Change the Life of 1000 Orphans

[muck]

Thank you in advance for reading what follows:

 

Some of you may know from previous posts on this topic that my family and I support a group, C3 Missions, that takes care of orphans in the third world. Here is a link to their website for more information -- note that 100% of contributions go to the kids; the family behind the organization underwrites every penny of C3's operating overhead.

 

Before the end of August, you have a chance to help feed, house, clothe and educate orphans too, with nothing more than a few minutes of your day and a few keystrokes from your computer. Note that voting ends in 10 days on August 31st.

 

What I'm asking you to do is just like any of the "vote for my nephew to be all-star of the week in the local paper" or similar sorts of "log-in and vote" requests ... except that if your vote pushes what I'm going to tell you about to the #1 spot in the voting, American Express will give $1.5 million dollars to help C3 take care of orphans.

 

Winning a $1.5 million gift from American Express allows FULL development of a children's village for 1,000 children (homes, medical facility, schools, all centered around the local church) and funds the village for 2 years. If the project doesn't get to #1 overall, but finishes highly, there is another $1 million to be spread around amongst other projects that received sufficient votes.

 

Here's what we need from you:

 

1. Vote for our project.

 

Go to AmEx's Member Project home page and log in.

 

Search for "C3" in the search box, and vote by clicking the "nominate" button. If you do not have an existing log-on for American Express, you may have to create one.

 

2. Get some of your friends and family to take 30 seconds to do the same.

 

If we do this, I believe we can get thousands of votes from the C3 Community in a flash and get in the hunt for the dough.

 

NOTE: Remember that voting ends in TEN days ... so, in spirit of the time of year, "vote early, and vote often"!

[muck]

Note ... if you voted, feel free to leave a note here ...

[Puddy]

Done. It looks like we can only nominate once per username, right?

[Puddy]

It's been nominated 149 times. Any way to see the 'standings'?

[muck]

It's been nominated 149 times. Any way to see the 'standings'?

 

Try here Up to 152 votes, tied for 113th out of 1190 projects.

 

Apparently, some of the other projects have been up for longer ... so, there is a bit of a headwind ... but, I know that they sent out an email to thousands of people that support C3, so it's got a good chance to make up some ground in a hurry.

Edited August 22, 2008 by muck

[Timmypg]

Done

[i_am_the_swammi]

Done....up to 178.

 

I'll pass it along to my address book for you.

 

All the best to you, and God Bless your family's efforts.

[muck]

... 181 and tied for 98th spot ... all in about 24hrs since C3 first posted at AMEX's site ...

Edited August 23, 2008 by muck

[Perchoutofwater]

It is not up to 186

[muck]

190 votes and in 97th place

[The Wolf]

Voted the first time ant it went up to 198...tried voting again and see it was at 196...hope their counts are accurate.

[muck]

217 votes

 

94th place

 

...movin' on up...

[muck]

Now C3 is in 86th place with 244 votes ... not bad for 24hrs!

 

Thank you!

Edited August 23, 2008 by muck

[loaf]

253! good luck!

[tazinib1]

260

 

Sept 9th the top 25 are announced and voted on. Lets get into the top 25 Huddlers!!

Edited August 23, 2008 by tazinib1

[tazinib1]

I have copied/pasted this into Fanball's version of The Tailgate (called Mindless Banter) and will do the same at FBG's.

[muck]

I have copied/pasted this into Fanball's version of The Tailgate (called Mindless Banter) and will do the same at FBG's.

 

Thank you, sir!

 

...getting close to 300 votes and are now in the top 80...

[fingfootball]

I was 318

[Azazello1313]

324

[muck]

Tied for 78th place with 325 votes.

[muck]

From Joe Knittig, Executive Director of C3 Missions, regarding the massive flooding in Haiti from Hurricane Hanna ... email received yesterday:

 

................................................

 

 

As we stir to go about our days doing this and that, stop... Drop to our knees. Let's not just fold our hands. Get on our knees.

