I never imagined that I would be like a missionary as a facilitator in Compassion eastern Indonesia, living far from relatives, friends, and everything that satisfies my eye.

West Kutai is one of the regions in East Kalimantan. Here, there is no public transportation; sometimes we need a boat to cross the river, and we never know how deep the river is. We have many challenges here, such as how to fight the paganism that we find everywhere even though Christianity is already here.

I realize that equipping, facilitating and helping 14 Compassion partner churches is not easy. Sometimes it is even exhausting. But along the journey, I find many miracles of God.

Rhyfalis, a registered child in one of our child development centers, has strengthened my faith, increased my devotion with God, and encouraged me. This little boy has opened my heart to the truth that miracles of God are still here. Rhyfalis was hit by a motorcycle and his skull was fractured. Doctors said there was no hope for his life.

Crying, I felt like his family as I stood beside his cold and unconscious body. Then I remembered that Jesus said, “With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.”

Through my tears, I prayed to God to spare this life, because I believe God has a purpose for this little boy’s future. Now, after two surgeries, Rhyfalis is recovered and able to attend his child development center, write to his sponsor, play, study and pray. God loves him so much.

People may have the same purposes and goals, but it is the journey that determines the strength of a vision. God’s miracles are still here, and that’s why I’m still here to serve Him.

Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.” — Mark 10:27, NIV

Prayer: Give us strength and courage through Your miracles, Lord.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Grignard Tanari is a field-based partnership facilitator in eastern Indonesia. Grignard also volunteers in youth ministry in West Kutai, Borneo.

Read all the One in Spirit devotionals.

My Account l Sponsor a Child l Help Babies and Moms l Crisis Updates

Today’s post is about giving you an inside look at how we, the third-largest producer of mail in Colorado Springs, handle the letters you write to your children.

To start with, allow me to introduce you to Joe Cammaroto. Joe is the correspondence supervisor in our Global Ministry Center in Colorado Springs. His team is responsible for processing all the letters you write and all the letters your sponsored children write back to you.

“Since implementing the new online letter writing tool, we receive about 7,000 web letters each day compared to the 1,000 or so we received daily before the tool was implemented.”

To put those numbers into perspective, at least a little bit, here’s a glimpse of what Joe’s team sees everyday.

A portion of one day’s mail, ready to be sorted by country

Sorting bins for East Indonesia and Indonesia

Sorting bins for all 26 countries

Letters packaged and ready to be sent to our country offices via DHL. Letters are mailed once each week to our country offices, every Thursday. We send about 4,000 letters to each country office every week.

As Joe mentioned, we receive approximately 7,000 sponsors letters each day. It takes his team about 5 days to process a letter and get it ready to be shipped to a country office.

Contrast that with the 12,000 letters we receive each day from children to their sponsors. A year ago, it took us 14 days to process a letter after receiving it in-house. Now, after some major process improvements, it takes only about three days.

Before the letters arrive, a lot of work goes into getting them to Colorado Springs. Here's some insight from Abraham about what happens when your letters arrive in Bolivia.

My Account l Sponsor a Child l Help Babies and Moms l Crisis Updates

We began our ministry in East Indonesia in 2005 with the Child Sponsorship Program, and in 2006 we started the Child Survival Program.

Country Director

Georry Nefiantuty Suardi (Tuty) joined the ministry in East Indonesia as country director in 2005. Before this, Tuty served as program manager in the Bandung office.

Prior to joining Compassion, Tuty served as a program manager and trainer for the Indonesian Christian Church Training Center, and as a consultant in human resource development for the Fidicia Consulting Group.

Tuty is the founder of the Youth Empowerment Station in Jakarta and the Youth Leadership Movement in Manado.

She holds a bachelor’s degree in theology from the Christian University of Duta Wacana, a master’s in development management from the Asian Institute of Management in the Philippines, and a master’s in holistic child development from the Malaysian Baptist Theological Seminary in Penang, Malaysia.

