Many of us think we “know” what faith means. When it is time to put our faith in action, however, it’s another story. Honestly, I have failed the faith test many times, but God’s mercy helps me to stand up again and again.

Last year my family had to make a decision that would affect our lives permanently. We prayed together and agreed to pray individually for some weeks before getting together again. At first, I thought I was praying and trusting, but as the days passed, I was more anxious and weary.

At one point, I finally gave up and poured out my heart to God in prayer. He knew how far I could go. It was then when I began to see His hand working in guiding the decision we were about to make. My soul was finally at rest, and my faith grew stronger. An indescribable joy was flowing inside of me. I knew I passed the test this time. God answered our prayer.

At Compassion, we also get together every week to pray. A staff member once asked for prayer for a child’s critical health. She said, “I know this is a group of anointed people, and God will hear your prayer.” We prayed, and healing came to the child’s body. God did it again! We rejoiced and our faith was strengthened.

No doubt many difficulties have come along in this ministry. But God has placed anointed men and women who stand with confidence that God is in control to watch over the millions of children who will be released from poverty in Jesus’ name. Some day they will join us in faith and intercede for others.

God is there for you; trust Him! You will see great results in your life and in this ministry.

Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. — Hebrews 11:1, NIV

Prayer: Help us, Father, to trust in You even when we don’t see a way out. Amen!

Read all the One in Spirit devotionals.

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The word brokenness refers to the state of surrender and defeat we experience when hardship comes into our usually steady and painless life. No one enjoys the feeling of brokenness, but the powerful benefits it brings to our spiritual growth are immense.

Being broken gives us an entirely new perspective on the Lord’s plan for our lives. We are human beings, bound to earthly perceptions. Enjoying a steady stream of blessings has an interesting effect on most of us: It distorts our view of the Father, often leaving us to assume that He exists for us.

Most of our relationship with God is confined to asking Him to bless us. We ask God for healing, for success, for financial security. We ask Him to bless our family, to bless our jobs, to bless our plans. We ask and ask and ask.

If we are honest with ourselves, most of the time we spend in prayer is not really talking to the Lord at all. Think about it: Who is actually at the center of our prayers?

It may be shameful for some of us to realize that more often than not, we are at the center of our prayers. The end result of this is the subtle belief that God exists for our benefit. This distortion breaks God’s heart and leads us far away from truly knowing Him for who He really is: our King and Creator!

When God says “No,” when He takes away instead of adding more, when He divinely manages what we have, how much we have, and how long we have it, He is helping us keep our eyes on Him.

Do not despise these moments; instead, dwell in humility and recognize these feelings of brokenness as the voice of our Father calling us back into His loving arms.

Brokenness is the antidote to our self-centered nature.

We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. — 2 Corinthians 4:8–10, NIV

Prayer: Lord, help us accept and embrace the moments of brokenness we have, and help us seek Your face in the middle of our suffering. Help our prayer to be focused on You and only You!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Claudia Longorio works as the Complementary Interventions specialist for Central America and the Caribbean. She lives and works in our Latin America regional office in Fla.

Read all the One in Spirit devotionals.

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On behalf of the children and God we serve, thank you for the abundant love you share with the world. Happy Thanksgiving!

I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.
- Abraham Lincoln, Oct. 3, 1863

Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth.
Worship the LORD with gladness;
come before him with joyful songs.
Know that the LORD is God.
It is he who made us, and we are his;
we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise;
give thanks to him and praise his name.
For the LORD is good and his love endures forever;
his faithfulness continues through all generations.
– Psalm 100 (NIV)

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Recently, I traveled to our Compassion Canada office for a week of meetings. But instead of sitting in meetings all day, I found a very tricky way of getting out of them: I came down with appendicitis.

Appendicitis doesn’t sound that scary, but when you’re pregnant — much scarier.

Thankfully, I was blessed to be in a developed country near one of the best ob-gyn facilities in the area. I had a quick operation, and my baby came through like a kicking champ (kicking all my sore spots, that is). I’ve never been so keenly aware that access to reliable, safe medical care is a tremendous blessing.