 

First, give thanks. All of our children in the south are safe. We'll have to assess damage, but the children are safe.

 

Second, boldly ask the Lord for help in Gonaive. You won't read it on the news, even now, but the greatest Hurricane problem in Haiti is from Hanna, not Gustav.

 

250 of our children are huddled on the top floor of the only 2 story structure in our Gonaive village. By the grace of God, that happens to be where the food and kitchen is located. The rest of the village is turning into a lake that's rising. And this is some of the "higher ground" in the Gonaive area. Most of the city of Gonaive is under water 5 or 6 feet high and rising. Water is pouring down in rivers from the mountains to the sea. The sea is too full to drink another drop. So, the water keeps rising as Gonainve joins the sea.

 

DouDou went to secure the children as best he could. The road from Port au Prince to Gonaive passes through a long, low-lying stretch. That stretch is now a giant lake, cutting-off Gonaive from the main route for help. DouDou had to swim across this lake.

 

This mess snuck-up on the people of Gonaive - again. Gonaive isn't getting slammed with the hurricane. Rivers from rains elsewhere - a problem nobody saw coming - just started pouring out from the mountains like someone turned on a faucet. Even at this minute, if you look to international reports on the news and internet, you'll see next to nothing about this problem. The news reports and hurricane updates for Haiti still focus on Gustav. Hanna is a blip on the radar screen. That blip is drowning a city, and has 250 of our children looking down from their perch praying that the rising water will miraculously stop.

 

This e-mail is not hype. It's not drama. We know these children. Dan Tasset and I spent the day with them 3 weeks ago. Our village in Gonaive started with a local church sending a busload of orphaned pre-teen girls - about 15 of them. Dony wasn't expecting the village to start with older children. He told the church leader that he could not take them. Those girls heard the news and scratched and wailed as they boarded the bus back to nowhere. Dony couldn't take that pain. He relented and took the girls and started the village with a group he never anticipated. Those girls now help take care of the little children - they're vital to the village. Dan and I watched 3 weeks ago while 1 of those "unintended" girls set tables for the wave of more than 100 little girls coming to take their turn for dinner. She led those children two-by-two, hand-in-hand to their tables. She led them in song and prayer giving thanks to the Lord for about 10 minutes, standing over their food full of contentment and gratitude to eat what was pre-prayer a warm meal. She was the first to the dining room, and the last to sit down to eat. The smile never left her face.

 

She and 249 other children are in that same dining room now watching the water raise, praying that it will stop, but knowing that their hope does not come from receding waters or the fragile life Gonaive has to offer. Their hope is in the Lord Jesus Christ.

 

Here is what I'd like us all to do:

1) Pray that Hanna will pass and the water will stop short of the second floor.

2) Pray that others in Gonaive find higher ground.

3) Pray that Hurricane Ike, next in line, steers clear of Haiti.

4) Pray that the damage to our Gonaive village isn't too great, and that we will have the blessing of repairing and doing whatever is necessary to make sure we can tuck every one of these 250 little ones into new beds, unharmed.

5) Take this personally! It's easy to cast this off as just another tragedy detached from what we see as our reality. Then we just go about our days, status quo. This complacency - which I'm guilty of - is wrong. It's wrong! There are no two ways about it. I've attached pictures of some of our children in Haiti. Look at them. Look into their eyes. They're all over the world. Governments don't help them. Parents don't help them, as they have none. Neighbors who want to help them often can't even feed themselves. These are God's children, and as God's people, these are our children. Distance and cognitive dissonance do not diminish this reality. There are times when I want to plead with God: Why do You allows so much suffering? On this point, a teenage girl recently reminded me of this: How will I respond when God asks me this question. "Why do you allow it? You are supposed to be my heart and my hands and my feet and my resources and my representatives amidst the suffering. Where are you? What in the heck are you doing about it? Throwing up your hands and 'waiting for me'?" True, none of us can stop a hurricane. But it's flat wrong for me to use that as an excuse for the status quo, and not to let the suffering get me off my butt and move me to action to help where I can. So I stand convicted. I pray you do, too. Take it personally.

