Food production @ Lifesong School - Zambia

A note from our Lifesong - Zambia (John and Dru):

Just thought you might like to see a few of these photos--the 3rd grade boys shelling the maize by beating it in a bag, the pile of maize that filled one classroom about a foot deep, the shelled maize starting to pile up, and the 3rd grade girls cooking for the the other children.

The children at Lifesong School - Zambia are really proud of their marvelous vegetable garden. What you see is Chinese cabbage and onions. There are thousands which will be transplanted to the other side of the road. Tomatoes, carrots, green beans and green peppers are also coming up.

It began with Bale

God has not forgotten these children...they are being Drawn from Water

Drawn from Water from Drawn From Water on Vimeo.

Life is short. Eternity is long. Advocate.

Life in the midst of death | Mapalo Blessings

Mapalo (Blessings)A note from Dru, Lifesong missionary in Zambia, Africa...

Dedicated in loving memory of Mapalo (Blessings) Mukange (1 April 2004 – 23 March 2009)

Malaria struck in full force the last two months. We’ve taken as many as 14 in one day to the clinic; it is often fatal, as it was in the case of 4-year-old Mapalo. I thought of Ramah crying for her children as I drove Mapalo’s aunt and father home from the hospital the day he died; the entire half-hour trip was accompanied by loud wailing and crying, which only got louder as they were joined by friends and family when we arrived in the compound.

I cried silent tears as I watched the neighbors carry furniture into the yard to make room in the house for the mourners. It is a daily occurrence in the compound, where death prevails; all too often, it is the children who die. Our security guard, Nicodemus, had 9 children; five died in infancy.

How do we celebrate life in the midst of so much death?

I found the answer at the cemetery, when I attended Mapalo’s funeral. This was my first time to attend a funeral in Zambia; I have usually made excuses to avoid them. The cemetery was as busy as an American shopping center the day after Thanksgiving—burials every direction I looked and the roads lined with cars, buses, and large trucks used to transport mourners. After the service, we walked to the area where children are buried. We had to wind our way through mounds scattered throughout, many with no markers; the cemetery is near capacity.

A man dug the shallow grave while we looked on, the wooden coffin we bought was laid inside, and the grave filled. The women patted the dirt with their hands, and a man uprooted a nearby cassava plant and stuck it in the dirt. This plant will wither and “die” but will later revive and form a large bush to shade Mapalo’s grave.

I found this a very poignant reminder that we must die to our old life in order to be reborn into our new life in Christ. The Zambians use this as a symbol of life after death. Mapalo may have left us, but he is enjoying life with Jesus in eternity. This is what we celebrate even as we grieve our losses on earth. We know that our Redeemer lives, and because He lives, we too will live again in a new body that will not suffer or die!

Meet Bob | India Vision Team

Bob joking around and talking with children @ Jyothi Nivas home

Meet Bob.

Bob was a vulnerable child during the first 2 years of his life...

then fostered by a Christian family in central IL, brought to church regularly...

shortly afterwards, God moved in another couple's hearts (from the same church) to adopt Bob and his brother - that was over 50 years ago!

Bob now runs a successful commercial construction company and prayed for several years how he could "give back" to the orphans, adoption, and vulnerable children...

It was an answer to my prayers, when Lifesong for Orphans asked me to become an Orphan Advocate and Vision Team member. It enabled me to give financially, and also my time, gifts, and abilities in a meaningful way...

- Bob Hoerr, CEO of PJ Hoerr, Inc., and Lifesong Vision Team member

What if no one stepped up to the plate to foster Bob?

What if no one stepped up to adopt Bob?

What an awesome picture of the CHURCH (ordinary people obeying God's heart for the fatherless)!

Isn't it fun to see Bob's life LIVED ON PURPOSE by advocating for children!?

Bob cutting ribbon to newly built Computer Lab

Video of Bob using his construction skills to help with Transition Home projects:

Bob's thoughts on SmartGiving with Lifesong

Stephen King, Warren Buffet, Bill Gates and Angelina Jolie: What unbelievers are discovering about giving

Just in case we've ever thought that what we do with our money is our own business...apparently God also considers it His business...

A great blog post by Randy Alcorn below...

-------------------------------------------------

Jesus said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35).

