Jailer is a descendent of those slaves. He’s from Buenaventura, a port city on the coast of Colombia where most of the population is of African descent.

Buenaventura is a dangerous place for children to grow up. Many children experience abuse and violence within their families, which eventually leads them to lock their heart into an unbreakable shell to protect themselves. Many spend more and more time in the streets in an attempt to escape from reality, learning that only the tough survive.

As a child Jailer watched as this environment destroyed the dreams of his companions, who were seduced by the easy path and ended up robbing or killing at a young age, trapped in a lifestyle that’s not easy to leave.

But Jailer grew up under God’s protection and the care of a devoted mother who, with discipline and dedication, raised her children despite the difficulties of not having a husband beside her. Jailer never knew anything about his dad; he lived at home with his mom, his uncles and cousin.

When Jailer was young his mom worked with a nongovernmental organization doing social work. But the organization closed in that area and his mom lost her job. Since that time she hasn’t found a stable income and now her work includes domestic labor. Such work brings only occasional earnings of $10 to $15 dollars per day.

Jailer’s life changed when his grandmother heard of the work that Compassion was doing in the neighborhood and filled out the paperwork to present him to the child development center. He was accepted into the program, and thereafter he had the opportunity to interact with other children who were learning the same biblical principles.

At the center Jailer found an open space for interaction where he could play, talk and spend time with other kids, without exposing himself to gangs, drugs, alcohol and abuses.

Jailer’s goals and dreams of becoming a professional were threatened by the economic limitations of his family. In most cases such circumstances push children to start working at an early age, closing the doors to new opportunities like pursuing higher education. Thankfully, God had other plans for Jailer.

Due to his outstanding skills and commitment to the church, the center staff proposed that Jailer be a candidate and participate in the selection process for the Leadership Development Program.

In January 2007, he was selected to enter this program, and is now studying civil engineering at La Salle University in Bogota, with three semesters left.

Jailer’s journey has been led by God, but it hasn’t always been easy. He faced many changes, like going from a small town to a big city where he missed his neighbors, friends and family. “The hardest part was not having my mom around,” Jailer says.

One of the most difficult circumstances Jailer faced was because of his skin color, which exposed him to ridicule and rejection from peers who repeatedly assaulted him verbally and emotionally.

The barriers placed by the people who excluded Jailer because of racial bias affected not only his emotional health but also his academic performance, especially when one of his teachers joined these behaviors.

“Last semester a teacher separated me from the rest of the group and advised me not to expect to receive good grades in his class nor even pass it. He told me the best I could do was drop out of the university because according to what he said, black people only could work with a shovel. Meanwhile engineers like him were white people.”

Despite this painful challenge, Jailer knows the purpose of God is bigger than human prejudices. He knows that God, the engineer of his life, created a plan that includes being a professional.

Jailer hopes to help build infrastructure in his hometown by developing bridges and roads. He has seen the corruption that can surround engineering, but he knows he is called to a higher purpose. He knows his life will be a testimony to the importance of having integrity, maintaining the dignity God has given to everyone, and setting a good example of the perseverance and discipline needed to achieve goals.

“I want to show everyone the importance of my skin color, because that is the special design he made for me, a brushstroke that makes me unique!”

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Henry’s fun and funny, he sings in a rock band, he has a passion for his job. And he used to be a sponsored child.

Here’s a little more about Henry, in his own words.

It’s 7:15 a.m. in Bogotá, Colombia, it’s cold, as usual, and I am waiting for the school bus to pick up Juan Felipe, my 5-year-old son.

As we stand at the door of the apartment building we live in we are talking about his favorite TV shows, dinner, games with his friends at school, and other things, just like every day.

The school bus finally arrives, so I give him a big hug and a big kiss and I tell him,

“The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him; and he delivers them.”

I come back to my apartment and Xiomara, my wife, is finishing feeding our little son Lucas. He is only 5 months old and he is happily kicking in his cradle, and he smiles at me as he sees me coming in.

Xiomara and I sit and start talking about how different things were for us when we were children.

To start, none of us had a home like the one our children have. In my case, my father abandoned us when I was only 2 years old so my mother, who never studied, had to work in many things to provide food, study, clothes and a home for me.