 

I will keep you posted as I learn more.

[muck]

From Joe Knittig, Executive Director at C3 Missions, regarding the massive flooding in Haiti from Hurricane Hanna ... Wednesday Update 9:3:2008 (Morning Update)

 

...................................................................

 

Good morning.

 

Status: We - C3 and El Shaddai - have 1,115 children in our care in Haiti. 56 are in Port au Prince. 250 are in homes in the children's village in Gonaive I told you about yesterday. 100 are staying with pastors and church families in Gonaive, waiting for us to complete their homes, which were under construction. The rest of the children are in the south, with Cayes as the nerve center for our work in the south. The children's villages in the south are: Cayes, Cambry, St. Louis, Casa Major, Bighouse, Darivage, Arniquet, and Port Salut.

 

In addition to the above, we have another 100 children selected and in line for homes in Gonaive. So, really, the number waiting for homes in Gonaive are the 100 first in line discussed above, and this additional 100 second in line. The second 100 are also staying with pastors and church families. In this update, I will refer to these children as the "200 in waiting."

 

I understand the PAP children are fine.

 

Hannah crushed and cut-off Gonaive from any meaningful communication and help. As of yesterday afternoon, we understand that the 250 in the Gonaive village were still okay - the water had not reached the second floor. We also understand that the 200 in waiting in Gonaive were okay. We've heard nothing since then, as communication lines are down. Our expectation is that our children there are safe. The reports we're getting from people on the ground through Dony is that when the U.N. and others get access to Gonaive, they will find a situation on par with what happened with Hurricane Jeanne in 2004.

 

Yesterday morning I reported that all homes and children were secure in the south. Unfortunately, the situation has worsened in the south. Cayes is experiencing massive flooding. Louis - who like all Haitians has experienced many a hurricane - says that this is the most widespread flooding he has seen there in his life. What we do know this morning is that the children in Cambry and Cayes are dry and safe. Louis and crew can get to the children in Cayes. Their home is flooded, but they were moved to the second floor of the church and are waiting out the storms there. Louis knows the children in Cambry are fine, but cannot get to them and cannot assess damage there. He can't get there because water has flooded the bridge to the road to get to Cambry.

 

We don't know this morning the status of the homes and children in the other villages in the south: St. Louis, Casa Major, Bighouse, Darivage, Arniquet, Port Salut. Communications and access are nil. The flooding is severe. We entrust their protection, as always, to the Lord.

 

There was a brief respite from the downpour this morning. The expectation is that the storm will turn back north and the dump will begin anew, although, hopefully, not as severe as yesterday. We're praying for a break in the action and that the waters will recede enough for Louis and his team to get to the children this afternoon. That's what we're shooting for and praying for - confirmation that ALL of the children in the south are fine, even if their homes are not.

 

As you know, El Shaddai has an incredibly impressive, trustworthy, committed network of leaders and churches. El Shaddai has more than 200 pastoral leaders it has trained, and 39 churches with roughly 16,000 church members saturating the south and Gonaive. Dony and Louis are organizing and mobilizing the El Shaddai network to move into relief and assessment mode for our children and beyond. I will tell you that NGOs can send in wonderful, big-hearted masses with good intentions to help, but they cannot network and deliver reliable relief and compassion like the El Shaddai crew.

 

Weather and conditions permitting, Dony plans to fly to Haiti tomorrow to help Louis orchestrate this effort on the ground. We, C3's leadership, will be assisting in this effort - trying to respond to their needs as they realize them - and are in regular contact with Dony in this regard.

 

Janie Hodgdon, a passionate C3er, connected C3 to Heart to Heart International a few months back. Since then, C3 has developed a working relationship with HH. This may prove to be miraculous timing. C3 has asked HH to mobilize with C3 and HH to provide emergency relief to our children, their caretakers, and to the many displaced villagers suffering in the very areas where our children are located. I believe this could be done via air. El Shaddai's network would be an amazingly practical and efficient network to deliver this relief. Please pray that this C3/HH connection will be made and mobilized ASAP. Janie, many thanks for your leadership and initiative.

