when packing for trips within the united states (after having lived in china), this was a common phrase glo and i would exchange... "well, even if you forget something, it's not like you're going to china."
well, now, i am going to china. the reality that i'll soon be back in a place where things aren't as readily accessible, and maybe not available at all, is quickly becoming a reality. fitted sheets, of all things, are one example. my soon-to-be roommate messaged me to say that if i'd like something other than a flat sheet on my queen mattress, i should bring it from the states. so, i've started making piles... wondering what will make the cut into my suitcase; what will i want (or wish i had) for the next 4 months.
i leave in 7 days and have just a few more things to do (give a lecture at the PT school, attend a wedding, give my testimony at church, attend a bridal shower, say more good-byes to family and friends, exchange money at the bank, make at least one more trip to target, work 2 days and train my replacement, make flashcards to start learning the orphans' names and their medical histories, pack, etc.).
i'd appreciate prayers for these next 7 days-- that i'd find time to get everything completed, while not becoming stressed or losing focus on god (who has allowed all this to come together and is ultimately the reason i'm going).
prayers for traveling mercies and good rest while on the plane will also be appreciated. my plane is scheduled to leave o'hare ~1:15 am friday, september 5th, for my direct flight to hong kong. once in hong kong i'll have an ~6 hour layover, and then a domestic flight followed by a ~4-hour car ride. i'll definitely try to update as often as i can on that initial 24+ hour journey to wenshan.
gotta get some sleep; good night!
Friday, August 29, 2014
Monday, August 11, 2014
{to look after orphans}
nightlight christian adoptions has generously pledged
to cover my budgeted expenses (~$5000) for my upcoming 4-month trip. i'm grateful for this provision and extremely humbled by their desire to partner with me and my professional skills.BUT, nightlight is a nonprofit organization and they fundraise for their various orphan care projects. their 1:1 china partnership fund is currently providing for things like, but not limited to, file preparation (paperwork so children can be adopted), nutritional supplements, crib upgrades, medical expenses, developmental toys and equipment, etc., ...and will soon broaden to include me/my skills (physical therapy, nanny training, and whatever else god may use me for).
there are a variety of ways to care for the millions of orphans worldwide and probably hundreds of different organizations by which to do so. however, if you're like me, you like to know where your money is going and it helps to have some personal connection to the work being done and/or the people doing the work.
if you'd like to join me in meeting some tangible needs of these chinese orphans, others like them, and even those who will unfortunately be abandoned in the coming months...
please give to nightlight's 1:1 china orphanage program:
(all donations are tax deductible).
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this:
to look after orphans and widows in their distress
and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.
James 1:27
Friday, August 8, 2014
{the power of prayer}
i am a firm believer in the power of prayer.
during previous mission trips i've experienced a very real and uniquely prominent spiritual battle in china and i've learned that prayer support is absolutely necessary and invaluable to any work being done there. with that said, it would be foolish for me to go at this alone. i would like to recruit an army of prayer warriors to join me on this ~4-month endeavor.
if you are a praying person, please consider these 2 options:
1) reading this blog and praying for the general needs that will be mentioned here
-or-
2) signing up to receive more specific prayer requests (via email or another (tbd) method) if/as needed (possibly more frequent, urgent and/or sensitive requests, etc.). if you'd like to commit to this latter option, please inform me via email (clark.april@gmail.com), facebook message or otherwise by 8/25.
while i'll be half way around the world and may not be as in touch with the life happenings of people here, please always feel free to share any personal requests with me; it would be an honor to reciprocally pray for you!
"Prayer is the vital breath of the Christian;
during previous mission trips i've experienced a very real and uniquely prominent spiritual battle in china and i've learned that prayer support is absolutely necessary and invaluable to any work being done there. with that said, it would be foolish for me to go at this alone. i would like to recruit an army of prayer warriors to join me on this ~4-month endeavor.
if you are a praying person, please consider these 2 options:
1) reading this blog and praying for the general needs that will be mentioned here
-or-
2) signing up to receive more specific prayer requests (via email or another (tbd) method) if/as needed (possibly more frequent, urgent and/or sensitive requests, etc.). if you'd like to commit to this latter option, please inform me via email (clark.april@gmail.com), facebook message or otherwise by 8/25.
while i'll be half way around the world and may not be as in touch with the life happenings of people here, please always feel free to share any personal requests with me; it would be an honor to reciprocally pray for you!
"It is possible to move men, through God, by prayer alone."
- Hudson Taylor
"Any concern too small to be turned into a prayer is too small to be made into a burden."
- Corrie Ten Boom
"Prayer is the vital breath of the Christian;
not the thing that makes him alive, but the evidence that he is alive."
- Oswald Chambers
"Work as if you were to live a hundred years, pray as if you were to die tomorrow."