Implementing Church Partners

Implementing Church Partners are local churches in East Indonesia with whom we work to deliver child development programs and ministry in the field.

• Spiritual Climate
  The majority of the population in East Indonesia is Christian; the evangelical movement is strong, and spiritual revival activities are held often.
• Unique Challenges
  One challenge unique to Implementing Church Partners in East Indonesia is that there are five major islands, all with different cultures and tribes. This makes it difficult to contextualize the program.

  The “field-based partnership facilitator” approach has been helpful in minimizing cultural barriers, because the partnership facilitator is able to focus on the cultural issues and deal with each partner strategically.

  Another challenge we face is that denominations are fairly divided. When we open a new child development center in a new area, neighboring churches belonging to different denominations are often suspicious of our program and partnership. But in time, denominations are usually able to build solid relationships with each other.



• Typical Contributions
  Implementing Church Partners provide buildings and training for local staff and volunteers.
• Partner Development Activities
  We develop partners by providing tutor and administrative training and training on child protection, as well as offering conferences for pastors.

Child Survival Program

• Caregiver Literacy
  Our Child Survival Program staff members evaluate the literacy level of the mothers and teach each one accordingly. We hold group classes once a week and also have follow-up lessons during home visits.
• Income-Generating Skills
  We offer various income-generating skills according to the different locations of the Child Survival Programs. For instance, the Child Survival Program in Papua offers “noken” making. A noken is a traditional bag from Papau, so it is only appropriate to offer that particular skill in that area of the country.

  Another region of the country teaches a certain type of flower making while another offers cake, bread and pastry making. Generally these skills are taught once or twice a month. If Complimentary Intervention funds are used for income-generating activities, then these classes are usually taught once a week.



• Health Care
  Indonesia has community health centers which are provided by the government and offer most services free of charge. Mothers in the Child Survival Program take their children to these centers for monthly check-ups.

  Pregnant mothers also receive prenatal care, and children and mothers receive immunizations. If medication is needed, there is often a charge, but it is nominal.

  In remote villages, the nearby community health center sends staff members to perform checkups, and they pay specific attention to mothers and children. Every six months we typically pay for routine medical checkups done at the development center by either a general practitioner or a pediatrician. We also pay for ultrasounds for pregnant women.

  If a program participant is ill and has unusually high medical expenses, we will pay the majority of those expenses. Hygiene items such as soap, toothbrushes, toothpaste and shampoo are also provided.



• Nutritional Support
  Once a week, beneficiaries are given nutritious food at the development center, receiving a balance of carbohydrates, protein, vitamins, minerals, and fiber. They also take milk home with them to have during the week.

  Some development centers also provide food to the mothers during home visits. We teach mothers how to cook nutritious food for their families using simple, inexpensive ingredients.

  During home visits, we sometimes cook together with the moms, ensuring they fully understand how to prepare the food correctly and cleanly.



• Involvement of Fathers
  Generally, fathers participate in a family fellowship event once a month. We also invite fathers to help with building projects and cleaning days, and they are usually glad to help with these needs.
• Transition Out of the Child Survival Program
  In order to begin transitioning children out of the Child Survival Program and into the Child Sponsorship Program, we introduce children to activities such as art, singing, and performing songs or memorized Bible verses in front of their classes.

  Children are also encouraged to learn to play appropriately in groups. The purpose of all these activities is to develop their social skills and their self-esteem, so they will not be overwhelmed when they enter the Child Sponsorship Program.

  Mothers in the Child Survival Program need to master at least one income-generating skill, and have the necessary skills to parent their children properly and manage their families well. Also, we hope that the mothers have developed a faith in Christ.



• Areas of Expansion for the Child Survival Program
  We would like to expand further in Papua. Our first Child Survival Program center is located there, but the mothers in this area still struggle a great deal, and many cultural barriers exist. There is a great need for further care and education.

