“…If you spend yourself in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness…” Isaiah 58:10

 

Dear Family and Friends!                                                                                                            

 

I wanted to tell you some exciting news!!  It has been quite some time since I have talked to so many of you and I pray that you are doing well!  For many of you I know it’s probably a surprise to be getting a letter from me.  Please let me know what you are doing!  It seems that by the time you graduate from high school and then college that you have friends spread out all over the United States and it gets harder and harder to keep in touch! 

 

I wanted to take this opportunity to share with you about what’s been going on in my life and what God has called me to do in the near future.  It’s quite an exciting time for me.  As most of you know, I graduated from the University of South Carolina in May 2003 and started graduate school at Eastern University in July.  My program (International Economic Development) focuses on serving the poor in the third-world, primarily through holistic, transformational development.  I believe that God has called ALL of us to share our lives with the poor by both providing for their physical and spiritual needs.   For me, this calling is to work with the poor overseas.  For many people this calling is translated into the sharing of their resources or through directed prayer.  As I begin the next phase of my life, I am asking for your help in the completion of my calling.

 

On August 23, 2004 I will be heading off to India, a land of immense natural beauty as well as immense poverty, to intern for a Christian development organization for a period of 4 months. Some of you may have heard of World Relief, which is the humanitarian arm of the National Council of Evangelical Churches.   I have been given the opportunity to work with their partner in NE India, SoFMEDA.  This is an indigenous, Christian Indian organization that works with poor farmers through the local churches. They provide moral, spiritual, social and economic assistance to nearly 1,000 families by enhancing family incomes, creating job opportunities, instilling savings habits and enabling self-reliance. I will be assisting many of these Indians in locating the resources they need to start a small business that is associated with their farming.  Most farmers in India are extremely poor and, on their own, are not eligible for any type of loans from commercial banks.  Without these loans they will be stuck in a perpetual cycle of poverty.  I will also have the opportunity to be involved in ministry.  The director of SoFMEDA is a missionary in the region, and has asked that I serve the poor through his ministry as well. 

After my time serving with SofMEDA, I will be continuing international humanitarian work in Zambia, Africa.  Africa is the poorest continent in the world, and the poverty and oppression of its people is absolutely unimaginable.  One of the greatest humanitarian disasters in sub-Saharan and southern Africa is the AIDS epidemic.  One of the awful consequences of this rapid spread is the increasing number of children who are becoming orphaned.   I will be interning with World Hope International, working with their AIDS orphan trust project in Zambia in Southern Africa.   Much of World Hope’s focus in Zambia is on the formation of Community Trusts, developed for the purpose of coming alongside caregivers of both orphans and sick family members by assisting them through three primary means: (1) Livelihood projects that form sustainable income generation, food security, and water availability; (2) Community HIV/AIDS prevention initiatives that focus on education, discipleship, advocacy, and counseling; and (3) Home-based health care and counseling for the support of people living with AIDS as well as those who care for them.  World Hope is an organization created in the Wesleyan tradition, and sharing of the hope and love of Christ is an integral part of their project as well.  Just imagine how much an orphan, who has no mother or father to care for them, needs to know and understand that they have a heavenly Father who loves them so much and wants to be a part of their life.  I will work with them from February through May 2005. This is a project that I am truly passionate about:  Offering life, opportunity and dignity to children who have been abandoned.  Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress (James 1:27).

For a long time I chose not to open my eyes to the horrific poverty of billions of people around the world.  In the back of my mind I knew that there were children without parents, shelter, or food and although it would break my heart to think about, I never chose to actually DO something to help them.  It amazes me the incredible amount of blessings that God has bestowed on each and every one of us in order that we can choose to honor him in so many different ways.  We are incredibly wealthy, and not only in a financial way.  We have freedom of religion, democracy, access to education, and access to most other resources we could need.  I wrestled with these issues inside for so long (and I still do!) and knew that I wanted to commit my life to being a light of God’s love, mercy, and justice to a world of people who literally have nothing to call their own.  In order to do this, I am asking for your help in raising support for my work with the poor in Africa and Asia, and/or your continual prayers, not only for me, but for the lives of those who don’t know Jesus and who live in destitution on the outskirts of society.  I’m asking you to partner with me in this journey, and to let God use the financial resources or the commitment to prayer that you possess to impact the lives of many people. 

               

For both of these jobs, I am required to raise my own support.  I need to raise a total of $11,000 for the 8 months when I will be overseas.  My goal is to raise all my support by August (before I leave for my first assignment in India), however funds for Zambia can be received until January.  I am raising support through Bel Air United Methodist Church, my home church.  If you are interested in supporting me, checks can be made out to Bel Air United Methodist Church and it will be tax-deductible for you.  Write “Missionary Fund” in the memo spot.  All correspondence can be mailed to my parents’ house:

 

Sarah Hidey

1407 Vermont Rd.

Bel Air, MD 21014

 

Your support will enable me to help poor farmers and orphans in amazing ways.  Your prayers will uplift and encourage me and your donations will allow me to spend months helping those who most of the world has forgotten.  Also, all other correspondence from me after this will primarily be by email.  I will have email access while in India and Africa and would love to email updates and prayer requests when possible.  On the enclosed card, you can indicate whether or not you are interested in supporting me in any way (or just hearing about my time in these countries!)  I can also be reached by email at shidey@aol.com. 

 

If you are interested in learning more about either of these organizations, their websites are listed below.

 

 

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