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Give Life to Xaiquo for Lent – Week 5

Gabrielle Pickle — Wed, 06 Apr 2011 09:00:20 +0000

Since the day of her birth in a rural village in China, Xaiquo was neglected and abused. Her two older brothers and father wanted to get rid of her. They even went so far as to poison her food. Yet miraculously, she survived. When she was 13, they sold her to a 73-year-old who wanted her as a breeder – to give birth to a son. When she gave birth to a daughter, her owner was enraged and sold her to traffickers. Xaiquo was just 16.

Faithful Christian workers serve tirelessly in the red-light districts of China to reach out to girls, like Xaiquo, and guide them out of slavery. Rescued girls are brought to a safe house with a loving house mother. Traumatized girls receive room and board in a Christ-centered haven, where they experience unconditional love, most for the first time.

The gift of $180 allows Xaiquo the life-transforming opportunity to receive the love and care to recover from her past and build a future of dignity, while receiving counseling, job training, and microloans to start a new life!

It is the fifth week of the Give Life for Lent campaign, sponsored by She Is Safe, where individuals give up something worth about $30 a week for the weeks of Lent (March 9-April 24) and use that money to change a life!

Prayer Focus

Pray for the rural girls who are trafficked to the cities, that they have access a safe haven home and a chance for new life.

Scripture Focus

“It is the Lord who executes justice for the oppressed, who gives food to the hungry. The Lord sets the prisoners free.” (Psalm 146:7)

Give Maya Life for Lent – Week 2

Gabrielle Pickle — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 09:00:15 +0000

“I did not have the skills to bring a good income,” Maya admitted, her brown eyes downcast. A single mom of the Dalit – Untouchable – Caste, she had struggled to survive in the slums of India since her husband divorced her at 16. “But I was given the opportunity for training at the women’s center. Now I have a business embroidering all types of things, even lace. People come from all over to have me do fine work on their saris.”

“I have two daughters, the older one is in a nursing course and the younger one is in the 1^st grade. The income from my embroidery business pays for my daughters’ education. This training has been a great help! Now my girls have a future,” she smiled, tears of joy glistening in her eyes.

The gift of $180 allowed Maya the training needed to change her entire life and give her girls a future.

It is the second week of the Give Life for Lent campaign, sponsored by She Is Safe, where individuals give up something worth about $30 a week for the 6 weeks of Lent (March 9-April 24) and use that money to change a life!

Prayer Focus

Join us in praying for the thousands of impoverished Indian women in self-help groups receiving vocational training, micro-loans and discipleship to grow in faith and abilities to provide a bright future for their families. And pray for the funding for over 1,600 destitute women who are on the waiting list for training, waiting for sponsors.

Scripture Focus

“Learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression, bring justice to the fatherless,

plead the widow’s cause.” Isaiah 1:17

Give Life for Lent – Week 1

Gabrielle Pickle — Wed, 09 Mar 2011 09:30:00 +0000

The season of Lent begins today. And it’s not too late for you to join Girls Gone Wise in giving life for lent!

Traditionally, throughout the history of Christianity, Lent has been a time to prepare our hearts to observe Christ’s death, burial and resurrection at Easter. But, what if this year, Lent did more than ever before?

What if this year, Lent remains a season of personal reflection, and also connects you to God’s heart for the hurting?

What if this year, Lent was about both individual spiritual growth and global outreach?

What if this year, for the next 6 weeks (March 9 -April 24), you committed to give life to the world’s most vulnerable human beings?

Around the world, women and girls make up 80% of those trafficked, 70% of illiterates and 70% of the impoverished. We know that religion God sees as pure and faultless involves reaching out to orphans and widows in their distress (James 1:27). This year, I am inviting you to join me in giving life to the oppressed for Lent. A gift of $180 to She Is Safe provides exactly what she needs for a whole new life!

Observe Lent – Change her life

Her sewing machine was sinking, the rain-soaked mud floor lapping at the legs of the heavy iron sewing machine. Undaunted by her muddy surroundings, the seamstress beamed while showing off her beautiful embroidery.

The seamstress, Ayuru, is just one of over 4.9 million Sudanese people run out of their homes by war. Escaping with her life, this illiterate widow and her 8 children ended up in a camp living in a home constructed of mud and sticks, where raw sewage flows freely from hut to hut during rainy season.

