The Heartfelt Plea of a Goose

This past month you may have read some of Mother Goose’s stories about sponsoring children through a great organization, Compassion International. A few thousand of us who sponsor these kiddos have been celebrating Blog Month and spreading the good news that sponsoring a child somewhere around the world can release them from the cruel bonds of poverty and open their precious hearts and minds to the potential that is within them. By writing letters and committing a tiny portion of our incomes to these little ones, the world brightens and hope returns and the love of Christ goes abroad into their hearts and the hearts of their families.

Our final assignment for this month-long event is to write a letter from the point of view of one of these sponsored children. Please enjoy this bit of sweetness with your toast and tea this morning:

“Greetings in the Jesus name from your sponsored girl in India! This is Benny K. and I want to say “thank you” to you, my auntie in the U.S. for believing in me. I remember when my father died two years ago, my mother and I cried for days and days because we didn’t know how we would be able to survive without his love and protection.

In my country, women and children, especially little girl children, are not very important to the society. In fact, many families quietly let little girl babies die because they have very little value and they cannot afford a dowry to give to their future husbands. It is a sad thing to be widowed and alone in the world.

Thankfully, my mother has great skill as a tailor. She sews pretty garments for our neighbors and community, and people are very glad to pay her for her work. But it is difficult work. She often gets shocks from the electric sewing machine. Yet, my mother is kind and loving to me, and also my grandmother.

Now that I am a part of the Compassion project, I receive meals and medical care at the center. They teach me many things about God and His great love. I am also learning in my school and I try very hard to get good grades in my classes. I have many friends and we play together with our dolls and also soccer when we are at the program center. I know that my mother and grandmother love me, but I also know that God loves me and that you love me too.

I have hope and happiness about my future.

Thank you very much for your letters and pictures. Thank you for your prayers for me and my family. Please remember that I am also praying for you everyday.

By Benny K. your kid in India”

Mother Goose has a heart full of faith that many children around the world are going to be blessed by the generous and loving readers of this blog. May your world be full of sunshine and love today.

Are We Pinning Yet?

Mother Goose welcomes you to Week Three of Compassion’s Blogging Month! In the unlikely event that you have missed the previous two episodes of this month-long campaign, we are finding sponsors for 3,108 children around the globe who live in various conditions of poverty. Compassion sponsorship costs very little in monetary units, and has an INCREDIBLE return on the emotional investment side.

Mother Goose invites YOU to go to their website, think about this for a little awhile and then make a life-changing decision to make a difference in the lives of one of these little kids. Since September 1st, we have found sponsors for 1,515 children — maybe you’ll be the next one.

Our assignment this week is to spread our social media wings and include Pinterest in our outreach for Compassion. And also, to post a picture of ourselves with the gosling whom we are currently involved with (sponsoring and/or corresponding). Here’s yours truly, Mother Goose, in India with precious little Benny.

Yeah, just kidding. I’m in my backyard holding a photograph of her.

Now, I must ask….have we discussed Pinterest here at Mother Goose Smiles? I’m thinking that we have not. I would like to cordially invite you over there right now to honk at my pins, repin my pins or just smile at them. There are various ways of enjoying Pinterest…. But first you have to sign up for that fun place. After that, just drop over and we’ll pin together.

I’m going there myself right now. See you at Pinterest.

Oh, yes! Here’s a link to my Pinterest page! HONK!

Mother Goose Writes a Letter to God

Dear God,

Can you hear me now? Are you there?

I know you’re there, of course. You promised that you’d always be there. You’re always with me, and you know my thoughts before they come out of my mouth or across my laptop screen. Our connection is so much more secure and reliable than my cell phone or my internet.

So, yes, you’re there.

But do you care?

You say you care. The Bible says all over the place that you love me, yes even me…

But, God, don’t you care about children around the world who don’t even have their basic needs of life met on a regular basis? What about kids who don’t have clean water, or nutritious meals or opportunities for education? What about little kids who live on the dumps of Ecuador or in the slums of Mumbai or on the hungry plains of Uganda?

God, don’t you care?

Yes, I know you care. You care a whole lot more than I do. You watch over the little ones day and night — you never leave their side. No matter what they have to endure in their worlds, You are always caring for them and protecting them.

Each child born into this world is a new bundle of hope. Babies and children are symbols to the world that life is going on — that love and genetics have produced another spark of miracle life once again — hope endures for another generation.

But the grind of poverty in a child’s life can extinguish that bit of hope.

