Remembering Haiti

As I prepare next week to travel to the Tri-Cities at WCQR Christian Radio to help my good buddy Dave Kirby host a two day 'Remembering Haiti' Child Sponsorship Drive with Compassion International, I am incapable of stopping the images from flooding back into my mind we all saw a year ago. Every local or national newscast, every online news source, every newspaper and magazine all reflected the horrors of the devastation that 7.0 magnitude earthquake left behind in Haiti in January of 2010.
Can it really be only a 12 months ago in Port-au-Prince that more than 220,000 people died, some 300,000 people were injured, and more than 1 million were left homeless?

And oh how our hearts broke at the images of the youngest of those left behind - so very many children. Some with only remnants of the families they once knew, some orphaned and completely alone.
They are still there you know, still living in make shift tents of ripped tarps and rocks. Still needing clean water, food, medical care, emotional help. And still needing the most basics things in life we all take for granted.
These children who had a hard enough time daring to dream bigger than what they saw within blocks of their homes before the disaster, now can't dream past tonight and the dire circumstances and extreme poverty in which they know they will still awaken to tomorrow morning.
But ever at the ready, with your help, is Compassion International and they ARE bringing hope! I have three Compassion children myself (one each in Guatemala, Columbia, and Ghana). I have seen first hand that in needy communities, operating through the local church, Compassion International projects all over the world are there ready to provide food, education, safety, health care, spiritual guidance, love, and hope - all wrapped up in Jesus!
Would you say a prayer for me, the staff of WCQR and those who will be tuning in? I'm so excited to be able to go help, and share the Children of Haiti and of Compassion with ther community. Pray for many to catch the vision, God's vision, of simply welcoming a child in His name. That with a monthly financial gift and exchange of letters they don't just provide the daily things that every child in this world deserves, but that they become the source God will use to begin to sew His Hope and help that child dare to dream bigger than they ever did before!
Yes the need is still so incredibly great in Haiti, but our God is greater, and through Compassion International hope is rising - and for those who will dare to help, they will be His hands and feet!
Every good thing is not for every one to do, but if you think you may be called to help a child to dream again, simply click the Compassion link you will find on my blog at http://love89djmarisa.blogspot.com/ (if you are already reading this and are already on my blog just look to your right toward the top of the page) Then pray for God to reveal the child He has already picked out just for you and release that child from poverty in Jesus Name!