Wednesday, November 7, 2012

A HEART FOR ORPHANS

The past couple of months have been so exciting  and crazy busy.  We have made some major changes around here and God is doing BIG things. I had been praying for a while that God would give me a new business model, a way to sell jewelry as more of a ministry than a business. Through a series of events and conversations with friends He gave us the idea to do adoption fundraisers. One morning, when the idea was still new, Matt (my husband) and I went to hear a guy speak on doing business as missions. Afterwords Matt told me he had been praying and that he felt like God was telling him to sell his business and that we were supposed to be doing the jewelry business together. It's pretty funny if you know my husband. He's a contractor who likes hunting, football, Nascar, and Duck Dynasty. But that is just God :) So we took a couple steps that felt like leaps and started moving in that direction. Since then we have had so much confirmation that God is leading this. He has continued to turn our hearts to orphan care in bigger ways. He has blessed the business like crazy. Orders are pouring in. And he keeps surprising us with the coolest connections to people and ministries that draw us deeper into His adventure and His work. One such connection is with a ministry we LOVE LOVE LOVE. Lifeline Childrens' Services. Not only do they facilitate adoptions, they partner with the foster care system here in town reaching out to the children, parents and workers. They help birth moms domestically and abroad. They have a ministry called (UN)adopted that helps orphans all over the world that either aren't available for adoption or are hoping to be adopted. They help the local churches in these countries start sustainable projects to help their own in their communities. And they advocate for children who need life saving surgeries who otherwise might not receive it. I was sitting at the Know More Orphans conference reading their brochure and one of the points on it really caught my attention. $1,000 can give a baby in China life-saving heart surgery. The same surgery over here in the U.S. could cost half a million dollars. Some of the surgeries cost more. Some cost less. But they are all so much more affordable than they are here. And they are all reachable goals. It's crazy to think that someone's child's life hangs in the balance over $1,000. Many children born with severe illnesses or defects are abandoned at orphanages because the parents are desperate to get them the help they can't afford. Matt and I couldn't stop thinking about it. So after meeting with friends at Lifeline we felt compelled to try to help fund at least one of these surgeries. So here it is...For the month of November 75% of the sales from heart necklaces at Rebekahblocher.com will go toward helping a precious child through Lifeline.

 

We are selling them in bundles too so you can take care of several gifts at once and save money.
I'll update this blog post on Monday with some more information about the kids awaiting surgery but I wanted to go ahead and get the word out. So please help us by posting on FB, tweeting, and pinning!