A week later, I sat in my home and worked on a report from one of our Child Survival Programs in La Paz, Bolivia. As the staff at this program interviewed mothers to be registered, they heard repeatedly how many of the moms had already lost one or two children. One mother, Lucia, has experienced the death of three children.

According to local data, 113 children out of 1,000 die before they are 5 years old. That’s more than 10 percent.

I can’t imagine the pain and devastation of losing one child.

A good friend of mine recently lost her baby, and some days the waves of grief that come over her make the most basic life functions unbearable. Imagine losing three children.

Nancy, the director of this CSP program, knows how hard it is for these mothers.

“One might think that since the moms have so many children, losing one doesn’t affect them, but that’s not the case. The moms feel that loss.”

It can be easy to subtly or even subconsciously assume that mothers in other countries are somehow different from us or that they feel things differently than we do. But that’s a lie.

They face their own unique challenges (that I certainly cannot understand) but they feel the same heartache that any human would feel.

The challenges in this particular community go deeper than just a lack of medical care and the emotional scars it has wrought.

Sometimes we would like to think that implementing a program is like waving a magic wand. A couple of swishes of the wand and “Ta da!” everything is better. Unfortunately, that’s not how it works — as any of our thousands of field workers can tell you.

Many of the mothers who live in this Bolivian community moved here from remote Andean regions. Many are illiterate and have little education. They grew up knowing only home remedies for sickness and don’t trust doctors or health clinics. In this community, the battle isn’t so much providing medical care for babies as it is educating the mothers to accept medical care.

According to Rosa, CSP program coordinator,

“When children get sick, the mothers usually treat them with home remedies because that is what they have learned. They don’t trust doctors. Even though their child might be dying, they take the risk of using only herbs because they aren’t in the habit of taking [children] to the doctor.”

Even among mothers who have the benefit of being in the Child Survival Program, it can be difficult to get them to seek and receive urgent medical care when it’s needed.

When it comes to childbirth, the mothers in our program are accustomed to giving birth alone at home and are resistant to giving birth at a clinic. Unlike home births in much of the developed world, these mothers are often alone — without aid from anyone who knows what to do if the delivery doesn’t go smoothly.

This is one of the factors that has led to such a high infant- and maternal- mortality rate, and why Rosa is worried about the moms. She doesn’t want to see any of them or their children die.

When asked what she would like us to pray for, she asks for prayer for the births:

“Please pray for the pregnant mothers. I worry about them. They don’t know how their childbirth is going to go because they always have their children at home because they don’t trust the health centers at all. So I would ask the supporters to pray for the childbirths.”

Would you join me in praying for all the mothers in the Child Survival Program, that they would give birth to healthy babies and accept the support and help they need?

Would you also pray for Child Survival Program workers such as Rosa and Nancy, that God would give them wisdom and discernment to educate and guide these mothers while being respectful of their background and culture?

And would you give thanks that we in developed nations are so very blessed to give birth where we know we have the medical care we need?

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Life was harsh for Rediet and her twin sister, Belene, until the day the child development center came to their Ethiopian village. With a fully paralyzed, terminally ill father and a mother who was busy trying to support the family, there was really no one at home who could give the 8-year-old girls the love and nurture they craved.

Rediet and Belene would often be told to feed their father and keep him company, which generally ended with them calling for help when he experienced seizures. Rediet shares,

“I really didn’t know my father. The only memory I have of him is either in a wheelchair or in bed.

“There was a lot of suffering in our house and there was really no one to take care of him, or us, when my mother went to work. All I wanted at that time was for something or someone to get me and my sister out of the house.”

Shortly after joining the sponsorship program, Rediet and her sister realized that the child development center was their safe haven where they could enjoy their childhood and forget the misery they witnessed at home.

They started spending most of their time at the center as the center staff and the people at the church showed them love and paid attention to their development.

For the first time in their lives, Rediet and Belene learned how to pray for their family’s situation — especially for their father. For the first time in their lives, they saw hope in Jesus.

