Story number 3 for 27 May 2002

(South Africa)–South Africa is the epicenter of the HIV/AIDS pandemic hitting Africa with estimates of one in nine South Africans infected. That means 70-to-100-thousand babies are born HIV-positive each year. Book of Hope’s Bob Hoskins says generations are affected by tragedy. He’s got a vision to reach out, but says the tragedy is enormous. “It somehow doesn’t get through to us that here’s a whole generation that’s dying, and most of them have never heard the true testimony of God’s saving grace. I just hope that the church will not only rise up to pray, but we need to give and we need to do everything we can to get the Gospel to these children that are dying.” Hoskins says the future is wide open for more evangelistic work. “We were scheduled to do a half a million children in the schools this year. But, I came back and I want to double our output. So, we’re planning to do additional printing and we’re planning to add additional schools to reach another 500-thousand of them before the end of this year.”