  We would also like to expand into Kalimantan (the Indonesian portion of the island of Borneo), because there are many pregnant mothers and children under five. In this region, mothers adhere to the traditional way of delivering babies which is extremely high-risk.

Child Development Through Sponsorship

Your sponsorship of a child in East Indonesia provides a variety of benefits.

Children are very busy with school during the weekdays, so we conduct our activities in the afternoons after school.

• Meeting Times
  • 3 to 5 year olds: 2 hours a day, 4 days a week
  • 6 to 8 year olds: 2 hours a day, 3 days a week
  • 9 to 11 year olds: 2 hours a day, 3 days a week
  • 12 to 14 year olds: 2 hours a day, 3 days a week

  

• Nutritional Support
  Each child receives a nutritious meal every time he or she goes to the child development center. A typical meal consists of rice, meat, milk, fruit and vegetables. We also give additional vitamins to the children. This food is provided because the lack of nutritious food is still a major challenge in East Indonesia.
• Vaccinations
  Vaccinations are typically given before a child is registered at the development center. Crucial vaccinations, such as polio and hepatitis, are usually given free of charge at the local health clinics, but there is sometimes a charge.

  If a child has not been given a vaccination prior to registration, the child will go to the local health clinic or to the hospital for the needed vaccination, and the Implementing Church Partner will cover the cost if needed.

• Extracurricular Activities or Community Service
  There are sports activities for children of all ages and camps for the adolescents. In suburban centers, they also have lessons in traditional art, music and dance.

  These activities are offered according to the teachers’ availability and the interest level of the children.



• Vocational Activities
  Most of East Indonesia is made up of forest land, and many people work as farmers or on plantations as substitute farmers. So it is important to offer vocational training related to farming and agriculture.

  Because of this, we offer income-generating skills such as farming and English.

• Areas of Expansion for the Child Sponsorship Program
  As with the Child Survival Program, we hope to expand in Papua and into Kalimantan (the island of Borneo) because of the vast needs in these areas.

Complementary Interventions

Our core Child Sponsorship Program, while comprehensive, does not address all obstacles to a child’s healthy development. The Complementary Interventions program was created to work with our holistic child development model to provide additional services, such as our AIDS Initiative, funds for Bibles, disaster relief and water projects.

Typical Complementary Interventions
Complimentary Interventions funds are used for curriculum, prevention and treatment of vector-borne diseases such as malaria and dengue fever, water projects, and non-formal education.

Highly Vulnerable Children

In East Indonesia, most of our highly vulnerable children suffer from severe child abuse or parental neglect. In order to address these needs, we work closely with the Implementing Church Partners to reinforce the importance of child protection.

My Account l Sponsor a Child l Help Babies and Moms l Crisis Updates

Yunita had grown up filled with passion for God. She entered the university in 2001, became involved in a campus ministry, and was entrusted to become the leader of the organization in 2006.

Yunita has a heart for children, and with six of her friends she established a group to help children from a landfill in Sumampow, Manado — children who don’t have the opportunity to go to school. She and her friends go to the landfill every Friday and Saturday to teach the children.

God’s love for her kept flowing. She had taken English literacy as her major, which gave her the opportunity to translate child letters for Compassion East Indonesia. Even though she was a student and didn’t have much time every day, she volunteered to translate 100 letters a week, which she’s been doing since 2006.

God had entrusted Yunita with many things and she felt alive. Though she came from a broken home, she began to believe that she could do anything. But all the success caused her to become arrogant. She thought that she would be able to do anything by her own effort.

When Yunita started to work on her thesis, things changed. Her university lecturer told her that she couldn’t finish her thesis.

“He was always angry with me every time he read my thesis. He told me that I couldn’t write a thesis. I shouldn’t be a university student because I couldn’t understand anything. I was in anguish.”

Yunita felt like God had abandoned her. She felt disappointed and that she couldn’t trust Him. Yunita felt that she didn’t have strength to write.

