There's No Place Like Uganda

There really isn't. Not that I have extensive world-traveling knowledge. (Well okay, I guess I have been to five different countries, but England, France and Israel are hardly an equal comparison to Uganda.) I'm not the only one who thinks this either. My feelings that Uganda is a place with a unique way of getting into your heart and soul is a sentiment shared by a number of world-travelers I know. The people of Uganda have so little and yet are incredibly openhearted, especially for a country that has been through so much war and devastation. It is hard to put into words, but once you've been there, you understand.

I watched the video from my last trip in 2006 and was filled to the brim (meaning I cried a little) with joyful anticipation at returning. (You can watch the documentary I made about the trip here. I would recommend letting the video load completely before playing.)

Oh, in case you missed the announcement - Devin and I are traveling to Uganda in March to serve with some pretty incredible people. One of which is Katie Davis, who not only started Amazima Ministries, but also has fourteen adopted kids. Yes. Fourteen. Oh and by the way, Katie is in her mid-twenties and a single mama. I'll say it once more - fourteen adopted children. Needless to say, Devin and I are honored to have the privilege of working along side someone who exhibits the sacrificial love of Christ so fully. (read Katie's blog here) 

Amazima (which means "truth" in the native language of Luganda) runs a number of programs including a feeding program that provides meals for some of the poorest families in Uganda (it only takes $0.15 to provides one meal). They also offer sponsorships for over 400 orphans and provide them with education, clothing, food, medical care and Biblical discipleship (sponsorships are only $300 for a whole year click here to learn more). A number of other projects are also run by Amazima but the one thing the all have in common is that they care for the needs of the "least of these" and spread some serious doses of Jesus-love while doing it. I am giddy with the thought of working in some of these programs.

While in Uganda, we will also be running a VBS-type program for some of the orphan homes in the area, including Canaan Children's Home which is led by Pastor Isaac Wagaba. Pastor Isaac has an incredible story of survival during the terrorist reign of Idi Amin (a.k.a. the "Butcher of Uganda"). As an outspoken Christian, Pastor Isaac was on Amin's "death list". After being shot and left for dead in a mass grave, Pastor Isaac heard a voice saying, "Isaac, I have saved your life so that you may save the lives of my fatherless children...Isaac, I will be the father of those children through you." This was the beginning of the vision for Canaan Children's Home.

I mean, wow. I can hardly believe that these are the kinds of people we get to serve with. Incredible.

More news to come in future posts!

I Wish You Would Have Kept More

*Part Six of the Radical Read-Along with Marla Taviano

"Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work... You will be made rich in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God." - 2 Corinthians 9:6-8,11 

If you've read my blog for any length of time, you may have seen me mention a time or two ... or three ...or four, the journey that my husband and I are on to live off of less in order to give more. This idea that God blesses us with material possessions, not so we can horde it, but so that we can give it, is something that God has truly being digging deep into my soul - over the past few months especially. Which, I think, is wonderfully ironic because it's those same few months that my husband has been without a job.

All this to say, I loved - L.O.V.E.D - chapter six in Radical. God has been opening my eyes to the needs of the world's poor so much lately and this chapter was such an exciting encouragement to me.

Let me take a pause to say, however, that I do not have this materialism problem solved. HA! Hardly. But man, oh man has God been changing my heart in this area. I'm a work in progress, but what a work He has already begun!

So here's the deal: I have a lot of stuff. Even with my "little" 878-square-foot, two bedroom apartment, I have a lot more than the majority of the people in this world. I have a lot of stuff that I don't even need and even when I give a good chunk of it away, I still have excess. I don't worry about where my next meal is going to come from or where I'll find clothes to wear or a roof to sleep under. I am blessed... However. I must remember that God has blessed me not so that I can have more, but so that I can give more (Radical, page 127).

