Haiti (MNN) — Food expenditures increase, and a family can no longer afford the quality of education they had been providing for their children. Even the seven percent of income that the family pays at a cheaper school is getting to be too much. The family is forced to choose whether their children should eat or get an education.
The children grow up working hard to provide for their families, but they are unable to do so without a proper education. They desperately want their children to have what they didn't, but they'll have to decide if their children will eat or go to school. The cycle continues.
According to Haitian government sources, this type of scenario happens all the time in Haiti, even when the food supply is relatively stable (as it now is). The vicious cycle of poverty seems almost unending in a country known to be the poorest in the Western Hemisphere and where 48 percent of the population is under-nourished.
Bright Hope International has been working to end this cycle of poverty through indigenous churches. They have planted seventeen churches with schools to reach children with the Gospel and an education.
However, Bright Hope has found that many parents can't afford both school and food. When families choose to sacrifice nourishment in the name of their child's education, children seldom have enough food in them to fuel their brains or concentrate–quite a fate since concentration must be at maximum in a classroom of 78 students per teacher. Their work suffers, and before they know it, they are falling behind.
But Bright Hope is not willing to see the children of Haiti suffer like this. To combat the downward spiral, Bright Hope has created a three-phase campaign. The campaign will provide physically, economically and spiritually for seventeen communities in which Bright Hope has already established relationships.
"We decided we need to really have a campaign to get people on board to help us," says Bright Hope's Craig Dyer. He says the campaign will serve to "feed the children, number one, supply the schools and the churches with materials and Bibles (which is phase two), and then phase three is a micro-loan program which we've been running for over a year now and have seen huge success. Now we want to take it to all seventeen communities and see more and more families be able to care for their own needs, eventually carrying on these feeding programs themselves."
In order to accomplish these three phases, Bright Hope is working through the seventeen indigenous churches it has already planted. By working through the churches, students and families will not only have their immediate needs provided, but their spiritual needs as well.
"Poverty isn't just a physical or financial situation: it's also spiritual," says Dyer. "That's why we've chosen to work solely through indigenous churches. It's a powerful mix that changes lives for today with physical needs, for tomorrow with economic needs, and for eternity with knowing Christ as Lord and Savior."
In order to spread the Gospel and make it through each phase for each community, Bright Hope needs your help. Now through November 1, any gift you donate will be matched.
You can help sponsor children by choosing specifically to supply food, school supplies or microloans. Click here to learn more and help in any or all of the phases.
In the meantime, prayer is imperative. Pray that the children of Haiti would have enough food to be able to attend school in full health, that they might gain an education and knowledge of the Word. Pray also that the church of Haiti would rise to the challenge before them and shine Christ brightly, even when up against spiritual warfare.
