It’s About More Than Survival

Last month, I was reviewing the next newsletter that will be sent to people who support our Child Survival Program. I wasn’t too far into it when the tears started coming. Ok, so it isn’t completely unusual for me to cry while doing my every day work … I mean I do work at Compassion. But this time was different.

This time I could hear my son’s giggle, I could picture his face and I knew that if I had been born in one of Compassion’s ministry countries, most likely neither my son nor I would be alive today.

To think of my now very active, 14 pound, 3 month old and to read about Martha in Peru who, at one time, had two boys (18 months and 3 years old) both of who were 15 pounds and barely able to hold their heads up — an 18 month old that is 15 pounds is one thing but a 3 year old that is 15 pounds. … are you kidding me?

And Edison, my sweet Edison, who was born by c-section after hours of labor that went nowhere will probably be 15 pounds in a few weeks … an average weight for a four-month-old boy in the U.S.

• What would I have done alone in a ramshackle house with a dirt floor after hours of pushing and no baby?
• What would I do now without the multiple child health and development resources that I pour over weekly?
• What would I do without Jesus and the support of my local church community?

It’s a miracle that a small number of women and children in these circumstances actually survive. How can I not do everything I can possibly think of to tell others about what Compassion’s Child Survival Program is doing?

How can I not pray that this program can grow and grow and grow? So the children around the world growing up along with the amazing boy God has blessed me with will have the opportunity to reach their potential.

In a world with a growing global economy it is no longer about children and mothers who are far away, it’s about my next door neighbors … it’s about my own child.

And it is not just about survival it’s about women and children thriving so that they can change their own communities and countries and build a better world.