Hi Friends,

Thank you for joining me in prayer for the children of the world.  If you can, we'd love to have you pray together with us on Wednesday at 11:30 in the Gym Conference room followed by a special lunch together. 

All the best,
Carrie
 
Please join us in lifting up the needs of vulnerable children around the world.
Picture Credit: Karen Winkler

At the start of 2017, this shattered world can use a lot of hope.  While the hope-stories don't often dominate the headlines, they are always there... we just need to look more closely for them.  I love hope stories precisely because of their stubborn resistance to evil, apathy, and despair.  Hope is audacious and sometimes subversive, isn't it?  Especially when the powers-that-be preach only doom and gloom on the TV screens and tell us to always be more afraid. 

But as people of God, we are told to not be afraid! We are told to put our hand into the hand of God and trust that He will be with us always.  Hope and Faith will always be tied together in my mind... we hope because we trust that good is more powerful than evil, lightness is stronger than the dark, and the Kingdom Jesus brought to this world will triumph in the end. 

Here are three stories of hope we can use this week to center our prayers and our praise. 


Mohaman Saminou outside the Grande Mosque in Briqueterie, Cameroon. 
Photograph: Thomas Petit Obrador

Cameroon // Mosque leaders use education for girls to fight Boko Haram. 
"Mohaman Saminou, director of the Grande Mosque in Briqueterie - one of the city's poorest and predominately Muslim districts, is providing free education for girls every weekend because he believes they are most at risk of being radicalised." "The classes are split by gender to "boost productivity", with the girls outperforming the boys academically, says the education director, Hassan Mohamed. "An educated population doesn't give away to extremism, so Boko Haram have very few opportunities," he adds.  If education is Saminou's first priority, his second is religious cohesion in the country, which is 70% Christian and 20% Muslim.  He allows Muslim women to marry men of other faiths in his mosque and says that most of the government security forces that guard Friday prayers are Christian. "For me it's symbolic, we come to pray and the Christians make sure we are safe. Perhaps there is another place like this? But I've never seen it," he says."  Read more here.

India // Nearly 200 children rescued from brick kiln.
"Indian police rescued nearly 200 children, most of them under the age of 14, who had been found working in a brick kiln in the southern state of Telangana in one of the biggest operations in the region, officials said on Wednesday.  "The rescue teams spotted girls as young as seven and eight carrying bricks on their head. Some of the children were as young as four." P. Achyuta Rao, member of a local state body that has the task of protecting child rights, said Telangana and neighbouring Andhra Pradesh had become hubs for child trafficking and child labour. "Last year more than 3,000 children were rescued, many from brick kilns and others from domestic servitude. In all cases, the children were from eastern India," said Rao of the Telangana State Commission.  Read more here.

USA // Uber driver saves 16-year-old girl from sex-trafficking.
Keith Avila was "driving Uber when two women and a teen got into his car for a requested ride and shortly after he realized something was wrong. "The young girl was sitting on the passenger and wearing a really short skirt and looked really young. One woman was coaching the little girl," Avila said. "She was telling her when she got there make sure the man doesn't have any weapons."
Avila also said one of the older woman reminded the girl to ask the man for a "donation" before doing anything. He said that's when he know something was wrong and called police."  Police arrested two women on charges relating to pimping and express gratitude to Avila.  "He could've said nothing. Went on his way, collected his fare. And then that 16-year-old victim could've been victimized again by who knows how many different people over the next couple of days, weeks, months," said Elk Grove police Officer Chris Trim.  Read more here.

As we look at the shattered world around us, may we always look closely to see the hands of God working to bring about redemption and transformation and good-out-of-bad. 
Praying with you,
Carrie

Faces of Children
A Ministry of First Presbyterian Church
Carrie McKean, Director
800 West Texas Avenue
Midland, Texas 79701
Office: 432 .684.7821