A few months ago I got to take a group of people to Peru with Compassion International. It was an amazing trip and there were a lot of great moments for all of came on the trip. One of my highlights was this little girl. Her name is Veleryn.

Veleryn came to the project and danced for us with a little friend of hers. Her friend was a little boy her same age who is in the compassion program. Veleryn was not in the program yet.  The two dance for us a very traditional type of dance and they were just about as proper as any one could be. It was like ballroom dancing mixed with latin tradition. I think they could have competed on Dancing With The Stars!

Well, as the time went on I looked at one of our office staff in Peru and said, “if she ever gets in the program I want to sponsor her.” So then I had my picture made with her and talked to her briefly. Absolutely adorable.

So a couple of days ago, I got an email from our Peru staff telling me she just got in the program and she can be my sponsor child if I was ready. WELL OF COURSE!!!!

How could I not sponsor a sweet little one like her!!! So now I’m off to print of this picture of us to send her and write my first letter to her.

This is what I love about this opportunity. It’s the ability to love on kids from far away, encouraging them to be the best they can be and know how much they are loved by God, their family, and me. It’s an opportunity to show a little one how proud we are of them and give them the confidence to be significant.

So… I think you should sponsor a child too. I’m going to the Dominican Republic again in April and to India in April so I’m going to writing about this a lot more.

Come on!!! Join me!!! Sponsor a child. I promise… you won’t regret it.

Sponsor HERE

As you are reading this post, know that I wrote it while on my flight from Miami to Lima, Peru. It’s been a great day so far, I have friends on this trip that are far to dear to me…the rest I’m getting to know. I’m the trip leader so I have everyone’s name branded into my brain along with any particular details I should know about them like their ages and medical needs should they get sick.

Tonight on the plane I was sitting in a bulk head seat right behind the bathroom. I dozed off for a moment only to wake up to a gathering of flight attendants trying to bust open the bathroom door. A young lady had gone in to take care of “business” not realizing that when she locked the door that it would malfunction and lock her in. Oh the fun…a flight attendant eventually busted through the door. The young lady was not panicked but laughing in embarrassment when she emerged from her possible new seat assignment. Everyone in eyesight was laughing too…it could have been a lot worse I’m sure.

This week’s trip is a special one because it takes me back to when I was married. It was my first time to Peru and I brought my former wife with me to see our work and…we were coming to meet one of our sponsor children, Marcela.

I didn’t realize sponsoring a child can impact your life so much by the things your sponsor child tells you.

I was leading the trip to Lima and when the day came to meet our little girl, we both woke up in stressful moods. There was a lot of stress going on for the two of us that day and I did not handle it well. We argued, got ready and put on our happy faces to go to breakfast as if nothing was wrong. As most couples do when stress is very present, we put our differences aside and focused on meeting Marcela. There is so much I remember about this day…

As we pulled up to Marcela’s project, Marcela and her mom were standing outside waiting for us. We got out of our bus and when our eyes met hers, she lit up like the brightest star. Even now I think about this moment and I’m brought to sweet tears. It was the perfect moment to see. There were big huge hugs and big alligator tears flowing from the two of us, Marcela and her mom.

From this point forward our day was consumed with Marcela. She had all of our letters and pictures we had sent and at the tender age of 9 she talked non stop. My former wife is part hispanic and knows her spanish well. Me…I’m the one guy in the room void of any spanish so the translator was trying to keep up with our little chatter box of a girl. The moments were incredible with this child, her mom and her older brother. Moments that once we got home, I would find myself sitting on our coach alone sobbing because my life had been so touched by Marcela. Everyday I did this…for a long time…wishing that she was living with us in Franklin. I loved this little one like she was one of our own.

Since meeting Marcela, there was one moment I have a little guilt over. At one point in the day with Marcela stopped everything, looked at the two of us and said as serious as a 9 year old could…. don’t ever leave each other. The room went quite and I was looking for a translation…What did she say? With tears in her eyes, my former wife looked at me and said…She said for us to not ever leave each other… As I tried to hold back the tears, the arguments seem to diminish in importance and life that day seem to take on a different meaning. We later found out that Marcela’s dad had just left the family.

The rest of the day I had this numbness that lingered around little Marcela’s innocent request as if she had x-ray vision into our relationship. We would just look at each other through out the day but never talked about it until we were in our room for the night. We looked at each other and just said…I’m sorry.

Not having kids, I never realized the impact one child could have on my life. It stopped me in my tracks. Here I am about 4 years later and if I were to see Marcela today, I would have to say….I’m sorry…we failed…but we both love you passionately and where we are in life today doesn’t change our love for you. Marcela has since moved and left the program.

This week’s trip is important because the redeeming moments I have had while traveling always come in the sweetest packages. I am grateful for the sweet times I had when I was married. I’m thankful for times of joying and sadness. Times of struggle and victory. And even though things still ended, I’m thankful to come back to Lima to ponder a great memory and recognize the significance one child has played in my life. Divorce isn’t always remembering the hard times. There can be real blessing in remembering to good times for what they were.

This week I will try and blog as much as I can about what we experience and if you are thinking about sponsoring a child because you think it might change a child’s life forever, then you are partly right. The other part is a warning…BEWARE, sponsoring a child might change YOUR life when you least expect it. Either way…it’s a win/win situation.