Dear Global Hope Friends,
The ministry of Global Hope began in Romania in 1996 when Randy Jessen, a Methodist pastor, and his wife, Sue, led a group of volunteers to Romania to hold orphaned babies. They had heard about the conditions of the communist-era orphanages and the need for people to simply lovingly hold the babies living in the orphanages. When they arrived, it was worse than they imagined; they were confronted with malnourished, under-stimulated infants who had learned not to cry even when they were hungry. Randy and Sue were deeply touched by these babies and felt called to take action. These babies needed a real home… a real family. Thus, as a result of this heartbreaking, and certainly life changing experience, Randy and Sue created Global Hope. Since that time Global Hope has expanded into Kenya and India, helping create loving homes for children in need. Dozens of teams have gone on mission trips to Romania, Kenya and India where their hearts have been forever changed by the children they met. The pandemic of the last year brought mission trips to a halt but we’re starting to make plans again for 2022, we hope that you will consider being one of the many faithful Global Hope supporters that raises a hand and says, “I’ll go!”
Below is a picture of a mission team in Romania in 2003. If you’ve been on a mission trip, especially one from the early days of Global Hope, we’d love it if you shared your pictures and your memories with us. Post them on Facebook or email them to me at nancy.week@globalhope.org and I will post them for you!
Nancy Week
Director, Child Sponsorship Program
Kenya – Obaga
Global Hope provides support for the village of Obaga, a small village on the western side of Kenya with a population of 7,000 households. In the last year COVID-19 has negatively impacted the village with direct consequences to the poor, vulnerable and marginalized households especially widows and orphans who rely on informal employment and businesses to fend for their children. Their ability to pay for school related costs such as school supplies, meals, and learning materials has been severely compromised. Learners from Obaga poor, vulnerable and marginalized households have no access to the mediums required for remote learning, so when the government adopted a remote learning model it further worsened the inequality in their access to and quality of education. The needs in Obaga are great, many children come to school without breakfast and can’t afford supplies such as pencils, books and uniforms. There are currently 74 students sitting for national exams, exams which qualify students to continue their education into high school. We pray that the struggles of the last year do not severely impact their performance on these very important exams.
Gratitude
You may recall that a few months ago we told you that the water pump at Obaga had been stolen. Without that pump the people had no water for their crops or their daily needs. Our wonderful Global Hope donors stepped forward immediately with amazing generosity and we were able to forward the funds for the people of Obaga to buy a new pump and repair their destroyed pump house. Today the garden is plentiful with tomatoes and kale about ready to be harvested!
We’d like to thank everyone who so generously contributed to help Spring Valley buy new sheets for the boys living in the Joshua boys’ dormitory. Your quick and overwhelming response helped us meet and surpass our goal in a matter of hours! The boys are sleeping comfortably now on their new sheets.
India – KEL Children’s Center
School has looked quite different for children all over the world since March 2020, here the children of KEL get some in-person teaching from the KEL staff. Despite all the struggles and challenges the kids are still smiling!
Reach Out!
We're glad to hear from you and answer any questions you may have.
Working together, we can make a difference!