Today's pic comes from another of our very small, rural church communities, this one in the Petauke area. It does seem like I post a picture of a feeding program taking place three out of four weeks a month, and I hope that doesn't get old for you followers. Those pictures never get old for me. That picture represents eight real families in rural Zambia that will be able to enjoy a little more food with their meals over the next month. It's just so hard to relate to such a difficult way of life in a place where we seldom have to think about where the next meal is coming from. That challenge is SO real in rural Zambia.
As we continue to work with Tracy and Dr. Youngs to improve the ability of our Zambian brothers and sisters to do meaningful work to sustain their families, we intend to continue to lift them up with a little bit of sustenance while they are getting there. It's so beautiful.
And it is so efficient. It costs around $40 to make that picture happen. By the time we do our harvest effort and supplement with several communities where there is no storage available. Then we send funds monthly so the recipients have something to take to the miller to get the shelled maize ground into cornmeal, it is around $5 per family. I think that is pretty efficient use of funds.
We at S2S proudly invite any and all to jump in with us. And what we are asking for is just a little of your surplus. And we aren't pushing some strict definition of surplus. If we were, and if "deficit" or "destitute" were being defined as LACKING in the basic necessities of life like food, water, and shelter. Then we might consider defining "surplus" as anything beyond the basic necessities of life like food, water, and shelter. From that perspective, we ALL have a LOT of surplus. I can confess that I am not sharing everything I have above that line. And I'm not asking you to either. Just consider your situation. If you are an accountant like me, you might track a household balance sheet. That would show how much your assets are greater than your liabilities. You might argue that some of that balance is "needed" for the future. You may be right. But how much do we "need" to store away? While our brothers and sisters are struggling to eat TODAY.
I realize that's in your face just a bit, but certainly no more than John was in I John 3:16-18. Are we a LOVING people? Are we teaching our kids to LOVE? How better than to follow that text and share with our brothers and sisters who are in need. I believe that is what the first group of Jesus followers were doing in Acts 2, Acts 4, Acts 6 and Acts 11. John wasn't one voice against some different "gospel" teaching elsewhere in the scripture. I believe John was saying in that text what everyone in the first century church believed. Jesus taught us to LOVE. And THIS is what LOVE looks like. I guess I can't just put that reference out there without sharing what it says one more time. Here it is, this time from my Revised Standard Version:
I John 3:16-18 By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But if any one has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or speech but in deed and in truth.
Those are hard words to live by. There is a reason the signs we see held up on national TV say "John 3:16" and not "I John 3:16-18." It is a beautiful thing to believe that the Creator "loves the world". Much less exciting to hear that the Creator wants US to love the world also. We can't show that in the same way the Creator did in the Jesus story. But we CAN show that in the way we share what we have. That is what we are about at Shoulder 2 Shoulder. Just sharing what we can with our brothers and sisters who otherwise won't eat. Simple concept. Surprisingly difficult to assent to and follow. Approaching 6 years of work, we are sitting at 150 total American household donors. 150. That group of people just sharing a little bit of their surplus will impact over 2,400 Zambian households THIS MONTH. The efficiency is amazing. But we could do SO MUCH MORE. Help us.
We will be asking for larger one-time gifts to purchase seed and fertilizer for destitute Zambian maize growers over the next couple of months. Think about playing a part. Typically, we can provide for one grower for every $100 donated. As importantly, we are always looking for more donors who can share a smaller amount every month. The exchange rate is ever fickle, but as things stand right now, we have around $7,800 committed monthly going towards a monthly desired spend of a little over $9,000. And we have a new live animal training farm in rural Chipata that has ongoing monthly expenses that we are still trying to wrap our arms around. We believe this will be a second amazing development project for us to be involved with over the coming years as we consider where to build the next one. But this one has to be successful first. I'm sure you will see more EGG pictures coming, as more and more of those 100 hens begin laying. SO FUN!!! Second time we followed the voices of some American brothers who have a more DEVELOPMENT based philosophy - and it has allowed us to feed more of our destitute brothers and sisters. I love it!!
Whether you are one of the 150 or not, thanks for following. We will keep pushing forward. In our second month feeding people back in January 2021, one of our Zambian leaders asked us how long we intend to keep sending over funds. We said as long as we had funds to send. That was around 68 months ago. A lot has happened. A lot has changed. But we are still sending over funds to feed our brothers and sisters every month.