- Benjamin Franklin
Saturday, August 2, 2014
{doing what & where?}
i go to china expecting my flexibility and patience to be refined, as those who have spent time there know that things don't always go as planned. with that said, below is what i think i'll be up to while i'm there.
i'll be based in wenshan, which is a city located in yunnan province. i'll be working with my good friend pam and her nonprofit organization, hope harvest international (hhi). while hhi cares for the marginalized in impoverished areas of china in multiple ways, one avenue for this is a center where children with disabilities receive various therapy and special education services. i anticipate providing physical therapy to these children, educating/training her staff, consulting on various future projects, etc. i'm really looking forward to serving alongside pam and her team, while also getting to know the families whose lives have been deeply impacted (many eternally) by hhi's commitment to model christ and his love.
once a month, i'll be traveling to guangxi province for ~10 days. there i'll be working on behalf of nightlight christian adoptions at their 1:1 partnership--the beiliu orphanage. i'll be providing physical therapy and general developmental activities to the children, educating and training the orphanage nannies (if/as needed), and hopefully spending a lot of time simply loving everyone there. there are also hopes for me to assess the status of the 6 new babies, improve the nutritional status of most all of the children with a feeding program, help determine which children may need more medical attention, and identify any additional, at-large needs of the orphanage.
in beiliu, i will be solely working with chinese nationals (no other expats/foreigners), only one staff member speaks english (fairly well), and there are no fellow believers (that i'm aware of). my time in beiliu will have very different challenges than what i'll face in wenshan, but god has clearly orchestrated the details for me to be at this orphanage; i can only expect that he'll continue to do immeasurably more than i could ask or imagine during my time there. (not to mention, he must think i'm due for a significant faith building exercise.)
information forthcoming for those who'd like to support me and the work i'll be involved with;
please stay tuned!
Hope Harvest International
www.facebook.com/HopeHarvestIntl/info
Nightlight Christian Adoptions (formerly A Helping Hand Adoption Agency)
www.nightlight.org
i'll be based in wenshan, which is a city located in yunnan province. i'll be working with my good friend pam and her nonprofit organization, hope harvest international (hhi). while hhi cares for the marginalized in impoverished areas of china in multiple ways, one avenue for this is a center where children with disabilities receive various therapy and special education services. i anticipate providing physical therapy to these children, educating/training her staff, consulting on various future projects, etc. i'm really looking forward to serving alongside pam and her team, while also getting to know the families whose lives have been deeply impacted (many eternally) by hhi's commitment to model christ and his love.
once a month, i'll be traveling to guangxi province for ~10 days. there i'll be working on behalf of nightlight christian adoptions at their 1:1 partnership--the beiliu orphanage. i'll be providing physical therapy and general developmental activities to the children, educating and training the orphanage nannies (if/as needed), and hopefully spending a lot of time simply loving everyone there. there are also hopes for me to assess the status of the 6 new babies, improve the nutritional status of most all of the children with a feeding program, help determine which children may need more medical attention, and identify any additional, at-large needs of the orphanage.
in beiliu, i will be solely working with chinese nationals (no other expats/foreigners), only one staff member speaks english (fairly well), and there are no fellow believers (that i'm aware of). my time in beiliu will have very different challenges than what i'll face in wenshan, but god has clearly orchestrated the details for me to be at this orphanage; i can only expect that he'll continue to do immeasurably more than i could ask or imagine during my time there. (not to mention, he must think i'm due for a significant faith building exercise.)
information forthcoming for those who'd like to support me and the work i'll be involved with;
please stay tuned!
Hope Harvest International
www.facebook.com/HopeHarvestIntl/info
Nightlight Christian Adoptions (formerly A Helping Hand Adoption Agency)
www.nightlight.org
Friday, August 1, 2014
{history: me + china + orphans}
god first led me to china in
1998. while i committed to
serving god for a year following graduation from college, i had no idea how
this time in china would significantly impact and shape my life.
i went to china to primarily serve in a college ministry, but my interest in orphans led me to volunteer at a local orphanage in my free-time. my teammates and i would relieve the nannies of their responsibilities so they could participate in a weekly bible study. we'd simple provide the orphans with attention and interaction, meeting their most basic needs.
my experience with caring for orphans deepened when one of my leaders took in a baby boy who had been abandoned on the steps of a local hospital. my friends and i took shifts feeding and caring for this baby with a cleft palate. we fed him with medicine droppers and strengthened his lifeless body to a point where he was strong enough to cry. (the baby later went to the orphanage and then to a forever family in the US.) i also had the opportunity to meet up with family friends who came to china to pick up their much anticipated adopted daughter. witnessing that first meeting, where in essence a child is exchanging their orphan status for a forever family, is hard to capture with words-- a priceless, emotional and unforgettable experience.