“I felt empty at that time. I was very embarrassed with myself. I thought that as a Christian leader I could do whatever I wanted to do. Arrogance had gnawed my heart.”

Embarrassed about her situation, Yunita began to lie to her uncle who had paid for her university. She told her uncle that her thesis was in progress.

Until one day God spoke to her.

It was when Yunita was translating a sponsor letter. Although she had read similar words before, Yunita was shocked by what she read in the letter. It was like her eyes were opened.

“God loves you. You are precious. You are special.”

The sentence that sponsors always write for their sponsored children suddenly shocked Yunita.

“I then realized that He never left me even for a second. He saw me as his precious one … I felt encouraged and got new strength.”

With a broken heart, Yunita prayed and gave thanks for God’s blessing in her life. After she surrendered to God, Yunita got the wisdom she had been looking for all this time. After eight years struggling in the university, Yunita finished her degree.

Another responsibility was then given to Yunita. She began to teach children in preschool, which is based in international literacy.

“I’m very happy because He still gives me an opportunity to prepare the next generation.”

Yunita’s days are still filled with passion for God. She gives everything for children as she continues to volunteer translating sponsor letters, helping children in the landfill, and teaching preschool. She realized that the ministry entrusted to her is God’s own.

“God is the one who put His picture on me. I’m just His tool. Now I just rely on Him and obey what He wants from me,” says Yunita.

Yunita is just one of the many translators who sacrifice their time and talents to be advocates for children. Their devotion to children has affected many children across East Indonesia.

My Account l Sponsor a Child l Help Babies and Moms l Crisis Updates

He had the opportunity to take part in the Global Leadership Summit in 2007 in Jakarta. At the meeting, God asked him to challenge his congregation to open its heart more for the people in the community.

Pastor Pangkey felt that God wanted him to look to the others who haven’t yet been reached by our programs and the church. This is how he began the Stefanus Group.

“God spoke to me through the scripture in Acts 6:1-7, which speaks about the seven chosen men. The Twelve Disciples chose Stephen and six other men to be responsible for what the people needed at that time.

“We know that people who live in poverty are not only people in the past. We still meet a lot of people who live in poverty today. They can’t afford their basic needs like meals because many of them don’t have opportunity to have a job or build their own business. They have to struggle every day to fulfill their basic needs.”

Struggling to provide enough room for the 295 children registered children in the child development center, the pastor knew that God would do something. Pastor Pangkey began sharing his vision for the Stefanus Group with his congregation in every service or whenever he had the opportunity to share.

He shared about people who give their love by serving others. He shared the story about Stephen and the other men the disciples chose to serve the needy. He challenged his congregation to share their passion for others by giving meal support.

Much of his congregation felt excited to help people in community. But many of them also rejected the pastor’s vision.

“They didn’t want to receive meal support to help them to survive. They thought if they receive the support, other people will think that they would be the same as the poor people.”

Pastor Pangkey knew that changing the congregation’s paradigm about this ministry wouldn’t be easy, but he didn’t give up. He kept sharing what God asked of him and kept challenging people to become involved in the group. Seven were chosen to serve the needy.

As a beginning, $100 was assigned by the pastor to buy meals. More support then began coming in from his congregation. They gave not only food, but also their time their time and energy cooking the meals. Now people may come to the church anytime if they can’t provide a dish in their home.

Among the seven people who have chosen to join the group are cooking tutors, those responsible for cooking and providing the meals for children in the center.

The Stefanus Group started serving church members who needed meal support, then expanded to include their neighbors who are also in need and couldn’t make dishes in their home.

“The congregation started to inform the church that their neighbors needed meals. Whenever we heard that kind of information, we tried to hurry up and serve their basic needs by visiting them at home. We didn’t think about who they are or from what church they came. All we want to do is to help those who are in need.”

During this time, God blessed the church with more land to build eight rooms for the children to learn. But the blessings haven’t come just to the children; most of Pastor Pangkey’s congregation members are now employed.