At Xiomara’s home, her mother also worked hard to give her the things she needed while her father wasted the money he earned buying alcohol. He also used to batter her mother really badly.

We didn’t have a school bus waiting for us at our front door. I had to walk almost 10 blocks to get to school, and Xiomara had to take the regular bus to get to school, which was very dangerous for a little child in a big city like Bogotá.

Xiomara was a Compassion-sponsored child since she was 5 years old until she turned 17, and thanks to that sponsorship, she was able to study through elementary school and high school, even though her mother didn’t have enough money to pay for her school and buy the books and school uniforms.

My mother worked very hard and she was able to pay the elementary school fees for me. However, she couldn’t do that when I started high school, so a brother of our Church told her about a school where a Compassion-program sponsored poor children and helped them to pay for school and buy uniforms.

Besides, it was a Christian school where they teach children about God’s Word.

I was able to finish high school in that way, thanks to the support of a sponsor. I didn’t know him since I never received a letter from him during the time he supported me economically.

However, no matter who he was or where he is now, I thank God for his life and for caring about helping this Colombian child to go to high school.

My wife and I met at that school where we were both sponsored. We were friends at the beginning, and then we started a relationship.

Thanks to our effort and hard work, we were both able to go to college. Xiomara became a dentist, and she is working as a missionary taking God’s Word to Colombian native tribes.

I was able to study journalism, and after some years working at very big press agencies, I came back to Compassion seven years ago and began serving the children of my country as the Field Communications Specialist in the Compassion Colombia office.

Right now, I am part of the Learning and Support team, which works in the South America area.

Now, as we look back, we realize that what started many years ago as a sad story for two poor children in Colombia, thank God is now ending as a very different story for two more Colombian children who have good parents who love them and teach them according to God’s will: our children.

They have a lovely family, a lot of opportunities in their beginning life, they live in a healthy environment, in a safe place. Their grandmothers have left behind so much suffering, and today they enjoy their grandsons and spoil them the most they can. The future of my sons is shiny and promising.

Two loving sponsors had a very important role in this happy story because they decided to do something. However, maybe they never thought that they were not only releasing those two children, but also their generations; they really broke the evil cycle of poverty.

Thank God for every sponsor in the world that decides to support Compassion International. You are changing the whole world, and your work is having a profound impact on many generations.

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• Join Luz and Vanesa as they look for food by clicking on the image below to a view a slideshow of their search.
• Select “Show Info” in the upper right hand corner of the slideshow to read each photo’s caption.

Upload your photos to our Flickr group. Show us how you see poverty.

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On Sunday evening, March 8, I flew into Bogotá, the capital of Colombia. I was picked up by Edwin Mendivelso, who became my host for the following six days. He and I got to know each other real well.

Edwin brought me to my hotel, and the next day he was waiting to take me to visit my first child. His name is Julian, and he lives on the outskirts of Bogotá.

We took a taxi to Julian’s child development center. One thing about Colombian drivers is that they are some of the most amazing drivers I’ve been with, or they are just very lucky not to be dead. We weaved in and out of traffic, broke about every traffic law imaginable, and managed to arrive at the center in one piece. Every taxi driver afterward operated the same way.

We were heartedly received at the center and several children put on small performances for us. One of the most amazing performances was by Julian himself.

Julian had learned how to take old paper, recycle it, and with a juicer, some water and additional material turn it into new paper.

Afterwards I went to visit Julian, his mother and his sister, and then returned to the center to enjoy a meal with the staff and some of the children.

That afternoon we visited the child development center of a child that I found a sponsor for. Yesmin is sponsored by Bob, my roommate at Florida Bible College.

At first Yesmin was a little shy, but as time went along she warmed up to me and was very happy I was there.

Yesmin had just found out that she was sponsored. I was blessed to show her pictures of Bob and his wife Donna, and tell Yesmin all sorts of stories about them. I went to visit Yesmin’s home and took lots of pictures and video for Bob and Donna.