“What impressed me the most was the way the staff treated us when we went to the development center. You see, I was not used to being given attention and being treated special. My mother was so occupied with taking care of our dad, she couldn’t do more than check whether we had eaten.

“The center staff showed us the love they always teach us from the Bible. What made my stay at the center all the more special was the fact that I learned how to pray, which excited me because I knew I could pray for the recovery of my father.”

Even though her father died after years of pain and suffering, Rediet continued to excel in all areas of her life.

“I accepted my father’s passing as the will of God. It was tough for both my sister and me to lose our father without really knowing him, but I knew God wanted it to be that way.

“The prayer and encouragement of the people at the church as well as the center staff gave me the motivation I needed to do well in school. But what was more encouraging for me was my mother’s concern toward my education.”

The presence of the child development center in Rediet’s life not only gave her the opportunity to experience a normal childhood, but it also brought significant change in her family as Rediet, Belene and their mother all accepted Jesus as their Savior.

“Even though we had nothing money-wise, our home was blessed the moment we gave our lives to Jesus. Jesus has been our strength ever since. A lot of people used to come to my mother to ask for advice and even sometimes for loans. We became role models in every way in a village where the community expects less of girls.”

As the family was enjoying their new lifestyle, Rediet’s mother’s health started to deteriorate, which threatened Rediet’s dream of finishing her education and attending university through Compassion’s Leadership Development Program. Rediet and her sister were spending more and more time at the hospital rather than preparing for the university entrance exam.

“My mother’s illness was something that threatened to darken my world. She was all we had. I thought about dropping out of school to take care of her. It just seemed impossible to pursue a dream when she was no more able to support me.”

The consistent support and prayer of the development center staff and church were the only things that kept the girls going. The staff made sure that the girls studied and stayed focused on the entrance exam that would make or break their dreams. However, tragedy occurred the day before Rediet and her sister were scheduled to take the pivotal exam.

“The day my mother died was a huge turning point for me. I had all the reasons to bail out on the exam and on life. But the child development center workers insisted that we go take the exam no matter what. We buried our mother and the next day we went to take the entrance exam.

“My mom had prayed for us, fed us and sent us away with many blessings the day we took our 10th grade exam, but that day [of the university entrance exam] there was no one to do that for us. What I didn’t realize at the time was that God was there and He gave us the whole congregation to pray for us.”

Despite the trauma Rediet and Belene were going through because of their mother’s death, and to the amazement of many who knew the family, the sisters passed the entrance exam with flying colors.

“The God who knew me before I was born didn’t leave me at the greatest junctures of my life. I clearly saw his helping hand and felt His presence in my life. And it made me cautious to seek His purpose for my life.”

With a renewed determination and clear vision for her life, Rediet pursued her dream of joining the Leadership Development Program. But the dream was not just for her. She desperately wanted her sister to be part of it, too.

In addition to helping the girls apply for the Leadership Development Program, the center staff joined hands and prayed for the girls during the interview session.

“The day I heard about the Leadership Development Program, I immediately knew that I could join the program if I worked hard enough. What impressed me the most was the Leadership Development students’ fellowship and their clarity of vision.

“I wanted nothing but to be part of that. When I secured my entrance grades, I prayed to God to make my journey into the Leadership Development Program a smooth one for me as well as my sister.”

After going through the intensive selection process, both Rediet and Belene joined the program they had dreamed about for years. The child development center as well as the whole church congregation rejoiced with the girls.

“I just couldn’t believe how close God was to me and my sister. When it seemed like we had nothing left, He provided a way — through the Leadership Development Program. I consider this program another safe haven where I found my family.

“I treasure the fellowship I have with my fellow students. That I get to be part of a vision this great is something priceless.”

Rediet also talks about how the Leadership Development Program changed her view toward having a family. The lack of attention and love she had experienced while growing up had convinced her that she would be unable to succeed in having a family of her own.

However, after attending training on cherishing families, she is determined to change from the way she had been raised when she has her own family in the future.

