no-longer-a-slumdog

No Longer a Slumdog
Hope in Crisis
By providing quality education to the poorest of the poor, we
enable them to rise above the oppression they have lived in for
centuries. And the positive response from the downtrodden is often
overwhelming. Not only are the lives of children completely
transformed by the simple love of Christ, but their families also
are being touched and finding hope.
From my experience, I have seen that the message a child
hears growing up can affect them all through their lives, whether
they are encouraged to succeed or told they are worthless. My
trust in the Lord began when I was a small child. My wife was the
same way. The knowledge that He loved us stabilized our lives
and prepared us to face the future. I am sure you can recognize in
your own life how the things you learned when you were young
affected the way you saw yourself and the world as you grew up.
The book of Proverbs teaches us that if you instruct a child
in the way he should go, he will not depart from it when he is
old (see Proverbs 22:6). If we bring these children the message
of God’s love for them, teaching them that they have great value
in His eyes and are not limited by the caste into which they were
born, they will be enabled to do great things with their lives.
I have heard it said that liberation comes through education.
And this is exactly what is happening in the lives of students in
the GFA Bridge of Hope program. This is the liberation needed
for the masses who live in South Asia.
I was surprised when I saw the cover of a Time magazine in
2006, calling India the next great economic superpower. 4 The sad
reality is that this statement is only partially true. Although India
as a whole is getting richer, the wealth of the nation is becoming
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