A few years ago, my wife Nanci showed me an article she had found in her Family Circle magazine. The article was titled "What You Pass On." It was written by author Stephen King. He's not a writer known for his theological insights, but what he wrote echoes the wisdom of Ecclesiastes 5:15 in his assessment of the futility of materialism. Buffet, Gates and Jolie will weigh in afterward. Here's what King has to say:

A couple of years ago I found out what “you can’t take it with you” means. I found out while I was lying in a ditch at the side of a country road, covered with mud and blood and with the tibia of my right leg poking out the side of my jeans like a branch of a tree taken down in a thunderstorm. I had a MasterCard in my wallet, but when you’re lying in a ditch with broken glass in your hair, no one accepts MasterCard.

We all know that life is ephemeral, but on that particular day and in the months that followed, I got a painful but extremely valuable look at life’s simple backstage truths. We come in naked and broke. We may be dressed when we go out, but we’re just as broke. Warren Buffet? Going to go out broke. Bill Gates? Going out broke. Tom Hanks? Going out broke. Steve King? Broke. Not a crying dime.

All the money you earn, all the stocks you buy, all the mutual funds you trade—all of that is mostly smoke and mirrors. It’s still going to be a quarter-past getting late whether you tell the time on a Timex or a Rolex. No matter how large your bank account, no matter how many credit cards you have, sooner or later things will begin to go wrong with the only three things you have that you can really call your own: your body, your spirit and your mind.

So I want you to consider making your life one long gift to others. And why not? All you have is on loan, anyway. All that lasts is what you pass on. ...

[World need, especially in Africa and Asia] is not a pretty picture, but we have the power to help, the power to change. And why should we refuse? Because we’re going to take it with us? Please.

...Giving is a way of taking the focus off the money we make and putting it back where it belongs—on the lives we lead, the families we raise, the communities that nurture us.

A life of giving—not just money, but time and spirit—repays. It helps us remember that we may be going out broke, but right now we’re doing O.K. Right now we have the power to do great good for others and for ourselves.

So I ask you to begin giving, and to continue as you began. I think you’ll find in the end that you got far more than you ever had, and did more good than you ever dreamed.

Okay, thank you, Stephen King. I know Christians, sadly, who haven't yet discovered what you've at least caught a glimpse of. Now let's hear from Warren Buffet, Bill Gates and Angelina Jolie.

It’s nice to know that the money will be utilized in a way that helps people's lives. …I get these letters from people thanking me and telling me what a difference it makes…. It's a good feeling to feel that perhaps a million people won't get malaria who would otherwise, or even, on a very small scale, thatsomebody's individual problems have been solved.
— Warren Buffet

Until fairly recently, my plan was to wait until later in my career to begin extensive giving, to allow time for a lot of focus. But I’veaccelerated my philanthropic plans. Melinda and I are convinced that there are certain kinds of gifts—investments in the future—that are better made sooner than later.

— Bill Gates



If I decide to go visit a school in the middle of Kenya, or Russia, the kids will be excited. That's better than having an Oscar.

I went through a depression when I was first famous, because what was I famous for? I didn't do anything great. And I didn't discover anything wonderful.

When I'm in a refugee camp, my spirit feels better there than anywhere else in the world, because I am surrounded by such truth, and family. I feel so connected to just simply being a human being. In these countries, they don't know who I am. I am useful as a woman who's willing to spend a day in the dirt. Maybe it was important for me to know that.

—Angelina Jolie

Okay, this is Randy again. If people who don't personally know Christ, who have never been transformed by God's grace, have learned this much about giving, shouldn't we who are Christ's followers have learned a great deal more?

Let me finish with a giver who wasn't famous, the poor widow. Yet in another way, Jesus made her more famous than all.
Mark writes, “Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury” (Mark 12:41). Notice that it doesn’t say, “Jesus happened to see . . .” No, he deliberately watched to observe what people were giving.

How close was Jesus to the offering box? Close enough to see that some people put in large amounts. Close enough even to see two tiny coins in a shriveled old hand and to identify them as copper (Mark 12:41-42).

Jesus was interested enough in what people were giving to make an object lesson for his disciples (Mark 12:43-44).

This passage should make all of us who suppose that what we do with our money is our own business feel terribly uncomfortable. It’s painfully apparent that God considers it his business. He does not apologize for watching with intense interest what we do with the money he’s entrusted to us. 

If we use our imaginations, we might even peer into the invisible realm to see Jesus gathering some of his subjects together this very moment. Instead of discussing the poor widow, perhaps this time you can hear him talking about your heart and sacrifice and joy in giving.

The question is this: What would He be saying about you?