kidneys and left to die.

Whatever would have happened, a child like Caleb - 14 years old - did not deserve to sell an organ in exchange for some food and school tuition. Immediately, Caleb was taken into the Christian Relief Fund sponsorship program. He found a sponsor and is now making fantastic grades at the Suzy Peacock High School.

Not long ago, Caleb wrote this letter to his sponsor.

Dear sponsor,

I am Caleb, aged sixteen years. I am saying thanks for helping me so that I can continue with my education. I was about to sell my organ, but God heard my prayer and guided me. He showed me another way by which I can succeed with my education. Thank you so much. Education is the key to my life. I will keep on praying for you always1 I love you. Now I know that my future is bright. I was about to lose my life, but you are a hope in my life. Thanks a lot.

Yours,
Caleb

Sponsor a determined, needy student like Caleb today. www.christianrelieffund.org/sponsor

Yellow Water Jugs

The yellow water jug

holds just a little in its bottom

in the early morning

so I can splash my

dark dark cheeks.

Uniform stretched out on my bed,

I wear a faded dress instead.

I stand up tall - upon my head

is the empty

yellow water jug.

The path is long and stretches far.

One way students walk to class;

this way we walk for water.

Dust is stirred by bare

dark, dark feet

like mine and all the other girls',

careful braids and short-cropped curls

and teeth like baby pearls. 

All carrying, just the same,

yellow water jugs.

The men watch us, 

taking tea with big, rough hands,

winking at us with 

dark, dark thoughts 

but we do not meet their eyes. 

The hairs on my arms rise.

Strength in numbers, walking by sunrise. 

I grow thirsty under the sun

but as barren as the dusty path

is my yellow water jug. 

The thorn bush catches my foot

and like a river, up wells

dark, dark blood

but still I smile because I've arrived 

at the end of the long queue. 

Women young and old and thin 

with weary faces, weathered skin 

stand at this daily chore again,

all carrying empty

yellow water jugs. 

The heat is thick and still I wait, 

jug at my feet, skin damp with sweat.

My head bows, casting

dark, dark shadows. 

When the sun is high it's my turn,

so I pump until my muscles burn 

and my dry, dry throat yearns, 

but others are waiting too, so 

I rush to fill my 

yellow water jug.  

The jug balanced on my head, I hurry. 

I don't want to be trapped in the

dark dark night

with the men who always watch.

I make it home, aching, tired.

Grandmother cooks bent over the fire. 

Brother walks in with stick and tire,

looking so smart in his school uniform.  

Grandmother cooks and empties most of 

the yellow water jug. 

It's hard to see through the

dark, dark smoke

but we eat and tonight there is enough. 

Brother talks about all I missed

in class. I ball my fists,

but through sleepy thoughts I listen. 

No need for tears. When the rains come, 

perhaps I'll go back to class again. 

But tomorrow I'll be walking 

with other girls, barefoot, balancing

our yellow water jugs.

Foster Care Timeline (From Training to First Placement)

Hello friends, I know I don't post often, but I am going through the training process to get my foster parent license and I thought I would share the timeline here - as a look-back for me and a help for anyone who might be considering the same.

As I begin, I'm in the very first stages of the training process, but I am curious to see what length of time lapses before my first child placement. The representative said 30-90 days from orientation to licensing, but I've heard stories of much longer lengths of time! We will see.

Before this timeline began were several months of talking to people who have fostered and interviewing with a few various agencies, as I didn't want to make the decision to foster lightly. The agency that I've chosen is the third that I've interviewed with - not including CPS, which I was considering, but I preferred a Christian-based agency for the support system and resources.

Foster Care Timeline:

January 20, 2016 - Interview with representative for a foster agency that I liked, but I didn't feel like I quit fit their needs (they're passionate about foster-to-adopt)

January 21, 2016 - Interview and private orientation for a foster agency that I also liked, but I didn't feel like I quite fit their needs (they're passionate about long-term foster care only)

January 23, 2016 - Conversation with someone at CPS; I was interested, but more passionate about a Christian-based agency

February through July (6 months) - After attending multiple meetings where I didn't feel the Lord saying "yes" and planning a group trip to Kenya in July, I took a break from interviews and meetings and spent time in active prayer about the next step to take

July 26, 2016 - Initial conversation with representative for my chosen foster agency (different agency from the first two in January)

August 2, 2016 - Foster Care Orientation and first training session

August 3, 2016 - TB test

August 6, 2016 - CPR Certification

August 7, 2016 - Two-hour Psychotropic Medication Overview Training

August 19 2016 - Finish reading The Connected Child, an assigned reading for training

August 20, 2016 - Built bunk beds for children's room, purchased smoke detectors, carbon monoxide detectors, and fire extinguisher

September 8, 2016 - Training sessions over sensitive communication, sound relationships, and child development

September 15, 2016 - Training session missed due to being out of the country - making this up during my home study

September 22, 2016 - Training sessions over separation, loss, and grief and child maltreatment