Poverty tells a child that they are not important — not to anyone in this world and not to You, God.

Poverty lies to these precious and impressionable children, telling them that they are just another mouth to feed.

Poverty deceives these little ones into thinking that they are no better than the dirty dress they wear or the broken shoe on their filthy foot.

God, I know that I cannot erase poverty in this world. I’m just a goose — how can I change the world? This world is riddled with crime and disease and evil and poverty. God, the problems of this world are simply too complex for me to fix. I can’t make it all go away, and I’m sure you don’t expect me to try, do you?

Nope, you don’t, right?

Right, God?

/

You can click here to see other kiddos who need a sponsor. (Or you can just go check your email now or click over to some other website, and forget all about their poor faces and their poor places…)

But Mother Goose knows that she can make a difference. I have discovered first-hand, or first-wing, that sponsoring a child with Compassion International can change THEIR world. Suddenly, somebody outside their immediate family thinks that they are special! Suddenly, they matter! Suddenly, they have an importance!

And here is the bottom line: they didn’t have to do a thing to earn it. It’s all grace (oops, just like our salvation!). There’s nothing they can do to win it, deserve it or improve on it. It’s just a love-gift to a needy little person.

When they get a sponsor, their future immediately changes. My little girl in India actually jumped up and down when I sent her a picture of my daughter, AnnaRose. Now that little bit of hope within the heart of every child gets a little puff of love and blazes into real anticipation and expectation of good things.

Faith grows within the heart of a sponsored child. Mother Goose knows, because she’s seen it happen in the lives of three Compassion children already.

Oh, and God, are you still there? Could you please help the children that I personally hatched from eggs to get along with each other today? Thank you for loving them and me…

Gotta Love the Little Goslings

“My dear sweet Aunty, greetings in the Jesus’ name. How are you? I am doing well. I enjoyed birthday gift that you sent to me. Thanks for the nice gift. Pray too my studies ranks in my class. And my mother is a tailor. She often gets electric shock when she is stitching. So please pray for her, I pray for you! by G. Benny Kiruba”

Mother Goose gets letters every other month from this sweet little girl in India. She’s eight years old and lives alone with her mother who earns a poor income as a tailor in their village. Her father passed away due to complications from jaundice.

Mother Goose has been a child sponsor with Compassion International for so many years. I’ve been overwhelmed by the love of these children who live in faraway corners of the world. The letters they write are sweet, cheerful and sometimes heartbreaking, but always jam-packed with thankfulness!

This little Benny is the third child I have sponsored, and it seems she touches my heart the most.

Perhaps because she is alone with only her mother who gets shocks from her sewing machine…

Maybe because she is nearly the same age as my own AnnaRose…

Maybe it’s her precious smile and her pretty face.

Here’s how to sponsor a little boy or a little girl — someone just like my little Benny!

Maybe I just love the little goslings…

Whatever the reason, there is no shadow of a doubt that we have developed a real bond of love. I have compassion on her. I believe that she has compassion on me — after all, I’m only a goose!

Compassion International is celebrating new child sponsorships for the entire month of September with Blog Month — their goal (and mine as well) is to find sponsors for 3,108 children scattered here, there and everywhere around the world. And they are having a contest for bloggish people because they know that we know how to spread the good word to our dear, faithful, loyal and loving readers.

The ultimate grand prize for the blogger who hauls in the most new sponsorships in September is way beyond exciting — it’s the dream of a lifetime for Mother Goose!

Imagine…the blogger who brings in the most sponsorships through their blog between September 1st and September 30 will win a FREE ticket on a blog trip to a country where Compassion works.

Whilst on this trip, Mother Goose would get to write her stories from the field, meet incredible people (you KNOW I’ll love that!), and get to experience Compassion’s ministry to the poor, up close and personal. HONK HONK — this would be so GREAT!

There are other prizes as well: books, gift certificates, gifts to sponsored children and their families. Friends, it’s all good.

I wonder if you are beginning to get excited about this opportunity? Are you thinking that being able to change the life of a young person might be a heartwarming experience? Maybe you’re wishing for some just personal mail for a change instead of the usual bills and junk mail.

Sometimes we feel small and helpless in the face of the world’s problems and tragedies. We wonder how we can possibly change the world…

Mother Goose knows first hand that you change the world for one child.

Please click on this link — it’ll take you to the Compassion website where you can see pictures of real kids looking for real sponsors. God’s sweetest blessings on you today for loving His littlest goslings.