“All the training I’m getting has impacted me, but what shaped my life the most is the training I took on cherishing family. I am now confident about writing my own story [with] the family I’ll have one day.”

Currently, Rediet is a second-year veterinary student and her sister is studying animal science.

“The most important treasure I got through the program is that I now have a clear vision as to what God wants me to do in the future. I want to work with children who lacked their parents’ love and attention while growing up, and with children who are orphans.

“I want to make a difference in their lives as Compassion did in mine. I want to show them that there is hope in Jesus. I want to avenge the children of our nation who are crippled by poverty by touching every aspect of their lives with the love of Jesus.”

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You have prayed. You have asked your friends to pray. You would wear sackcloth and ashes in the streets of your neighborhood if it meant you would experience a breakthrough in a request you made to God so long ago.

“How long, Lord, must I call for help, but you do not listen? Or cry out to you, ’Violence!’ but you do not save?” — Habakkuk 1:2, NIV

Now, at this point, you can’t help but feel doubt. You begin to wonder if the cynics and critics are right — that the Christian walk can be summed up as an emotional crutch for the weak and unfortunate, and that only the lucky and strong survive.

If this is your experience, I have one comment: Do not give up.

After all, if this world is just for the lucky and strong, how do you explain the advances and positive turn of events experienced by the children, young adults, mothers and families we serve? Do their successes come merely by chance, or are they the result of your prayers, commitment and reliance on Christ?

Just read the Bible and you will find saints, prophets and leaders asking the same questions as you are asking: Where is God and why hasn’t He answered me?

Whether it’s David, Job, Naomi or Habakkuk, almost every character in the Bible encountered, at one time or another, fear, confusion and uncertainty when it came to their faith. So you are not alone.

However, don’t make the mistake of judging God because you haven’t seen His work in action. Remember, crying out to Him about your pain is not a lack of faith, but denying that He cares and is working for you is.

For those of you who are tired from the load of your circumstance, I invite you to read the book of Habakkuk, especially chapter 2, where the prophet says, “I will stand at my watch … I will look to see what he will say to me. … For the revelation awaits an appointed time.” [1]

God hasn’t given up on you. So don’t give up on Him. Wait on Him and on His appointed time.

1. Habakkuk 2:1-3 (NIV)

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It is important that we pray for one another, but this chapel message from Bambang Budijanto, Vice President of our Asia Region, is not about praying for others that God will help those who are in difficult situations or will cause them to accept Jesus or will increase His blessing upon them.

It’s about prayer as an authentic, integral and holistic relationship with God.

Subscribe to the audio podcast of our chapel messages via iTunes.

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In our partner country of Australia lives the cathedral termite, which is skilled at building settlements well over three meters (approximately 9 feet) tall.

Although these termites are ordinary in size, shape, and strength, when they join together they are capable of constructing a huge, complex hive for their colony.

Now here’s the really strange thing: The cathedral termites don’t have a leader, and the individual termite probably doesn’t even know what it is making!

How is this possible? A group has more capacity and complexity than the sum of its parts. This is what scientists call “emergent behavior.”

In the world of business, it’s known as “synergy” among a team. So what would we, as Christians, call this phenomenon?

We could invent a trendy new word or phrase like “spiritergy” or “emergent miracles,” but I connect with our mantra: “one in Spirit.”

Living systems such as cathedral termites flirt with the boundary between randomness and order – what a behavioral researcher has termed “the edge of chaos.”

At times, our challenges may appear to put us near that edge. When the computer bugs show up or the “termites” of conflict surface, remember that even though Satan continues to attack our kingdom-building work,

“Greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world.” — 1 John 4:4, NASB

Remember what God’s Spirit has, can, and will accomplish through us. Unlike the termites, we know our Leader and what we’re creating. More importantly, our Leader knows us and calls us to one body.