Yet in this desolate situation, Ayuru has hope. She was given the priceless opportunity to learn sewing at the Women’s Center run by Sudanese believers, funded by She Is Safe. Now Ayuru earns $200 a month with her sewing machine, paying for her oldest son to attend the university and the younger children to go to school. ”Because of Jesus, I have hope,” she smiles. “And because of his people, I have the skills to provide a future for my family.

How can you change her life?

Step 1: Choose to give up something – for the next 6 weeks – worth about $30 a week.

Step 2: Donate the saved $$ to transform the life of an exploited and abused girl through She Is Safe.

Step 3: Pray for safety and survival supplies of the women and children living in the camps and settlements in war-ravaged areas of Sudan.

“Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in his holy habitation.” Psalm 68:5

Smart Talk: Life for Lent

Katie McCoy — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 18:00:34 +0000

Fatima was a child-bride at age 9, gave birth at 10, divorced at 11,was re-married at 12, and discarded at 13. In today’s Smart Talk, Gabrielle Pickle, from “She is Safe” joins us to discuss the plight of young women around the world who endure the abuse, injustice, and indignity of child-bridehood and prostitution. She shares how you can help rescue a girl like this by giving Life for Lent.

Around the world, women and girls make up

80% of those trafficked

70% of illiterates and

70% of the impoverished

She Is Safe (SIS) is an organization working to prevent, rescue and restore women and girls from abuse and exploitation in highest risk places around the world. For just $180 – the cost of giving up a luxury for just six weeks – you can change the life of one woman for an eternity!

…How?

SIS invites you to participate in giving life to the oppressed for Lent. What if, this season, from Ash Wednesday (March 9) to Easter, you committed to give life to the world’s most vulnerable human beings?

What if this year, you could Give Life for Lent?

If you and your friends or family would like to join this powerful campaign, sign the petition ( http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/lifeforlent/). This automatically sends you an email each week during lent with a prayer focus, scriptural emphasis and story of a girl whose life was transformed! The email will also give you instructions on how to donate and change her life!

If your church would like to join the campaign, SIS offers a free digital promo packet, including a promo video, bulletin inserts, slide, and a 6-week prayer guide. Email Gabrielle Pickle at gpickle@SheIsSafe.org for more information.

Together we can Give Life for Lent!

If you can’t listen on the player, CLICK HERE

(Sorry that this week’s Smart Talk is late… we had a malicious attack on the website and server yesterday, that crippled our site and tried to take us down.)

Christ Our Coming King

Dannah Gresh — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 02:00:25 +0000

In the late 1800′s, a New York journalist asked a theologian named A.B. Simpson if he knew when Christ was coming back to earth. “Yes,” replied Simpson. “and I will tell you if you promise to print what I say, references and all.” The reporter agreed. “Then put this down: ‘This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto the nations and then shall the end come.’ Matthew 24:14. Have you written the reference?” The reporter lowered his pencil and said, “I think I begin to see the daylight. I see the motivation and the power in this movement.”

“Then,”replied Simpson, “You see more than some of the doctors of divinity.”

Girls, we have a coming King. The story of Jesus Christ is an incomplete picture if we stop at the manger. We must move beyond his first visit to earth, to his second coming. His Kingship can only be understood in light of his second coming. This month, we will celebrate his coming as a tender Lamb of God. But one day, he will come as the Lion of the tribe of Judah – Our King! And in this character of God, we find much of our motive. Our motive for what, you might ask. It is our motive to share the gospel and our motive to live pure lives.

Titus 2:11-14 says:

“For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It teaches us to say ‘no’ ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope – the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.”

Our belief in his second return should, in part, shape our lifestyle. It makes this world less attractive because we are looking forward to the New Earth that will be ruled by our King. It makes us want to talk about him and prepare others because he canâ€™t come until everyone has heard the gospel.

I was at the last crusade that Billy Graham ever preached. Flushing Meadows, New York City. He said, “For years every time I came to New York through LaGuardia Airport, I would pass a graveyard on the way down to Times Square. I don’t know what the name of it is, but there are graveyards all over New York and those graves are going to be opened if they are people who knew Christ as their Lord and Savior. And those who are left here that are still living are going to join them. Where? In the air on our way to heaven.”

Are you ready for Christ our coming King?

This blog quotes A.B. Simpson as found in The Fourfold Gospel by A.B. Simpson and Billy Graham as found in Living In God’s Love: The New York Crusade, a compilation of his sermons at his last crusade.