Recently, through God's impact in my heart, I have begun to look at my possessions in comparison to the lives the money spent could have saved. Wow does that shake some sense into me! Even when I gather up items to donate or sell, I have to shake my head at my foolishness. This stuff, when I sell it, is worth so much less than what I paid for it. It makes me realize how much money I waste on stuff I don't need or even like enough to keep for more than a few months or years before I end up selling it or giving it away. Had I not bought those things in the first place, that money could have made such a difference to someone in need - someone who will now only receive the small re-sale percentage of what that the item is now worth. 

Am I (or David Platt) saying that having possessions is wrong? Not exactly. Possessions themselves are not inherently evil -  but the heart (my heart) that seeks after those possessions is wicked beyond belief. Yet, a heart focused on giving rather than possessing is made from an entirely different matter. I love how Platt puts it on page 126:

“We don’t sell them [our possessions] or give them away because they are sinful… We sell them and give them away because Christ in us compels us to care for the need around us.”

There is so much need. More than we could even comprehend honestly. Example: “In the time we gather for worship on a Sunday morning, almost a thousand children elsewhere die because they have no food” (Radical, page 115). 

Numbers and statistics can be so overwhelming, but that is not an excuse to do nothing. There are needs that we do see and when we turn our backs on them in order to continue on in our comfortable, stuff-filled lives, how can we say that the love of God is in us? (1 John 3:17-19)

It is so simple (I won't say "easy", because life-style change is often difficult) to start making a difference and honestly, once you start - once you open your heart up to the needs and name and faces of the poor of this world -  it changes you and that change and that urgent sense of generously becomes a joyful, addiction of sorts. 

So, here are some other numbers and statistics for you to consider:

Fifteen cents can provide a child in Africa with a hot, nutritious meal (click here for more information). Sometimes, I don't even bother to pick up fifteen cents when I see it lying in the parking lot.

One dollar (the same one dollar I would spend on french fries) would provide one African clean, safe drinking water for one year (www.mochaclub.org).

Forty-dollars can buy a goat for a family living in poverty and provide them with sustainable income as well as fresh milk to nourish their own families. (click here for more information) I know that one step into Kohl's or Target and I am in serious danger of easily blowing forty dollars on excess stuff-that-I-don't-need.  

Last one (this just thrilled me when I found this out): David Platt mentions his church using their excess of $500,000 to partner with twenty-one impoverished churches in India to help feed starving children. Well guess what program that was? Compassion International's Child Survival Program (I have a thing for Compassion in case you didn't know). Which means that you and I and our churches can go here right now and start making the same kind of impact that Platt's church is having! Wow - so exciting!!

I could write gobs and tons and oodles more on this subject, but I'll leave you (and myself) with this powerful thought:

“I wonder at some points if I’m being irresponsible or unwise. But then I realize there is never going to come a day when I stand before God and he looks at me and says, ‘I wish you would have kept more for yourself.’” (Radical, page 123)

Joy-FULL Update!

I wrote a rather passionate blog post a couple months ago how we should respond when we hear about and see the suffering of the poor in this world.

Remember this little guy? 

How could you forget, right?

Well, I just read some amazing, awesome, God-is-SO-great news. In His great mercy, and through the work of Serving His Children, God flat out saved the life of this little one. This is that same little boy today:

Can you believe that?? Absolute miracle. Little Katoya is happy and healthy and ready go home to be with his family again. A child that should have died - would have died- without the intervention of a compassionate God and His compassionate servants is alive and thriving and I just couldn't help but share this joyful news.

Death by starvation is preventable - but we all must join together to help make a difference. Click here to read more about the work of Serving His Children and how you can help .

I Left My Heart in Uganda, Africa

Six-to-eight-weeks and $120 later, I can officially travel internationally as Jennifer Hanson! The final piece of the puzzle that is changing-your-name-after-marriage (which ::ahem:: guys don't have to deal with) has been completed (over a year after my nuptials) and I can now (only if needed of course) quickly leave the country at a moment's notice. (Why do we say that any way? "Always have your passport ready in case you need to quickly leave the country." Sounds so sketchy.) (And while I'm at it -why is the majority of this paragraph in parentheses???)

Why would you need to "officially travel internationally"?, you may be wondering (or not). Well, I am so glad you asked (or didn't).