Around Yesmin’s home, different children came up to me and asked me what the time was. When I left her home, the same children kept coming to me and asking for the time. These, by the way weren’t Compassion children, but children that lived in the area.

It became clear to me that they really didn’t want to know the time, but they were intrigued by this big guy that came into their slums. They wanted to spend time with me. It was a huge blessing, because I got to sit down and just share with them the gospel, and they were so eager.

What also became apparent was that the area had a lot of gangs and they were watching me, and supposedly, though I didn’t see this, they were calling each other trying to figure out what to do with me. Oh, well …  ignorance is bliss.

The next day, we woke up early to take a whole-day bus trip to Medellín. This was a unique experience that I will never forget. The bus looked very similar to a Greyhound bus, but the experience wasn’t similar at all.

The trip took about 10 hours. The drivers of the bus and the passengers were separated from each other by a darkened thick glass wall. And for some reason, the drivers liked to really put up the air-conditioning in the bus. It was about 50 degrees Fahrenheit.

The drivers also liked to play very loud pirated action films in the bus. And the shocks of this bus weren’t always working properly, and the roads weren’t that smooth.

On top of that, drivers took us through the beautiful mountains, frequently using the brakes and weaving in and out of traffic, much like the taxi drivers. The bus drivers went around the curves of the mountains and crossed the double lines, right in the curves — this all with fairly busy traffic. All in all I felt like a James Bond drink, “shaken, not stirred.”

My stomach wasn’t happy with this. Without going into great details, I suggest to everyone, if you go on a visit like this take a roll of toilet paper with you. Trust me, you will thank me later!

Outside of that, the countryside of Colombia is breathtaking. You see the coffee being grown and the most beautiful green mountains with streams in between. I really didn’t regret having taken the bus.

The next morning, I woke up early to visit the child development center of Santiago, my next correspondence child, and two children that I helped find sponsors for.

When I arrived at the center. I was led into a room full of children. I was brought to the front to sit down facing all of the children. Six girls, in three rows of two, started walking towards me, as if they were getting married that day.

I wasn’t sure what to expect, but all of a sudden, they moved aside and behind them was Santiago, right in front of me. We hugged and I was so glad to see him.

Santiago’s parents came to the front. I turned my chair around and the pastor started addressing us. He shared how he was so thankful that I was there and that I was helping the poor of his country. All the while, I was thinking about how I was really the one that was blessed and if anyone was rich, it was them, because they were the ones who were totally dependent on God.

Edwin had mentioned to me that as a sponsor, I was in a sense a representative of all of the sponsors, and so I brought some postcards as little gifts for each of the children. It was a huge blessing to give each of the children a postcard. I got to do this at all of the child development centers I visited.

That afternoon, I had the privilege of visiting Kevin, my pastor’s sponsored child. Kevin is 16 years old and was probably 6 feet tall, which is huge in Colombia.

Kevin is a real sharp young man. He wants to be an engineer, and I would not be surprised if he becomes a Leadership Development Program student. We spoke a lot and I also met his family. Santiago was with us the entire time, which made it even a bigger blessing.

The next day, Edwin and I took the bus from Medellín to Cali. This time I was prepared. I made sure to eat a very dry breakfast. I also had a thick sweater on.

All in all it was a pleasant 10-hour drive. They were showing Nicholas Cage films. I was hoping to see my friend Hunter Gomez on television in Colombia, they didn’t show National Treasure.

One of the first things you notice when you get to Cali is the three crosses on top of the mountain. In the midst of so much deep poverty, the answer was right there on top of the mountain for all to see.

We arrived in a beautiful child development center. Jessica was my correspondence child there, and I spent the whole day with her.

Just three weeks before this, the pastor had been bound by the gangs for several hours, because they wanted to find out if he had money. They eventually set him free.

The pastor took us through the neighborhoods near the center. It was tragic to see the little shacks under the bridge. We had police protection with us, because it was too dangerous to be there alone. These were the very areas that the children were coming from.

Many adolescent boys get involved in the gangs and spend their evenings robbing people and doing drug trafficking.

It was so encouraging to see the light that Compassion was in the midst of this. I even did an interview with a Compassion-assisted child, now 15 years old, who had gotten involved in a gang but then he had gotten saved and was now a light to his surroundings.

