Day 4: Birthday sponsoring

Did you know that you can go to the Compassion website and search for children who have the same birthday as you? This is a great way to get your family involved, especially your own children. Sponsor a child that has the same birthday as your son or daughter, and they will automatically feel connected to each other.

In His peaceful presence,

Sharon

Day 3: Goodies in letters

As time goes on, I try to think of different kinds of goodies that I can send in the letters to my Compassion kids. There are lots of blogs that post lists, including the official Compassion blog. Here are a few...

~Band-aids
~Bookmarks (putting the child's name on one of these makes it more special!)
~Stickers, stickers, stickers!
~Paper dolls
~Scripture cards
~Pages from a coloring book (make it age appropriate)
~Greeting cards
~Scrapbook (if you're a scrapbooker, like me, then the ideas are about limitless! be creative on this!)
~Pictures (family photos, flowers and trees)
~Baseball cards
~Postcards of your town/city or state

As I mentioned, this is a very short list of things that can be sent. Just remember to keep it thin, and it must be paper.

In His peaceful presence,

Sharon

Day 2: Change the Story

Have you heard of the Compassion Mobile Experience, Change the Story? Check out a future post that tells all about it. I'm excited about the opportunity to volunteer! More to come...


In His peaceful presence,

Sharon

Day 1: Called to serve

When we started sponsoring our girl Beatriz in 2011, I had no idea at that time that God would soon ask me to serve as a Compassion advocate. I wasn't even aware that they even had advocates for this ministry until months later. While perusing another blog, I came across a post about how to become a Compassion advocate. It intrigued me, and I felt a little tug on my heart, like God was whispering in my ear, starting me on a path. The months went by, and after several more very clear confirmations from the Lord, I found myself filling out that advocate application and going through the training.

While I'm just now stepping up to really focus on my advocacy, all along I've felt that God was calling me to this position. He's made it clear time and time again that this is one way that He wants me to serve.

"Called to serve"...What exactly does that mean? In Galatians 5:13, we read "For you, brethren, have been called to liberty; only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another." If we look at this same scripture in the Message version of the bible, it says that it is absolutely clear that God has called us to a free life ("liberty"). Just make sure that we don't use this freedom as an excuse to do whatever we want to do and destroy our freedom. Rather, we should use our freedom to seve one another in love.

I can't think of a better way to serve one another in love than sponsoring a child, or advocating on behalf of children who are hurting, hungry, feeling unloved and unwanted.

Has God called you to serve somewhere? Have you obeyed? I've learned time and time again that if I try to follow my own plan, something happens to disrupt it, or it just doesn't work out. But, if I follow God's plan, and obey and serve the way He wants me to, it will work out!

In His peaceful presence,


Sharon

31 Days of Compassion

"The meaning of compassion is to recognize the suffering of others, then take action to help."

I'm not sure where I saw this sentence, on some other blog probably, but it spoke to me and I think it's right on target. We see people in need, and we do something to help. That's what Compassion International is all about...seeing the need to help poverty-stricken children, and then stepping out in faith to do what God calls them to do.

Each year, for the past 5 or so years, someone in the blogging world has sponsored what they call "31 days of blogging". People blog about all kinds of things, and I've never participated. But this year, I want to do a "31 days of Compassion". Quite a few Compassion advocates are participating with this, and if I can make the time (and figure out how) to link everything up, I'll post links to the other blogs that I come across. In the meantime, I want to start with my own 31 Days of Compassion.

I'm working on a list of topics that I want to cover during the month of October, and I'll post that list soon. As I publish each post, I'll update the list to include a link to the actual post.

I pray that God will give me a clear sense of direction as to where He wants me to go with this. With my Compassion advocacy taking off now, I think this is a good next step.

Please join me in praying for the least of these, and spreading the word about Compassion.

In His peaceful presence,

Sharon

Sharon Landers
Compassion Advocate

Catching up...again

Well, it's that time again...catching up on posts, and trying to get back into the swing of this. It's been a busy year for me. When I became a Compassion advocate, I really didn't have any direction as to how that might look for me personally. At my church, there was already someone who was "the Compassion person", and she only did Compassion Sunday, one day each year. After that, there was no mention of Compassion at all, from anyone, throughout the year. So, I haven't done a lot with my advocacy, but things have changed. The person has moved to another state, which means there is no-one to take over this area. I've felt the Lord calling me to step up to the plate, and so I met with one of the pastors at church who is in charge of missions and mobilization. It was a good meeting, and steps are being taken to bring more awareness for Compassion at our church. It's coming under the umbrella of a brand new orphan ministry, so we'll see what happens!

I'm excited about this opportunity, and I'm looking forward to what the future holds. Now, I need to start making plans to update this blog more often and come up with ways to promote Compassion within our church and community.

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.

Become a sponsor and change the world for one child!

In His peaceful presence,

Sharon

Sharon Landers
Compassion Advocate

Planning for the future

I'm working on several things, trying to come up with ways to work on my Compassion advocacy. I have some letters from our Beatriz in Brazil that I need to upload and publish. And, I'd like to do more with my advocacy...putting my thinking cap on!


In His peaceful presence,

Sharon

Sharon Landers
Compassion Advocate

52 ways to pray

Compassion has a section on their website where they list 52 ways that we, as sponsors, can pray for our sponsored children. This is so helpful because sometimes, I want to pray for them in a very specific way and I just don't know how. This list helps me to focus. It's a wonderful tool that we can use to pray for our kids! In 2013, I'm going to list one prayer each week. Another blogger (Jill at Compassion Family) posts her's on Sundays. I'm not sure what day I'll be posting mine, just however it works out I guess because I have other regular posts that I'd like to start doing next year.

Thank you, Compassion, for coming up with this list!

In His grace,

Sharon

Antonio needs a sponsor

This is Antonio in Brazil and he's waiting for a sponsor.

Antonio just turned 7 years old in June. He lives with his father and mother. His father is sometimes employed as a laborer. He loves soccer, playing with cars, and playing with marbles!

Little Antonio is a special needs child as he is crippled in both feet. Please consider sponsoring him! If you can't sponsor, please pray for Antonio, that he'll find a sponsor soon.

Would you like to sponsor Antonio?
Click here...
http://www.compassion.com/sponsor_a_child/child-biography.htm?needKey=BR4240686

In His grace,

Sharon

Did you know...?

Did you know...

-more than a quarter of the world's 7 billion people are children age 15 and under?
-in developing countries, a thid to almost half of the population are children?
-about 153 million of the world's children are orphans?
-and, more than 100 million (of those 153 million) live and work on the streets?
-more than 100 million children who are school age do not attend school?

Children are our future. They are future parents, teachers, pastors, doctors, nurses, scientists, community leaders. Let's invest in their lives, both locally and globally. Help release them from their spiritual and physical poverty. Let's build them up and help our children to become responsible, healthy and happy Christian adults.

Sponsor a child through Compassion International today!

Click here...
http://www.compassion.com/sponsor_a_child/default.htm?referer=126731

In His grace,

Sharon