Before the Stefanus Group began, most of the people in the congregation didn’t have jobs, and it was very difficult to find jobs. But after they began the ministry and helping those in need around them, church members began to find work.

Because they have begun to earn, the congregation has been giving regular offerings. This has enabled the church to buy the land and build the facilities for the children.

“God has given His blessing to us because He sees us faithful in small things. He has entrusted more to us because of our work in this ministry. We believe what we enjoy today is one of His blessings.”

My Account l Sponsor a Child l Help Babies and Moms l Crisis Updates

Disasters often bring immediate attention from governments, such as the recent earthquakes across Java and Sumatra, which resulted in families losing their most basic needs. But the sad truth is that governments are rarely lobbied to defend the daily safety of children — children who are at risk of abuse and neglect.

In Indonesia, the social bureau stated that there were 6,295 cases of children experiencing violence in the year 2008, either at home or in their community. This figure is five times higher than in 2007.

Although the Indonesian government is a signatory to the 1989 U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child, little has changed for child protections since then. This ambivalence toward the law, both on the part of the government and the individual, means that the number of children neglected or mistreated in Indonesia is increasing day by day.

Compassion Indonesia understands the urgent need to address this issue that often remains silent.

Starting in June 2009, Compassion Indonesia made a number of advances in this area through its Complementary Interventions programs, endorsing training in child protection for child development center workers.

Approximately 329 social workers from child development centers across Indonesia will be trained and enabled to become change agents in their centers, learning how to prevent and respond to violence, abuse, neglect, exploitation and discrimination against children, including children with special needs.

Since June, we have conducted child protection training at almost all of our Java and eastern Indonesia island child development centers. The Sumatra area will receive training beginning in February 2010. Once trained, participants will carry out child protection campaigns in their respective areas.

Ririn, age 27, is one of the participants selected from her church as a representative to join this training. She is a development center mentor and was willing to have additional responsibility to promote child protection in her church area.

Mentors, defined as trusted counselors or guides, have long been considered critical for success in this training because they must first of all be experienced adults, both in terms of knowing our ministry and the job, but also in knowing the nuances of how the ministry operates on a day-to-day basis.

In addition, mentors must be able to understand and interpret the local culture and have good interpersonal skills.

Ririn was sent by the church to join a weeklong training in Yogyakarta for the Central Java region. She plans to transfer her knowledge by training staff, volunteers and parents in her local child development center.

“I have already co-facilitated a workshop on why we need to protect children and how to ensure they get protection. And I assessed the development center to try and improve the standards of care we offer.”

Recently the church and center staff agreed to make several changes to create a safer environment for children. For instance, they renovated the computer activities room and other classes, providing windows for accountability and a higher level of child protection.

Ririn now works at the center as an advisor for children affected by family conflict. She ensures that all activities are well documented, acts as a liaison between the church and the families, and ensures that center operations are carried out effectively and in accordance with Compassion’s policies, values and principles.

She also trains the child protection team to deliver existing program objectives.

In many ways, Ririn’s role as a mentor at her church and the support from Compassion have been the perfect launch into her role as an implementer for child protection in her hometown, too.

For many parents in Indonesia, beating a child is socially acceptable, so the parents must be educated against this. But the Indonesian education system does not accommodate a child’s potential and need for protection.

For that reason they have to be protected by the community or church, which can pay attention to what is going on around them and reduce the incidence of child abuse.

Her community was very cooperative, but unresolved issues for some families in another area meant that it was difficult for the people there to see each other as a “community.”

In her efforts in the fight child abuse, Ririn established networks with other child development centers and churches in her town. She hopes through these networks that people’s awareness will be raised and then a positive action will be taken.

There is great hope and a future for children when we prevent abuse and neglect and protect them as well.

My Account l Sponsor a Child l Help Babies and Moms l Crisis Updates

You can now find all of those maps in our Flickr account.

My Account l Sponsor a Child l Help Babies and Moms l Crisis Updates