Jessica was a delight. She was so excited to be with us. She absolutely loves Hannah Montana and was happy to hear that Hannah Montana got started on DOC, a show where her dad’s character became a missionary with Compassion.

The next day, I took the bus back to Bogotá. I was prepared again, and this time, there wasn’t a big glass wall between the bus drivers and the passengers, and the bus temperature was quite pleasant.

Being in Colombia and having walked through its slums, it is obvious that there is such a deep spiritual need in the country. People eat from the trash piles. Gangs are all over the place, and drugs are in abundance. Despite this, I felt very safe.

For one, Compassion made sure that they kept me safe, and at times we even had police protection. Also, Edwin Mendivelso was a constant guide. I would never have been able to take this trip if it wasn’t for his guidance and friendship. We actually got to know each other quite well, and we had a great time!

If you can, I would encourage you to visit your sponsored children. It makes such a difference. The child is no longer just a picture on a refrigerator, but he or she is a real child with personality. There is nothing quite like it.

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Shoes are draped over the cables, hanging from their laces. They seem to me to be part of the decoration. But later someone explains to me that gangs put them there to mark their territory.

This is a typical day in October, with sun in the morning and rain in the afternoon.

I keep walking under the sun through the streets searching for the student center, and I find all kinds of small businesses along the way, such as small stores where women can buy food to make their daily meals and a few Internet cafes with video games.

Children are visiting the stores. A few minutes later, I cross by a street seller of fresh fish, as a couple of street dogs search around him for food.

Behind the moving people and buses, I spot the student center. I arrive at the same time that Michael and Jeferson do.

We start talking about soccer, the favorite subject of 11-year-old Jeferson, and also talk about video games, the favorite subject of 9-year-old Michael.They tell me that the neighborhood has gangs who rob the people after 10 p.m. A month ago they helped the police to catch a thief.

As we walk to their house, they assure me that one can know who is a gang member and who is not. They say that the six youths there on the street are, who are painting signs on the ground and asking the bus drivers for coins.

They belong to a band of robbers in the night. I believe that. They tell me that the smell in the air is the smell of marijuana; Jefferson explains that the smell is like burned grass.

When we arrive at their house, I meet their mother, Paola, a lady whose face reflects more than her 29 years. The house smells of smoke, and she tells me with shame that she has not been able to quit cigarettes. I meet Lorena, her 5-year-old daughter from her second husband.

Paola lived only six months with her first husband, Nelson, father of Michael and Jefferson. She became pregnant when she was 17 years old. Under the influence of her friends, she wanted to abort the child and took beer boiled with aspirin, but it did not succeed.

Seven years ago she met her second husband, who is Lorena´s father, but they did not live together for very long time. Paola says that the two men were irresponsible, and they had other women. That is why she decided to live alone with her kids.

Paola is working temporarily in cafeterias, selling lottery tickets, selling shoes so she can earn about 50 cents to 3 dollars per day.

Because of all this, Paoloa appreciates very much the student center, because they care for her children when she is working. Because in the streets there is much danger. But the student center is a refuge for them.

It was four years ago that a neighbor invited her to enroll the children in the program. When Jeferson arrived, he was very rebellious. He was not doing well in school. He had low scores, and he did not eat lunch at the center.

One day at the main door of the student center, he threatened the teachers that he would not return ever again. Daisy, the supervisor of the tutors, began to pray for him with the staff and make visits to his house.

One day on his birthday, the student center celebrated Jeferson’s birthday. Then Jeferson began to change. Now instead of hitting his younger brother and sister like he used to, he cares for them. He even washes both of their school uniforms.

Just like many mothers in Bogotá, Paola says that thanks to God the student center exists and that she can work confident that her children are safe and on the right path.

When I asked Jeferson and Michael what they are going to be when they grow up, without any hesitation and with confidence they said they want to be policemen.

Jeferson and Michael say that if there are more police, they would not have so many gangs and drug dealers in the corners and the lives of children would be better in their neighborhood.

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Fernanda, Israel and David are going to their house. From the bus stop, they spent half an hour climbing. Already at the peak of the hill they can see the city.