“For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ.” — 1 Corinthians 12:12, NASB

Prayer: Father, please build us into a resilient, caring, productive hive in which Your Spirit dwells. Lord God, help us daily to seek unity for the sake of children and to emerge as “one in Spirit” to conquer poverty in Your precious and powerful name. Amen.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Grant Dewey is a Production Training Manager, leading a team who trains our Sponsor Donor Services and Distribution Center staff. Grant and his family moved to Colorado from South Korea where he was a teacher and administrator at an international school.

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Today is the National Day of Prayer in the U.S., and I want to share with you the importance of prayer in our ministry.

I felt wildly unworthy to write on this topic, so I sought wisdom from Eleanor. She is our Prayer Ministry Manager.

At first I thought I would share with you some of her insights, but I think I will keep it simple and share with you an example of the power of prayer.

Every day in our contact center, we speak with sponsors who are going through difficult times. When we receive a prayer request, we send it to Eleanor and she compiles a weekly brochure.

This brochure is passed out to every employee at chapel on Wednesdays and we take time to pray through the prayer requests listed.

On May 2, 2001, we prayed for Cindy’s* 16-year-old daughter, who had run away from home. We asked for God to protect her and lead her back to her family.

Ten years later, Eleanor received this letter from Cindy:

Dear Brothers and Sisters in the Lord,

It’s been many years since I received this amazing letter from you. It so overwhelmed me to know there were others out there praying for my daughter when all I was able to put before Him were tears and an occasional ‘Jesus, help us. Jesus, be with her.’

From that I have a framed verse on my desk: Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who built it; unless the Lord guards the city, the watchman keeps awake in vain. In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat – for He gives to His beloved even in his sleep (Psalm 127:1-2).”

The letter continues:

I know it was such a small thing compared to the parents whose child had bone cancer and needed to have his leg amputated, or the lady whose husband had died, but the moment we discovered our child was gone is a realization I’ll never forget.

We must live with the fact that she so badly wanted to get away from her life here. Once, the police called to let us know she’d been picked up for hitchhiking and scolded us for being bad parents. We also had to listen to what other ‘Christians’ said to us. Ouch.”

But God is good, and He answers our prayers.

My daughter and her husband now live in California and she made me a first-time Gramma last year. Although her husband told her to ‘get rid of it’ when he heard she was pregnant, she kept the baby.

She told me that she loves God and is through making mistakes. She is now taking very difficult university classes and is excelling with a 95 percent average. More importantly, we are a family again. Thank you and love to you for your prayers.”

How has the power of prayer changed your life?

*Cindy’s name was changed to protect her identity

LINK UP: If you write a post about the National Day of Prayer or about the importance of prayer in your life, please link up with us so we can all benefit. Thanks.

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In my humble opinion, Compassion more than does its part to help children in poverty. Since I’m not part of their staff, I can say that! There are things like the letters I receive from my sponsored child and there are also the country spotlights. I’ve even received letters from pastors whose churches host the Compassion child development centers where my children are enrolled.

I was reading over some of the more recent posts on this blog and I got to thinking:

How do we get into — and stay — in our child’s world?

Compassion offers this blog, Facebook, Twitter and probably a dozen other social media outlets that I don’t know anything about. I’ve even visited a couple of kids in their home countries, met one of their parents, and met a development center director.

All of the pieces are available to help me connect with my child.

But sometimes … often … I still find myself very disconnected.

How do I stay in my child’s world?

I ask this question for a deeper reason. Sure, I want to be in tune with the lives of my sponsored kids so I can ask culture-appropriate questions in our letters and really build our sponsor-child relationship.

But more than that, I want to know how to pray for my kids. More than knowing how to pray, I want to feel a constant compulsion to have to pray for them.

In my head, I know my sponsored children need constant prayer. Let’s face it, all of us do. But unless I’m in their world, I’m ashamed to say that I don’t pray for them regularly. Or even consistently.

I don’t want to just be that supporting sponsor only when I get a reminder from Compassion. I want to be a sponsor who covers her kids in prayer all of the time.

So I’m asking you, our dear sponsors with a wealth of knowledge, experience, with some of the deepest hearts of anyone I have ever met —

How do you stay in your child’s world?

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