 

In closing for now, let me say that our priority is making sure the children are safe and have ample food and clean water. I believe that these children are and will remain safe. Beyond that, we already know that the infrastructure damage will be profound. And we know that with many, many thousands of already fragile family units wrecked by the hurricanes, thousands of more children are going to be left to fend for themselves. The demand for what we do will dramatically increase in a flash.

 

We don't feel beaten at all. We absolutely plan to respond in kind. We plan to GROW this work.

 

Our Requests:

 

1. Prayer

 

Please keep this up. Pray that what the immense suffering and uncertainty these children must feel - which feels so unreal to us as we go about our days - will sink into and break our hearts. If you pray nothing else, pray that.

 

2. C3 Haiti Relief Fund - LAUNCHING LATER TODAY

 

The most practical way you can help is to give. We know that the homes we had under construction for the 200 in waiting in Gonaive, for more children in Arniquet, for more children in Darivage, are going to be wiped out. Multiple additional homes under water will not withstand this. We have schools that will go down. We have a $100,000 medical clinic in Gonaive - construction finished and set to open in the next few months - that is trashed. We'll have 1,115 children that will need additional emergency care, and we expect we'll bring in another 1,000 in the coming months in the wake of this tragedy. All will need to be housed, fed, medicated, cared for by mommas.

 

In short, I expect that to get back to Par and start to meet additional needs of orphaned and abandoned children in these areas will cost well over $1,000,000. The more we can collect for the orphaned and abandoned children in Haiti who will - more than about anyone - feel the brunt of this damage; the more we will do. Period.

 

TODAY we are launching the C3 Haiti Relief Fund. This will be a dedicated C3 account whereby every red cent of money given to this account will go towards what we need to do in Haiti to rebuild and get more of these children in care, immediately.

 

We will be sending to you this afternoon details of this Program.

 

3. Send This On - If you forwarded yesterday's update to others - to your database of friends - or if you can do so, please forward these updates, too. We need to mobilize an army to respond to this. Praying is great. But we need resources, too, to immediately address the need.

 

We need to get this word out, without worrying about whether someone will view an "ask" as a nuisance. There's no place now for sheepishness or any shame in pushing the envelope for these kids.

 

4. Please Allow Us to Update You So many of you have your hearts deeply tied to these children, and to the C3 cause. Many of you have called or e-mailed us to talk about what's going on and the latest updates we have. I certainly understand. But, with all respect and humility, please hold off on these calls and e-mails today, knowing that we will send out periodic updates. This will help us stay on task.

 

We appreciate you, and you will hear from us later today.

[muck]

From Joe Knittig, Executive Director of C3 Missions regarding the massive flooding in Haiti from Hurricane Hanna:

 

......................................................

 

This morning we alerted you that we're setting up the C3 Haiti Relief Fund.

 

Updates and Gonaives Video are available on the C3 website (click here)

 

We are set to receive these donations. 100% of these donations will go to the relief, rebuilding and necessary expansion of our work on the ground for orphaned and abandoned children in Haiti. Here are the donation options:

 

Option 1: Cash & Checks

Donate by mailing or delivering a check to the C3 Office. Please note in the memo line "C3 Haiti Relief Fund." Our address is as follows:

 

3000 NW 50th Street

Kansas City, MO 64150

U.S.A.

 

Option 2: Credit Cards:

Donate on-line, please click here. Again, please note "C3 Haiti Relief Fund" in making the donation.

 

Option 3: Non-Cash Donations

The Servant Christian Community Foundation is set to receive non-cash donations for the C3 Haiti Relief Fund: stock, cars, boats, timeshares, etc. SCCF has graciously agreed to waive its charges for processing non-cash donations for this fund. If you are interested in making a non-cash gift or learning more, please click here.

 

Thanks for your generosity and faithfulness. We will keep you all posted.

 

Faithfully yours.