Devin and I have sent off our paper work to go to Uganda, Africa in March 2011!! We'll be traveling with Visiting Orphans and will have the opportunity to work along side the amazing Katie from Amazima Ministries (who I've mentioned many times on this blog). 

I traveled to Uganda with BreakDown United back in 2006 and I left a piece of my heart in that beautiful, precious country. Plus, I have two little pieces of my heart living over there - two amazing girls that Devin and I will have the joy of meeting in person for the first time during this trip.

One of the little beauties that I met while in Uganda in 2006
(© Jennifer Hanson 2006)

I am so excited for this trip - so excited to love on some precious people, so excited to serve as the hands and feet of Christ and so excited to see how God provides as we raise the hefty chunk of change we need to get ourselves over there. I have been longing to return to Uganda for over four years and now that I can start counting the days (150 by the way) until our trip, I can hardly contain my joy!!

I'll be posting more soon about what we'll be doing while we are over there and some of the super-awesome ways we'll be raising support. Can't wait to share it all with you! 

Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. - James 1:27

P.S. Devin, the photographer, took my passport photo so that I don't have to look questionably deranged for the next ten years. Excellent marital benefit.

P.P.S. Confession: When I wrote Goals #63 and #93 I honestly thought it might be a bit far-fetched to accomplish them in the allotted time. Ha! Silly Jen. When God tugs at your heart to do something - He provides a way! 

Compassion Sunday: Update

Thank you to anyone who prayed for these ten kiddos in need. We were able to find sponsors for Seylin, Omar, Kokou and Fancy this morning! Plus, two more families said they were going to head home and sponsor a child online. Praise the Lord!!!
 

Please say a prayer that sponsors will be found for Jose, Patricia, Abdul, Aaron, Nareerat and Irankunda. As sponsors where not found for them today, they will go back into the system to continue waiting for sponsorship. I look at the pictures of the remaining children and my heart churns with bittersweet feelings. I am overjoyed that I had the privilege to help find sponsors for four (hopefully six) children in need. Those four (six!) kids will be so impacted by the support they'll receive from their sponsors and the sponsors will be so incredibly blessed as they learn about their child and watch them grow. Your heart and your perspective changes when you begin to fall in love with a child living in such harsh circumstances. So I am filled with joy in that regard, but my heart is still aching as I look at the sweet faces of the six children who were not sponsored.

I did have a great time chatting with some other people in our church who sponsor children through Compassion International, or similar organizations. It was like a little mini-family reunion as we all shared and "bragged" about our sponsor children and encouraged each other to make the most of this privilege by sending letters, cards and pictures to our sponsor children more often. It was so exciting for me to share face-to-face with people why sponsorships like these are so important to me.

I have a long history with Compassion. When I was growing up, my parents sponsored a little boy from Haiti named Ethney who was just a few years older that me. I loved sending letters and pictures to him and we grew up together through the correspondence my family shared with him (I even had numerous dreams about being in Haiti and playing with him). My parents sponsored him all the way through high school. 

Then, when I was twenty-three, I went to Uganda, Africa and was able to witness firsthand the poverty these children are facing. The lack of food, water, clothing... The lack of opportunity or hope that things will ever get better. When I returned home, I began sponsoring Nazziwa, a sixteen-year-old girl from Uganda. Older children are always harder to find sponsors for, which is why I picked her. Plus, since she is older, I've been able to have some really meaningful conversations with her through the letters we've shared over the past four years. Then, two years ago, added a second Ugandan sponsor child, Barabra (who is now seven). The past four years of being a Compassion sponsor have been such an honor. I've gotten to know these sweet girls and hear about the things they are learning about Jesus. With Nazziwa especially, I am able to encourage her as she grows into a young woman of God. It is an incredible blessing and privilege.

The problems of this world and the enormity of poverty can seem overwhelming, but changing the world can begin with one child. It can be with me. It can begin with you. 

Help a Child

 

Compassion Sunday

This Sunday, October 17th I am hosting a Compassion Sunday at my church to find sponsors for some precious kids in need through Compassion International (if you read this post, then you know how passionate I am about this cause). 

