A Note from Tom: March 29th, 2011
Hey, everyone!
Wow! It’s dogwood time in Tennessee!! Technically it isn’t “Dogwood Arts Festival” time yet…We’ve got about a week to wait. But the dogwoods blooms didn’t! In Fountain City they tells us theirs have been blooming for a week! UT ag experts say they’re ten days to two weeks early! Seems like it was just Christmas!
Speaking of which…
It really was just a few weeks ago that folks were rushing, shoving, yelling, reaching, grabbing, sometimes boxing, just to get those mitts on the hottest toys of Christmas 2010. Seems kinda crazy now but remember when back in December in some households across the land nothing mattered more than having Squinkies under the tree! It seemed such a tragedy if someone you love had to face the “Day” with out the Nerf N-Strike Stampede ECS Blaster, FurReal Friends Furry Frenzies, or little Kung Zhu Pets. One of the most shopped-for toys of this Christmas past was “Stinky the Garbage Truck…he can talk and tell jokes, sing or eat garbage, giving your child a sense of amazement as Stinky realizes whether he’s full or empty. That garbage your child feeds him can consist of anything from other toy cars to several tiny toys your child is sure to have laying around his or her room…”
If you kids can’t find their Kun Zhu pets, don’t forget to look in Stinky! (Wonder why he doesn’t stink just like ”a real garbage truck”?)
I guess I was thinking about last Christmas craziness because we got a letter from our Compassion child, Doreen, yesterday. Like so many of y’all, on our fridge there’s a picture of a child. Our Doreen is a five year old who lives in Uganda. We sponsor her for a few dollars a month so that the work of those who love Jesus in her district can provide her, along with dozens of other kids like her in her village, with daily food, clothing, medical care, school, and times each day to learn about, and sing to, Jesus, (as Paul says) “her Lord and ours”. Many of you have kids like this that you sponsor through Compassion. Your kids may live in Guatamala, India, Africa, Philippines, or another of the 27 countries where Compassion works.
Listen to the goal of Compassion…
“…In response to the Great Commission, Compassion International exists as an advocate for children, to release them from their spiritual, economic, social and physical poverty and enable them to become responsible and fulfilled Christian adults.”
Wow! That’s a lot for a few bucks!
Doreen was writing to thank us for the few extra dollars we included at Christmastime. She’s only five and her teacher helped her write it. “Doreen thanks you so much for her gifts she was able to buy with her Christmas money. She bought a new Christmas dress and shoes. She also bought socks, rice and one kilo of meat for her family. You enabled her to celebrate Christmas in a jolly mood…”
Wow! A jolly Christmas because they enjoyed extra rice and some meat!
Some kids in our country are playing with toy garbage trucks while other kids around the world would happily eat what the garbage man throws in our real ones!
When you support a Compassion child, and when we support our missionaries whose pictures are on the wall at Triple C, God is using you so that men and women, boys and girls, and babies, around the world, can enjoy what others may never think twice about. Things like rice, socks, Christmas meat, a new dress (for 15,000 Ungandan shellings) and the message of the love of Jesus.
Dogwoods are blooming in the woods and yards of East Tennessee. The love of Jesus is blooming in hearts around the world because you give.
That should put us all “in a jolly mood!”