September 26, 2016 - Completed two-hour Trauma Informed Care training and two-and-a-half-hour Medical Consent training

October 26, 2016 - Fingerprinting

November 22, 2016 - Sent autobiography, house and yard floor plans, and dentist and doctor information

December 7, 2016 - Veterinary papers and rabies certification sent

December 13, 2016 - Received wellness check from physician

December 16, 2016 - Cleared TB test

January 21, 2017 - Behavioral Crisis Management Training (4 hours) and Medical Training

January 25, 2017 - Fire safety home check

January 27-29, 2017 - First placement; respite care for 3 children under the age of 5 years

February 3, 2017 - Home visitation

February 7, 2017 - Submitted income information 

Psalm 91

Tomorrow the CRF team leaves for Kenya. I have enjoyed sharing 40 stories with you and I’m sure I’ll have more to share when I return. Please pray for our safety in the air and for our ministry on the ground. 

For my final story I simply want to share a passage in the Bible. When I first traveled to Kenya in 2009, Psalm 91 seemed to appear everywhere. It was spoken aloud on the radio as I drove to the airport, it was the page I saw when I let my Bible fall open, and it appeared in notes and sermons and seemingly everywhere I looked. 

And so as I return to the country I now consider with as much love as I would a second home, here is this precious chapter of the Bible that seems to fit a long journey so well. 

Psalm 91

Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.” 

Surely he will save you from the fowler’s snare and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart. You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day, nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday. A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you. You will only observe with your eyes and see the punishment of the wicked. 

If you say, “The Lord is my refuge,” and you make the Most High your dwelling, no harm will overtake you, no disaster will come near your tent. For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways; they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone. You will tread on the lion and the cobra; you will trample the great lion and the serpent. 

“Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him; I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name. He will call on me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him and honor him. With long life I will satisfy him and show him my salvation.”

Julius's Story

“A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in his holy dwelling. God sets the lonely in families.” -Psalm 68:5-6

Julius’s earliest memory was when he was five years old. He was already living on the streets at that point and he has no memory of any relatives or parents. Julius does not know his tribe, a remarkable thing in Kenya. He has no “mother tongue.” He speaks only English and Kiswahili. Julius grew up completely and utterly alone. 

To survive, Julius spent his days either begging for money with other street boys or selling scrap metals on the roadside. Due to the terrible conditions on the streets, Julius contracted a disease that caused his entire body to shake. 

For 4 years, Julius lived with a kindly neighbor, but her house burned down and he was back on the streets again. Julius began to spend the night at a video store that closed at one in the morning. His health decreased as he struggled daily to survive. 

Three years ago, Julius entered the Christian Relief Fund sponsorship program, went to live at the Kimbilio Christian Academy, and got a sponsor. For the first time he had security in where he lived. He had a real chance to go to school to stay. And he had a sponsor who would become the closest thing to family to him. 

God sets the lonely in families. There is no truer definition of lonely than what Julius has faced in his life. But he is in a family now—his church family, his school family, his CRF family, his sponsor.

In a few days, Julius will meet his sponsor for the first time. They will go on a safari together. They will embrace and talk, face-to-face. 

God sets the lonely in families. He brings together families from across the globe, across cultures, across languages. 

“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” -John 13:34-35

Joyful Poverty

I hesitate a little to share today’s story because I don’t want to make anyone feel guilty about what they might have said before. Please know that I’m not calling you out in any way if you have ever said this, but that I’m only trying to inspire some further thought on poverty and orphan care. 

One misconception a lot of people have is that impoverished children are incredibly happy. While it’s true that these children find joy apart from material possessions and American comforts, I think labeling African orphans with a broad label of “they’re always happy” can be damaging to relief work. 

So I will be clear. Suffering children aren’t always happy. They’re malnourished; their stomachs ache from hunger and their bodies are physically weak. They have diarrhea from parasites caused by drinking unclean water. This makes them feel fatigued and nauseated. These children miss their parents—and that grief and trauma is very real. When you see a slum in a developing country, tragedy is there. Sorrow is there.  

Truly, I don’t want to make anyone feel silly for having said that poor children are happy. There are many reasons to say this. The children’s happiness is not tied to material comforts, unlike many American children’s. I have seen so much more graciousness and thankfulness for small things among orphans than I have among American kids—they know what it is to go without, so many are thankful and joyful when they do receive. There is joy that extends beyond the lack of nice toys or a soft bed. Also, when you visit a school full of children receiving help, they still do experience hardship and grief, but they are flourishing. For the first time they’re able to live as children, and this is a wonderful reason for the joy that you see. And finally, when you meet children who love Jesus, his joy is in them—and that shines brighter than everything. 

So there is joy among people who live in poverty. But there is also grief. 

Please remember that if an orphan is malnourished and ill and without a family, they’re not always happy. They experience unimaginable pain. This is why your support matters—because when you sponsor a child, you are easing those burdens. You are providing hope to a child that is hurting.