from hope to reality

I had the privilege of preaching at Grace Church of Memphis yesterday on the cosmic significance of adoption within the story of redemption. You can listen to it here.

One of the ways our family seeks to serve orphans is by praying for them at supper time. I’ve had the opportunity to travel to orphanages in China and Ethiopia. So I printed out pictures of orphans I’ve had the privilege of meeting on those trips and put them on our refrigerator. [...]

From our Ethiopian Orphan Benefit Dinner and Silent Auction page:
On Saturday, September 6, from 6:30-8:30 p.m., Carolina Hope is having an Ethiopian Orphan Benefit. The event will be held at Furman University in Greenville, SC.
In addition to dinner, the fundraiser will feature…

live musical entertainment

a silent auction with jewelry, rounds of golf, clothing, home interior pieces, [...]

As many of you know, in honor of his daughter Maria Sue, Steven Curtis Chapman wrote a CNN article entitled, “Our Tragedy and God’s Love for Orphans.” It is a great example of how vertical love (God’s adoptive love for us) can move horizontally (our adoptive love for an orphan). Steven’s article about Maria and [...]

Registration for Together for Adoption Conference 2008 is now open! Please join us for this unique event as we explore what our adoption in Christ means for us and for orphans.
Conference Speakers: Rick Phillips, Russell Moore, Carl Robbins, and Tullian Tchividjian.
See conference schedule here.

To read the article, click on the image below, and you will be able to download the article as a PDF.

Check out Jason Kovacs’ excellent post on adoption at Desiring God’s blog. It is entitled “Glorifying the Father of the Fatherless.”

James 1:27 says, “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction.” God’s people are to be marked by a compassion for orphans and widows. We have received compassion that we might have compassion on others who are in need of it. [...]

Benedict & Kathleen Schwartz of All Kids Can Learn International and Children of Zion Village will be guests on FamilyLife Today both Monday and Tuesday, March 17th-18th, next week. Dennis Rainey will be interviewing them about the exciting orphan ministry opportunities with this Christian Alliance for Orphans partner in Namibia and Zambia. You can learn [...]

Over the weekend we received our first donations to specific needs at the Ethiopia Group Home. Check out the list of needed items to see what’s been given and what is still needed. And thanks to those who gave!
(You can watch video footage here of Ethiopian orphans who were visited by Carolina Hope’s Lisa Prather [...]

This is our Ethiopia video that premiered at our recent benefit concert with Caedmon’s Call. It was created by Brannon McAllister from footage captured on our recent trip to Ethiopia. The children shown in this video live at one of the orphanages with which we work, an orphanage located in a village with [...]

The staff at Carolina Hope wants to thank Desiring God for their very kind and thoughtful blog post about our recent trip to Ethiopia and our upcoming benefit concert.  Lukas Naugle’s post was encouraging to us.  It has been our great privilege to partner with them in these ways.
(Donations to help Ethiopian orphans can be [...]

(Donations to help Ethiopian orphans can be made here. Tickets to the Ethiopia Benefit Concert can be purchased here.)
:: picture taken by dan ::

(Donations to help Ethiopian orphans can be made here. Tickets to the Ethiopia Benefit Concert can be purchased here.)
:: picture taken by dan ::

The picture below was taken at the same orphanage where these three pictures were taken (one, two, three). As I mentioned in the post of the first picture linked to above, we had just handed out colored pencils and paper to the children. They were all very quick to sit down to start drawing. [...]

These children were enjoying watching themselves as I filmed them. And yes, I was listening.
Wesen, the gentleman speaking, is talking about churches sending mission teams to this orphanage to serve these orphans (builders, teachers, musicians, electricians, health professionals, people who just love spending time with children, etc).

[Update: Donations to benefit Ethiopian orphans can be [...]

Marty McAlpine, Media Engineer at Desiring God, accompanied us on our trip to Ethiopia to video capture much of what we did while there. The director of the orphanage where the picture below was taken told us that many professional cameramen come through their particular village (a village with 20,000+ known cases of AIDS) to [...]

:: posted by dan ::

This picture, as well as the last, was taken in the neediest orphanage of the three with which we are working. These children have great food support needs, space needs, and clothing needs. Yet look at this little girl’s smile. This is a smile that is blossoming in the midst of profoundly difficult life circumstances. [...]

I’ve dreamed about Ethiopia every night since my return from that amazing country. One thing I am learning is that you really don’t visit Ethiopia when you cross its borders. It visits you. Ethiopia — its people, its cultures, and especially its orphans — presses itself in upon your heart with great weight. I’m still [...]