Mother Goose Gets a New Friend

Happy Birthday to Miss Benny Kiruba! Benny is my new sponsored child in India, and today she turns SEVEN years old. I am very happy for her and wish I could give her a big birthday hug in person. Look at how sweet she is!

Happy happy Birthday Benny

Mother Goose has been a child sponsor with Compassion Int’l for more than ten years, and it has been a true blessing. My first child in the program was Annet Kagoya, my daughter in Uganda who recently finished her studies as a nursing aide, found work in a pharmacy and then lo! and behold! became a momma to a little fellow. I got a letter from her last week, probably my last since she is now out of the child sponsorship program, and she expressed her gratitude to me for supporting her over these many years. It sounds like she is doing well — Annet and her baby boy. And does this make Mother Goose a granny?

I also sponsored a little fellow in northern India for awhile, but he had to drop out of the Compassion program and go to work in the tea fields near his home. It made me sad to think of a child only nine years old having to pick tea leaves instead of going to school and learning about Jesus.

So now my heart sails around the world to the southern tip of India to a little girl who lives with her mother who is employed as a laborer. Her father passed away due to jaundice. She likes to play hide and seek with her friends — she likes to draw pictures, and she’s in second grade, just a little younger than my dear AnnaRose.

I’m just honking with delight to have a new little girl in my life, and I’ll be praying for her. I hope that in years to come, she will grow into a fine young woman who loves and knows that she is a precious person in God’s world. Here’s what Compassion Int’l says about that: “Children in poverty are susceptible to believing its darkest message, that they don’t matter.” It is my hope that Miss Benny Kiruba hears the true message today that she is loved and so very valuable.

Be blessed today with your friends.

My Precious Annet Kagoya

Ten years ago last February I began a relationship that has blessed me in so many ways. Through Compassion International, a well-trusted child sponsorship organization, I was introduced to Annet Kagoya. Here’s the first picture I ever had of her:

Over the years, I received many letters from her and quickly grew to love her with all my heart. For years and years, she started out her letters the same way, “Much greetings in the name of Jesus Christ.” Very appropriate, very formal. But for the last two years, her letters began differently, “Receive much greetings from your beloved daughter in Uganda.”

She always thanked me for sponsoring her and for praying for her. I saved every single letter she wrote and also every single photograph of her. I sent her pictures of our family, as well as newsy, encouraging letters. We were as close as two people on opposite sides of the planet could be, communicating the old-fashioned way several times a year. Annet was very joyful for me when I gave birth to my sixth baby, AnnaRose, and frequently asked about her in letters and assured me that she was praying for AnnaRose.

She was very interested in helping people and planned to study nursing. And she did. Besides providing medical care and Christ-centered education, Compassion International has a very good program to help young adults learn career skills. Annet finished the Compassion program and left her village to find employment. I have heard from the organization that she is working at a pharmacy and has a little baby now. I would love to receive another letter from her, but don’t know if I will.

Here is my favorite recent picture of my beloved daughter in Uganda:

I just love her dress and her self-confident smile in that picture. I am very thankful for her love and prayers over these last ten years. Every time the mailman left a letter from her in my box, I would stop EVERYTHING to sit down and catch up with her. I know that God used me to teach Annet about His love which knows no bounds. No matter where we live, whether in a suburban setting or in a Ugandan village, God loves each and everyone of His children. He has a plan for each of us, a good and delightful plan. I’m so very glad that His plan for me included a connection to one of His dear children in Africa, my daughter in Uganda, Annet Kagoya.

Bee blessed today. Love, Natalie

Travel

If we live truly, we shall see truly. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

The one place that I must visit is Uganda.  For ten years, I have sponsored a young lady there through Compassion International.  Her name is Annet, and we have corresponded over time with so many letters and pictures.  She was only ten years old when we first began our friendship — she is now attending nursing school and plans to work in the city at a hospital when she has finished her education.  She loves the Lord Jesus truly and shares His love with people wherever she goes.

At the closing of her letters to me, she always writes, I pray for your safe journey to Uganda.  It has long been my dream to visit her, but whenever I have a little extra cash for the plane ticket, you know something else comes up.

Now I will make a plan:

The next Compassion group tour is in November, and the cost is $4,200.

I need to determine if I should go this year, or make the really out-of-character, long-range goal to go in 2012.

And I need to pray for God’s help to shower down on me, and His grace to be sufficient for all the details that need to be worked out.

I can do this!  Truly I can!

Important Stats for a Goose

  • 84,845 honks to date

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