Going Back to School With Compassion

By now, most parents have shopped for school supplies, updated essential items for wardrobes, packed lunches and sent their children back off to school.  If you are anything like me, you headed to Target with an extensive list. You carefully selected the needs and threw in a few "wants" to help ease the transition and put a smile on their faces. Lisa Frank has still got it! Puppy folders, tye-dye pencil pouches and brand new crayolas are sure to start my girls' year off great.
I've been scouring Pinterest for healthy, but fun lunch box ideas.  I printed out signs with the applicable grade on them and made my children pose for pictures while their bellies were swarming with butterflies. 

We gently reminded the big girls about being kind, working hard and most importantly to look for someone new or lonely.  I was always, always the new kid.  I went to 7 different elementary schools, and I still remember, with absolute clarity, the girl who would reach out to me at each school.  I also remember and hold the scars, of the girls who didn't.  Kindness to the lonely is something we stress in our family. It is just as essential a school supply as their paper.

In America, we get to do this.  Moms get to prepare, clothe and spoil our children back into school.  A brand new pair of sneakers with surely help our sons feel like they can race like an Olympian.  New hair bows and a glittery shirt will help our daughters walk in with confidence and happiness right?

But what if you couldn't?  What if you couldn't buy the neccessities, or pay for lunch?  What if you had to pay to send your child to school and you couldn't afford it?  What if you knew that to not send your child to school would mean a lifetime of debilitating poverty, and likely death?  Hopelessness.

What if I told you that you can not only send your child back to school with the things they need, but for a very small amount each month, you can send a child to school,  feed them, and give them medical care when they need it???

Superman isn't real, Iron Man isn't coming to the rescue, Spider Man isn't swinging in to save the day.  But you CAN be a superhero.  You can come to the rescue of a child who NEEDS you.  You may not wear a costume, or a cape but there are parents out there waiting for you to come to their rescue.  You are a superhero to them.  Be on the Avenger team.

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And if you are on the Avenging team already, write letters of encouragement.  Send a birthday card. Stay in contact.  Sadness, fear and discouragment creep up quietly, and they need us to be a lifeline of prayer and kind words to stick it out.  Compassion Int. goes out of their way to make it easy on their sponsors to stay in contact with your child and their family.  Write a letter to your child today! See how their school day was, as if they were one of your own that you are interviewing at the end of the day. 

Go to http://www.compassion.com today to sponsor a child, and send them to school with Compassion.