"Defend the weak and the fatherless; uphold the cause of the poor and the oppressed.” - Psalm 82:3
Dear Friends,
Greetings in the mighty name of Jesus, and a very warm welcome to all those who are new to this newsletter. God is on the move, and we have so much news to share with you this month!
Kimberli and I went back to Ghana at the end of May. We arranged our flights to meet up in JFK (New York) and then took the same flight to Accra. It was a whirlwind 2-week trip, but we were able to get a lot accomplished.
We were met at the airport by Beth, a missionary friend of Kimberli's who has lived in Ghana for 10 years. She invited us to spend the night with her and her two "adopted" Ghanaian daughters, and we flew out the next morning to Kumasi where David (our Ghanaian accountant), Ezekiel and Israel (2 of Kimberli's "adopted" sons) met us and drove us to our hotel in Tepa.
The next morning, we participated in a dental clinic at Legacy Career Institute in Tepa, the school Kimberli's nonprofit is building. (We're hoping it will be officially opened to students in 2024!) It was a long, HOT, but incredibly rewarding day as we were able to help hundreds of children (and some adults) see a dentist for the first time in their lives.
The kids were so cute! My "job" was handing out gummy vitamins after they got a fluoride treatment and pointing them to where they could pick up their bag of "goodies" (toothbrush, toothpaste, pencil, and drink).
Our scholarship nursing student, Lawrence, volunteered to help by giving fluoride treatments. He did such a good job, especially with the little ones who didn't understand and were scared.
The rest of my trip was focused on meeting with our current scholarship recipients and interviewing others who have applied for an academic scholarship.Two things really stood out to me:
How hard-working and committed the applicants are to make a better life for themselves, and
How affordable it is to send young adults to school in Ghana and break the cycle of poverty.
This month we'd like to introduce you to two of our new scholarship recipients, Stephanie and Silas.
Stephanie finished at the top of her class in all three years of high school. She wakes up at 5 am every day to help her mother sell bread. She works until noon, goes home, and returns to work from 4 - 10:30 pm, every day, without ever getting a day off. For their efforts, she and her mother bring home about $4-5 per day. Stephanie has dreams of becoming a nurse, and we can make her dreams come true and send her to nursing school for about $1200/year for three years.
Silas is the fourth of six children who lost their father when he was 10 years old. A year later, he began weeding with his mother to help support his family. Years later, a relative helped him pay the initial fees to enter a vocational school where he discovered he had a love and a God-given talent for drafting, but he had to continue to weed and work as a laborer on construction sites to continue to pay for school, even taking out a loan, but it was extremely hard and many times had to skip classes to make enough money to purchase food. He is currently finishing his first year of architecture school. Katharos Love has been able to purchase him a computer and can help him obtain an architecture degree for about $1200/year for four more years.
“Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your powerto do it.” (Proverbs 3:27)
We are committed to sharing God’s love in tangible ways by enabling brilliant but impoverished young adults to continue their education. Your tax-free donation provides for school expenses (including but not limited to fees, books, a computer, food, and housing), spiritual discipleship, and HOPE for a bright future where our scholars are empowered to break the cycle of poverty for themselves and for their communities.
We currently have 12 young adults in our scholarship program. Can we count on your prayers and financial support?
Please join us in making a life-changing difference.
