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Is There Any Hope for 115 Million Asian Children Living in Abject Poverty?

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Gospel for Asia (GFA World), Wills Point, Texas – Discussing the stories of Bridge of Hope center’s impact on the lives of thousands of children. Hope. An optimistic state of mind based on an expectation of positive outcomes. Hope is a reason to keep on keeping on. It is a reason to keep on living. People without hope live in despair. No one can reasonably say how many people live in despair. It is fair to say, however, that most people who live in abject poverty eventually lose the hope they once had. It is impossible to know exactly when that hope is lost, but for many, it is sometime during their childhood years when they begin to realize that the obstacles in the way to what they hope for are insurmountable. As the hopes and joys of early childhood are clouded by the realities of their inability to escape their destitute life, despair creeps into their hearts until every ray of hope is replaced by a dark cloud of doom. They can’t get to where they had hoped to go from where they ...
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Touched by Tony: A Mission Support Team Story

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Tony and Kelly are partner-supported members of the GFA Mission Support Team. I remember the first time I met Tony. It was late at night, and I had just arrived at the Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport. I was standing at the arrivals curb waiting for someone I had never met to give me a ride to the GFA campus in Wills Point. (I could almost hear my mother’s voice telling me to never accept a ride from a stranger—especially in the dark of night.) Fortunately, the first and only person to offer me a ride was the one GFA had asked to take me to Wills Point. Turns out that Tony is a member of the GFA Mission Support Team. The drive to GFA provided plenty of time to get to know him. You see, I had thought that Wills Point was a Dallas suburb. But it’s not. I don’t even know for sure how long the ride was or how far we traveled. I’m not saying that the GFA campus is at the end of the world, but in the daytime, you can just about see it from there. I’m almost positive that I saw a sign ...
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Come Unto Me All Ye Who Labor and Are Heavy Laden

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Bridge of Hope students “The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.” —Franklin D. Roosevelt Imagine 168 million children . That’s a very difficult thing to do. In perspective, 168 million is about one-half the entire population of the United States. What’s the point? More than 168 million children worldwide are deprived of the education they need to succeed because they live in abject poverty and are forced to work to survive. Some turn to begging. Others search garbage dumps for food, shelter or clothing. These underprivileged children are extremely vulnerable to sickness, disease, death or the bondage and exploitation of human trafficking. Poverty is widely considered as the top reason why children work at inappropriate jobs for their ages . Children work because their parents are poor, and they must supplement the family income or provide unpaid labor until debts are ...
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It Takes a Village to Change a Mind

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Gospel for Asia (GFA World), Wills Point, Texas – Discussing the challenge to change minds on open defecation in Asia. “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.” —Galatians 6:9 If all your friends are doing it, would you jump off a cliff? That sounds like something your mom might have said. But what if the cliff is really just a big rock on a bank, and there’s a beautiful, clear swimming hole down below? Perspective changes everything, doesn’t it? Peer pressure can sometimes be great. In parts of Asia where open defecation is still widely practiced, tradition says that’s how things are done. But times are changing. Education is spreading. Nudges from the community to break with tradition and use a latrine can save lives. It takes a village to change a mind, and that’s happening throughout rural Asia right now. Proactive Communities Make Open Defecation Less Socially Acceptable In the hours after dusk and before dawn, a ritual as ol...
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“You Are the Curse of Our Family”, she was told.

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Aaliya was fortunate. She survived her prenatal condition and her birth. Nonetheless, her life as a child was miserable, primarily because she was – through no fault of her own – a girl. Gospel for Asia (GFA World), Wills Point, Texas – Discussing when girls are considered to be a curse to their families. There’s just something about a brand new baby girl that can put a twinkle in her father’s eyes and a smile on her mother’s face. It’s a joyful scene when the new addition to the family arrives and is soon cradle in her mother’s arms. In just a few minutes, baby will be adorned in pink, and family members will be taking pictures of the newborn. Minutes later, those photos will be delivered to a myriad of family friends over social media. Those friends will post congratulations and add emojis, digital stickers and all other manners of online artwork to celebrate the occasion. Not so much in India, China and other Asian countries. To the contrary, in many Eastern cultures, women are rega...
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Gendercide: The Ultimate Violence Against Women

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Gospel for Asia (GFA World) , Wills Point, Texas – Discussing the topic of gendercide. Whoever dreamed up the idea of gender reveals was onto something fun. Have you seen them on social media? Sometimes, they’re baby shower games or scavenger hunts that bring the participants ever closer to finding out the big secret. Sometimes, they’re clever videos. One of the most bittersweet examples was for a military wife whose husband had been killed in action before meeting his new child. His fellow soldiers made a video of the big reveal with a shower of pink tissue paper and confetti descending as they cheered for the new baby girl. Gender reveals have surprise endings by nature: something pink or something blue. In America, we tend to cheer for girls and boys, alike. In parts of Asia, the happiness scale dips heavily in favor of boys. Many girls never have confetti, applause or even a chance at life beyond the earliest days of protection in their mother’s tummy. Selective Abortion Accounts ...
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Go Tell It on the Mountains

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Titus literally has to climb mountains like these to minister to people in churches in this area, as well as villages that have never heard the Good News. Gospel for Asia (GFA World), Wills Point, Texas – Discussing Titus, who literally has to climb mountains on foot to minister to people. When Jesus told His disciples that His plan was for them to go into all the world, He meant ALL the world (see Matthew 28:19–20). Starting with the first 11 and Paul, followers of Jesus have been going wherever they need to go to share Christ’s love. Whether that’s to our neighbors or whether it’s to people living across the globe in a far, distant country, they all have one thing in common: They need to hear about Jesus. The Bible says that whoever chooses to believe in and follow Him shall be saved (see Romans 10:13). But that Scripture verse is followed by several questions that must be answered honestly by every Christian. Not the least of these questions is “How shall they believe in Him of whom...
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