Today, I wept with the ugly underbelly and danced with hope.
I saw a man, a father, stumbling in a drunken stupor strike his daughter in the wide open as our bus rumbled down the stone road.
Just moments later, I saw jumping, playing, smiling kids greet us at a World Vision empowerment program.
If I’m honest with myself, and you, I’m having a hard time figuring out the disparity between the two images.
The one thing I can tell you is this: The kids that I saw playing at the World Vision school live in the same community as the young girl that was struck by her dad. The problems are not solitary, they are rampant – they are lurking behind every dark corner and under every tin roof. Every kid is vulnerable in this place.
Every kid.
But, one child at a time, one family at a time, and one community at a time, World Vision is making massive strides to replace the dark with the light. To replace the ugly with the beautiful. To replace the dispair with hope.
Let’s choose to be the light. Let’s choose to be the beautiful.
Let’s choose to always dance with hope.
Sponsor a child through World Vision. Let’s change the world.
All photos © Amy Conner for World Vision
thank you for going and for being a voice to us that are unable to go.
Makes my heart cry…..but its just not in Bolivia…its everywhere. So very sad…..there is hope
These stories are absolutely heartbreaking. Thank you for being there. For sharing the stories and sharing the need. I’ll definitely be reading more on World Vision and sponsoring a child through them.
These things hurt my heart. But this is part of the amazing, redemptive work of Jesus–that in the midst of ugliness there can be beauty and dancing, laughter, joy, love. Ugliness doesn’t mean all-ugliness. Death doesn’t mean all-death. Hope grows. Grace grows.
Thank you for telling these stories.
Nisha,
Thank you so much for sharing your sponsor child with us! It is great to see how we all become one big family helping each other! Thank you for taking the time to go down and spend some time with our staff and learn more about World Vision!
Blessings
Lily
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