Psalm 10:17-18
This time last year the Lord was just birthing this ministry in the hearts of Mary Slager and myself. After doing Orphan Sunday at our church in November of 2011 we felt led to Christian Alliance For Orphans' annual orphan summit in California last May. Since then we've spoken in a handful of local churches, held our first ever orphan conference, hosted a "Faultless" event, and we've been on local Christian radio a number of times.
We settled on the name Justice For Orphans based on the above Scripture. And we believe the Lord is directing us to 3 main areas of ministry:
- Rally the Church for the cause of the fatherless. (James 1:27)
- Advocate for Christian families to step up and adopt and/or do foster care.
- Wrap around families who have answered the call to defend the orphan.
Pure and lasting religion in the sight of God our Father means that we must care for orphans and widows in their troubles, and refuse to let the world corrupt us. James 1:27
How will we do this? To rally the Church we are aiming to speak at area churches who will permit us to bring the message of God's heart for the fatherless. We are also planning to do this through Christian radio and social media. When we speak we always share about the plight of orphans here in the States and around the world, we present practical ways anyone and everyone can help defend the orphan, and we share our own personal testimonies as adoptive moms. Since we have personal experience with the joys and difficulties of adopting and fostering, we have a heart to bring hope, help, and encouragement to other adoptive and foster families.
Learn to do good, seek justice. Help the oppressed. Defend the orphan... Isaiah 1:17
What's on the calendar for 2013? We are very excited to announce that our very own JFO logo and website are in the works and will be up and running in mid-March!
In the area of foster care we are in the process of setting up the classes (mapp) for families to become certified to become foster parents. These are tentatively scheduled to begin at Gospel Community Church in Coxsackie, NY on February 4th.
Pastor Stan & Mary and Wayne & I are planning to attend CAFO's 9th annual Orphan Summit in Nashville, TN in May!
We are amazed at how the Lord opened the door for us to be on the radio. It all started when I was invited to share about orphans on a local Christian talk-radio station. They had me back on again in October to promote Orphan Sunday. Then another Christian station interviewed me for a pod-cast to celebrate National Adoption Awareness Month in November. That led to the station doing a live-remote broadcast from our home to celebrate adoption month! This is not an area we would have ever thought to pursue, but the Lord keeps opening the door. In December I was approached by the talk-radio station with the idea for JFO to host our very own weekly, 1 hour radio show! We really prayed hard about this possibility because of the huge responsibility it is. But it's also an excellent way to "rally the Church for the cause of the fatherless," so after some negotiation, we signed the contract! Over the summer we will record 17 half-hour shows covering various topics relating to orphans: adoption, fostering, trafficking, global orphan care, local orphans, challenges parenting kids from hard places, etc. We can have guests, do interviews, promote up coming events, etc. The shows will air from August-November on Fridays at 1:30pm. Each of the recorded shows will be the property of JFO and will be available on our website for free downloads. Of course, now we need to raise the funds to actually do the show since air-time isn't free! We need to raise $1300.
We have a couple of fund raisers in the works including the Coxsackie Yard Sale Day in the summer and a Christian woman who will sell flower and vegetable plants and donate the proceeds to JFO. We have been blessed by some area churches who have sown into our ministry as well.
We have tentatively sent a date for our Second Annual Orphan Conference to be held at Gospel Community Church in Coxsackie. This year's date is Saturday, October 19th, so mark your calendar. We will cover topics such as adoption (domestic & international), foster care, global orphan care, human trafficking affects on orphans, and a session for adoptive/foster families who are struggling with their children.
Last September Wayne and I attended "Empowered To Connect". A teaching conference for parents and professionals working with kids from hard places. It was presented by Tapestry Ministries and Dr. Karyn Purvis, PhD. I'd read the book The Connected Child by Dr. Purvis and watched some of her videos. We were so impressed by her teaching, and our family was so helped by her methods, that we just had to attend the conference in Nashville last fall. Since then we've been accepted into a "train the trainer" program where, starting in August, Wayne and I will go through the classes at home for 7 weeks so we can be certified to teach the "Empowered To Connect" program and the TBRI methods. After the 7 weeks at home we will travel to Texas in early October for a 3 day intensive training session. This training will not only help us with parenting our own kids (many from hard places) but will also help us to help other families walking through the same challenges.
Last, but not least, is Orphan Sunday on November 3rd. Since I'm the Regional Coordinator in NY for OS, we will be promoting it again this year.
So, Justice For Orphans has some exciting things coming up! As soon as the website is up we'll be able to keep everyone up to date on all events. One area we really need to open up for us is getting into Churches to share God's heart for the orphan. We thank you for your interest, your prayers, and your support.
Blessings,
Sandra Flach,
Justice For Orphans
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