i lengthened my one-year commitment to serve in china to two, and before long it was evident that god was cultivating this caucasian, country-girl's heart with a passion for a people group and culture very different from her own. i came back to the states and resumed my plan to attend graduate school for physical therapy and work in pediatrics, but now had a hope to someday use my education and training to impact chinese orphans and children with special needs.
i obtained my doctorate of physical therapy degree in 2004 and have since been working as a pediatric physical therapist at the university of illinois medical center in chicago. i have extensive experience working with hospitalized children in general acute and intensive care units, including the neonatal intensive care unit where i help premature and other medically fragile infants obtain feeding and other developmental skills.
i have returned to china 3 times for short-term mission trips, observing and volunteering with different organizations (international china concern, cram worldwide, hope harvest international, nightlight christian adoptions (formerly a helping hand adoption agency), etc.) and their work with orphans and children with disabilities. from these experiences i've witnessed the ongoing needs that both local and foreign run orphanages and therapy centers have for resources and trained personnel as they work to minimize disparities, optimize outcomes, and provide hope for the children they serve.
my most recent trip to china was in november of 2013 and my experience is well captured by the words of david platt in his book, radical: “We learned that orphans are easier to ignore before you know their names. They are easier to ignore before you see their faces. It is easier to pretend they’re not real before you hold them in your arms. But once you do, everything changes…”
whether it’s praying for timothy, a severely malnourished little boy i held in my arms with a need for love, or helping to coordinate gloria's life-giving heart surgery, or wondering what other children simply need someone to advocate for their needs... i feel compelled to do more.
through god's amazing provision, this fall i'll be taking an unpaid leave of absence from my job to return to china for 4 months. i'll be working alongside two nonprofit organizations who care for orphans and children with disabilities. i am very excited and grateful for this opportunity, and eager to see what god has planned. hopefully this blog will serve as a means for people to read about and/or partner with the work we are doing.
i went to china to primarily serve in a college ministry, but my interest in orphans led me to volunteer at a local orphanage in my free-time. my teammates and i would relieve the nannies of their responsibilities so they could participate in a weekly bible study. we'd simple provide the orphans with attention and interaction, meeting their most basic needs.
my experience with caring for orphans deepened when one of my leaders took in a baby boy who had been abandoned on the steps of a local hospital. my friends and i took shifts feeding and caring for this baby with a cleft palate. we fed him with medicine droppers and strengthened his lifeless body to a point where he was strong enough to cry. (the baby later went to the orphanage and then to a forever family in the US.) i also had the opportunity to meet up with family friends who came to china to pick up their much anticipated adopted daughter. witnessing that first meeting, where in essence a child is exchanging their orphan status for a forever family, is hard to capture with words-- a priceless, emotional and unforgettable experience.
i lengthened my one-year commitment to serve in china to two, and before long it was evident that god was cultivating this caucasian, country-girl's heart with a passion for a people group and culture very different from her own. i came back to the states and resumed my plan to attend graduate school for physical therapy and work in pediatrics, but now had a hope to someday use my education and training to impact chinese orphans and children with special needs.
i obtained my doctorate of physical therapy degree in 2004 and have since been working as a pediatric physical therapist at the university of illinois medical center in chicago. i have extensive experience working with hospitalized children in general acute and intensive care units, including the neonatal intensive care unit where i help premature and other medically fragile infants obtain feeding and other developmental skills.
i have returned to china 3 times for short-term mission trips, observing and volunteering with different organizations (international china concern, cram worldwide, hope harvest international, nightlight christian adoptions (formerly a helping hand adoption agency), etc.) and their work with orphans and children with disabilities. from these experiences i've witnessed the ongoing needs that both local and foreign run orphanages and therapy centers have for resources and trained personnel as they work to minimize disparities, optimize outcomes, and provide hope for the children they serve.
my most recent trip to china was in november of 2013 and my experience is well captured by the words of david platt in his book, radical: “We learned that orphans are easier to ignore before you know their names. They are easier to ignore before you see their faces. It is easier to pretend they’re not real before you hold them in your arms. But once you do, everything changes…”
whether it’s praying for timothy, a severely malnourished little boy i held in my arms with a need for love, or helping to coordinate gloria's life-giving heart surgery, or wondering what other children simply need someone to advocate for their needs... i feel compelled to do more.
through god's amazing provision, this fall i'll be taking an unpaid leave of absence from my job to return to china for 4 months. i'll be working alongside two nonprofit organizations who care for orphans and children with disabilities. i am very excited and grateful for this opportunity, and eager to see what god has planned. hopefully this blog will serve as a means for people to read about and/or partner with the work we are doing.
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