When I opened my information package for the presentation and saw the faces of the children I'll be trying to find sponsors for, my eyes filled with tears and my heart just plain hurt. I had to remind myself that it is through GOD's work that sponsors can be found, not through me (thank goodness!).

So, can I ask you to do something for me? I have packets with ten pictures of ten beautiful children who all need sponsors. Sponsors that will help them to receive an education, food, clean water, medical care, as well as learn about Jesus and be loved on by some amazing Compassion workers at the child centers they will attend. I'm going list the names and ages of these child here. Would you please pick one and pray for them? Pray that someone in my church would be moved by God's compassion for these little ones and to become a sponsor.

Seylin is thirteen years old. She lives in Honduras.

Omar is four years old. He lives in Mexico.

Jose is eleven years old. He lives in Bolivia. 

Patricia is nine years old. She lives in Brazil. 

Abdul is four years old. He lives in Peru. 

Aaron is eight years old. He lives in the Philippines.

Nareerat is ten years old. She lives in Thailand.

Irankunda is six years old. He lives in Rwanda. 

Kokou is ten years old. He lives in Togo.

Fancy is eight years old. She lives in Uganda.

If you are reading this beyond October 17th, would you please pray that God will continue to tug at the hearts in my church and that they will choose to have the honor and blessing of sponoring a child in need?

Thank you so much friends!

Save Children

"But whoever has the world's goods, and sees his brother in need and closes his heart against him, how does the love of God abide in him?" - 1 John 3:17

Love is in the Hair

Goal #40: Grow hair out 

What is it about getting engaged and married that makes women want to grow their hair out long?

And what is it about actually becoming married that compels women to chop all their hair off? 

And how is it that men seem to be nearly unanimous in their preference for long haired mates? (My sister-in-law came up with a great answer to that one. "Why do guys like long hair so much? Because they don't have to take care of it!")

I've always maintained that, once a woman is married, she has less time to dedicate to fixing her hair, as her time is now spent serving her husband (yeah, that's it). So, it is for the husband's benefit that she chop off the luxuriously locks which she labored to maintain during the wooing and wedding time of her relationship with him. At least, that was the excuse I gave Devin when, a couple of months after our wedding, I went from this:

To this:

 

Yeah. He was a bit shocked to say the least. I asked him what he thought of my new do and he said something to the effect of, "Um... well... It's not my preference." Ouch. (In all fairness to him though, I might as well have asked the dreaded, "Does this make me look fat?" question.)

So now that you have some context, there was a very specific reason why I put the goal "grow hair out" on my list of 101 Goals. That reason was my husband. I decided that it was more important to me that I present myself in a way that my husband fines attractive rather than being stubborn about having my way in the area of clothes, make-up or hairstyle. I'm not trying to sound all anti-feminist (well, maybe a little), but I am starting to realize the great value that exists when a wife dresses in a way that pleases her husband. There are certainly exceptions (one of them being a husband who asks his wife to dress (in public) in a immodest fashion ... or in neon orange legging from the 80s and a purple fur coat... I would eliminate that one as well), but in general, dressing in a way that pleases our husbands should bring us joy and be something that we want to do as wives. For me, wearing my hair how Devin likes it was a fairly simple way for me to show him love by submitting to him and letting him know that I wanted to be attractive to him.

When I came to this epiphany (brought about mostly by Martha Peace's book The Excellent Wife), I decided to ask Devin which hairstyle and hair length he found most attractive on me. He told me, and I started growing out my hair to reach his "preferred" length again. Here is the result:

Turns out, the length and style he finds me most attractive in is actually the look that I feel the most attractive in. Go figure.

 

But now I have a question for you:  

1) What are your thoughts on a woman dressing to please her husband? 

2) At what point does a girl or woman begin "dressing for her man"? Is that an appropriate behavior to encourage in dating relationships (specifically young, high-school age) or should this attitude be reversed for marriage?

Can't wait to hear your thoughts.