This week I offered a bonus blog post with thoughts from Isaiah 58 as they may relate to the modern practice of doing some small sacrifice or fast during the Lent season. I hope it was as thought provoking to some of you as it was to me. Friday we continued with our African zoom through the book of Ruth, explaining to our African brothers the American film rating system from “G” to “R” – if you haven’t read Ruth 3, or my commentary from two weeks ago, you may not appreciate why we had that discussion…
The week ahead should see me wiring April funds to Zambia. Those will include amounts intended for sharing food with around 2,200 household, as well as funds for our 21st clean water project. Some of my closest friends sent funds this week for another project, and with those in hand we will be discussing TWO projects for May!
Meanwhile, the attention is quickly turning to the Zambian maize harvest. Word this week suggests that fields that were planted with the early December rains that got just enough rain later in the month to survive the hot dry spell are getting very close to maturity. We believe the harvest will begin in May and go through June and maybe into July, and with that in mind our intention is to begin sending funds for PURCHASE of said harvest as early as NEXT MONTH.
That means you are likely to get a LOT of attention from me in coming weeks on our efforts to raise funds here for that project. We have a GREAT start already, but if our goal is to increase our monthly capacity, to expand to more community partners that have been waiting for months, and continue to fulfill our mission in Zambia, we will need some more of our friends here to catch that vision.
Here is how it has gone to this point:
2022 Harvest – we sent $25,000 for the harvest, increased our participating communities to 40, and increased our monthly capacity for feeding to over 1,100 households.
2023 Harvest – we sent $50,000, grew our participating communities to 52, and increased our monthly capacity for feeding to around 1,500 households.
2024 Harvest – last year, in the midst of the drought, we sent around $130,000, searched for maize wherever we could find it, had some major setbacks along the way, but in the end added another 21 communities to get us to our current level of 73, and increased our monthly capacity for feeding to the current 2,200 household level.
2025 Harvest – To Be Determined, but we have LOTS of communities eager to be a part of what we are doing, and would LOVE to include them. Why do we care about this?
Click to access 2024-Global-Hunger-Rankings.pdf
The link takes you to a page from the Global Hunger Index report from 2024 which shows what we are up against. Zambia is certainly not the only place in our world where our brothers and sisters are starving. But it is among the most challenged at this time.
We celebrated donations to date topping $1 million last week. It took us a little more than four years to get there. That wasn’t something we were aiming for. But with only 120 friends, a few American church communities and some corporate matching, we got there. The driven Rob is now wondering if we can get the next million faster. Not because of the statistical growth. But because we could share into that Globally recognized deficit even more!
Four ways to do that:
- That donor list needs to increase. To this point the vast majority of the donors are simply connected to Rog, Lisa, Ronda or me. And that is SO fun. But maybe YOU are a donor because you believe in what we are doing and would think, “Who do I know that I should invite into this effort?” That would be REALLY fun and helpful!
- More church/small group communities. Maybe you are a donor, or maybe you don’t see yourself with enough surplus to become an individual donor, but you think your church or community group would be interested. We would LOVE to come and meet your group and present the opportunity to them! We love to connect Shoulder communities here in America with one of our Shoulder communities in Zambia, and to date that has produced some really exciting relational, development, and relief efforts.
- More corporate matching support. We have received corporate matching gifts from donors who work for PRINCIPAL FINANCIAL, RAYTHEON TECHNOLOGIES, and BOEING. But we believe there are many other employers that are offering donation matching to their employees. Might be worth checking with yours.
- Finally, the tough one for ME: current donors may consider doing more. Ouch! First of all, let me once again say THANK YOU to any who have ever donated to S2S. We are extremely grateful, our Zambian brothers and sisters are extremely grateful, and maybe at least as importantly, we believe OUR FAITH (which is in deficit here because of our money) has grown as a result of our generosity. Can we do more? I, for one, am always asking myself that question. And please don’t assume it is any easier for Rog, Lisa, Ronda and me to answer this call than it is for anyone else. Sad as it is, even though this mission started right here in our family, we are still constantly wrestling with the myriad of other ways we could use whatever we obtain for our own indulgence.
God, help us ALL be open to your call to care for one another. Help us see with YOUR eyes the real hunger and deficit lifestyles our brothers and sisters are experiencing. Help us LOVE with our actions. Amen.
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