Compassion

"What do you want for Christmas?" was Pete's question for me almost weekly from October on. Around that same time someone at church had given me a postcard from Compassion.com, that had a little girl who needed sponsoring. In the past I have always been leery of these programs because how much money really gets to the child and how much puts the ceo in an expensive house on the hill? But I contemplated it, I prayed about it, I talked to Pete about it. And after one of his questions of "what do you want for Christmas?" I said "I want to commit to sponsoring this child." So we committed. Called Compassion, gave them a credit card number and set it up that the money would be donated that way. Not much to it. Then we got a letter from Yeimy from Honduras. She committed a Bible verse to us, she asked for prayer, she told us that she is doing well in school, and she sent us a picture. This little nine year old girl, even with thousand of miles between us, is now a part of our family. She gets prayed for daily by my girls; we collect stickers and make cards for her.
It is heartbreaking that we can't go down there, scoop her up and bring her to the States to live with us, but we do as much as we can right now.
This endeavor is going to last us nine years or more because they ask that we try to commit to the end of their time in school, but some also support a child for a few years beyond that. Although we never have asked "how does this benefit us" but knowing that a child outside of our little life is benefitting from our support is profit enough for us. And my children have a connection with someone outside of their little lives. It has been a true and complete blessing for us to support this child for many Christmases to come.