Here the houses have one floor and are made from cardboard and plastic pieces. A few are made from brick.

Fernanda and her children have been living in this neighborhood since 1999. Since a year ago, she has been living with Antonio, a man about 15 years older, who owns this house. Antonio is a home builder and the stepfather of Israel and David.

Israel jumps to the neighbor’s yard and begins to search through the cornfield for the best corncobs to make donuts (bunhuelos).

Bunhuelos are Colombian biscuits typical for the Christmas season. Israel brings back some corncobs to make the dough.

Everybody is helping in the kitchen, while Fernanda grinds the corn and makes the mixture with cheese, a bit of sugar and salt.

When the dough is ready, they go down the hill to the main street of the neighborhood “Paraiso.” They walk half an hour to where the family has the frying cart, where they are going to fry the donuts.

Fernanda pulls the frying cart from a bus garage and parks it at the front of a warehouse. This place is visited a lot, and more at Christmas time. Fernanda moves her hands in the dough, creating balls the size of golf balls for each donut.

After about two hours she finishes frying the donuts and sends these with David to the student center, approximately five blocks away.

A few minutes later Marien, the director of the child development center, came to them and asked if Israel was ready to buy his Christmas gift.

Israel jumps with happiness. He puts his hands on his face. Just in front of him is the store where the director buys the gifts for all the children of the student center.

There Israel receives a t-shirt, jeans and sport shoes that he does not want to remove ever. Israel says that the last time he received a new pair of sport shoes was two years ago because the last Christmas was a black pair of shoes just for the school classes.

The director of the program tells Israel that within a few hours he will receive his gift formally in the Christmas supper, and she returns to the student center.

Israel has five years at the Compassion program and David eight years. They have learned to be obedient to their mom and they will collaborate in everything with her.

His mother helps to cook and clean up in the student center when it is necessary. Fernanda also appreciates that in the student center she was taught to brush her hair and make their beds. She did not know how to do it before.

Israel knows by memory the name of his sponsors and even has Legos in the original packaging and some cars that they sent on his recent birthday and Christmas.

He has waited for this Christmas Eve as never before because he knows that the angel of God always brings him just what he needs.

The dreams of Israel are alive on each Christmas, and his great dream is to be a firefighter. Being next to his mother on the street, he has seen three fires, and he dreams to help their community in case of a fire.

Fifteen minutes later, Fernanda, Israel and David move toward the student center where a Christmas dinner is prepared.

In November, the center director made a list of things to do with her staff to prepare the presentations for the great night.The youngest children were dressed as angels and followed their tutor Yuli to sing Christmas carols in the opening service.

Then the children from six to nine years old with their tutor Tatiana presented the Christmas drama.

Later the children of 10 to 12 years sang more Christmas carols, dressed in costumes of the Middle East. The adolescents group prepared special songs to recall the birth of Jesus.

Finally, the pastor Elvia Parra offers a sermon of hope in Jesus’ name. With prayers for the blessing of their food, everyone knows that it is time to sit at the tables to enjoy chicken, rice, and as dessert cinnamon pudding and Fernanda’s bunhuelos.

All the student center team are serving the tables. The teachers are dressed in Christmas costumes. Fernanda is in the kitchen helping in the midst of all the bustle.

The main room is decorated with Christmas posters. Children are laughing and talking. One can feel the atmosphere of Christmas, the musicians do not stop singing, while children finish eating dessert.

After the children have finished eating, Marien the director shouts, “It is time to deliver these gifts!” and with one voice they make their “Yesss!” strong, confessing with authority that God is faithful again.

All children receive their gifts with a big smile and with a hug for their teachers. They have already spent two and a half hours since the beginning of the Christmas presentations.

Israel also receives his package, and he decides to go to the bathroom and puts the new sport shoes, pants and t-shirt on.

Afterwards, Fernanda, David and Israel help to clean up the main room and they are prepared to return to their job in the street where Antonio is waiting for them.

There Israel and David show to their stepfather Antonio what they got for this year. It is 9 p.m. and they will spend Christmas selling donuts.

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