Almost daily, my wife and I pray that the gospel would give our children a God-sized vision for the world, that they would be inspired to think about, to pray for, and to give their lives for the nations. We pray that they would come to understand that when God blesses them, they are never supposed to hoard that blessing like a reservoir; they are supposed to be a channel for God’s blessing to flow to others.
As Veronica and I have talked about how to make missions real to our children and how to give them this vision, Compassion International has been an answer to prayer. Compassion partners with local churches worldwide to sponsor impoverished children right in their own neighborhoods. It is a model that ensures that real needs are met in healthy and sustainable ways.
Compassion matched us with a young girl, Alexandra, who is the same age as one of our kids. Now our entire family is involved with Alexandra, especially our kids. They pray for her, correspond with her, and have enjoyed just getting to know her.
The whole process has enlarged our family’s vision of the world and made missions something more personal to all of us. “Missions” is not just an abstract idea for my kids anymore; missions has a face in Alexandra. Because of this partnership, they are learning to be involved with people from places that need social and financial development. But more importantly, they are learning to be involved with people and places that need gospel development.
There are so many myths floating around churches about what missions has to look like, and one of them is that you are either on the field or you aren’t involved. But at different stages in your life, there are different ways to be involved in missions. I’m convinced that a lot of families in our church want to engage in missions, but they don’t know how. For families with young children (like mine!), this is a great way to contribute and to join what God is doing worldwide.
I’m eager to see what God will do through the Summit’s new partnership with Compassion. I hope to see hundreds of families use Compassion to give their kids a vision for what God wants to do through the gospel among the nations.
Sponsor a child through Compassion today! Click here.
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