Building My Horizon: Seeing Empowerment in Action!

“I’m very grateful for Building My Horizon. It instructed me in how to follow God and has encouraged me to work hard every day in my studies. Before COVID-19 started, I attended church regularly and was very active in the church. I liked to sing in front of the congregation. Through this I encouraged them to continue looking to God and attend church. When I’m older, I want to be a teacher and Christian singer. With the teaching education, I will be able to better teach families and children about God’s Word at church. As a singer, I can share about God through worship songs and encourage people to accept Christ as their Savior.”  BMH student (4-year participant)

This child is from a family where higher education was never considered possible and most BMH children are in a similar situation. She now has dreams of further education and is being empowered through this program to reach this goal.

We started Building My Horizon with the goal of transforming young lives to influence their families and society for good. The foundations have been through teaching life skills and the Gospel. The longer we run the program, the more we see fruit. We know this investment in a child’s life is like planting a seed. It takes time for the plant to grow, for it to blossom, and then finally produce fruit. We have started seeing good fruit, especially in the children who have been attending since the very beginning 4 years ago.

In January of this year, we conducted year-end evaluations. We evaluated the children in Bible and English, verbally and written. We are excited by the results! Many children learned 5 new Bible verses! Some even learned 8 Bible verses and some 10!

We also saw that 3 Bible stories made a big impact in their lives as most children remembered and could tell these stories well. The stories and their messages were:

• Jesus’ Birth – Very good news and the greatest gift of all. They were reminded that God keeps his promises, like the promise of a Savior, and that they can trust Him in all circumstances. They were encouraged to worship God as the wise men did.
• Ana and her son Samuel – They learned that they can communicate with God through prayer and that God responds to our prayers. They also learned about sacrifice as Ana gave her much wanted son up to serve to God as she had promised.
• Jesus’ Baptism – They learned that through baptism they make a public commitment to follow Jesus and leave the old sinful life behind. Baptism also highlights obedience as baptism is a commandment from God.

We pray that these children will impact their families and friends with these Truths and the Bible verses they memorized.   

 

This was our second year of teaching English. Learning English from home was a challenge for them. Many of them experienced their first exposure to learning English. The topics they worked on were:

• Personal pronouns
• Words for kitchen items, fruit, and vegetables
• When to use a/an, numbers, and the verbs to be/to have

 

We hope they are ready and excited to learn even more English this year!

The final activity is normally a big year-end celebration with the children and parents. They would have had lots of fun showing what they learned. Because of COVID we couldn’t do that this year. Instead, we gave out gifts to reward the children for their hard work and educational achievements. Despite, the masks, you can still see their joy at receiving their gifts!

 

“I learned to put my trust in God, behave, and help my parents” BMH Student

 

So, what does 2021 hold for BMH? As long as the current restrictions of face masks and social distancing remain, we will run BMH with a mix of in-person classes and at-home studies. The program will start in June and end in November. Here are the components:

• Continue with the once/month handouts that contain English and Bible education
• English – monthly in-person sessions – to strengthen their at-home learning
• Computer Science – monthly in-person sessions
• Parents’ Education sessions – Having parents involved is key

We invite you to help contribute to the transformation of these young lives. Here is how:

• Sponsor a child:

35 $US/month for 6 months

210 $US total per child

• Pray:

For God’s guidance for us as we prepare materials

For God’s guidance as we select 4 new children

For the children, especially as they will start back in public school next month

For the parents of the children

For health for all in the face of the on-going pandemic

Keep watch for our Valentine’s Day Catalogue of Opportunities in February. You will be able to choose which way suits you best to help these children Build their Horizons.

We thank you right now up front for your generous partnership