The Letters

Today at Gatagara, the blind and visually impaired students recieved encouraging and uplifting letters of encouragement along with hygiene essentials. Several of the students are orphans, others come from extreme poverty. For them, recieving a letter from someone that cares enough to take the time to uplift them with their words, is life-changing. Words of inspiration and reassurance provides light in the seemingly hopeless lives of the students at Gatagara.

"I think we should make a help list for the students at Gatagara, where John went to school in Rwanda...." My sister said this to me about nine months ago. Sometimes the words she uses, like "Gatagara" and "Rwanda" and "Naizy Baizy," before they become familiar to me, are really REALLY confusing. So I typically respond verbally without my heart's involvement. My response was something like "yea, that sounds like a good idea, remind me about this later."

My sister is the second born on my dad's side. She is incredibly patient, and while I watch the dynamics of my own children's birth order play a role in their personalities, I have come to realize that most middle children are patient. My sister would probably wait on me for 40 years if I told her to. She reminded me of this "help list" again and again. I still don't understand what is wrong with me, because sometimes I just don't get it. Finally a tugging at my heart enabled me to focus and pay attention to this "help list" my sister kept reminding me about.

One morning I found $100 in my wallet after she had mentioned the "help list." I don't normally carry around cash, and it was during the holidays so I am sure someone gave it to my family. But it was exactly the amount that was needed to cover the extra costs for the blind students at Gatagara. I mailed it to my sister, asked her to give me more info on these students, and tell me exactly what her intentions were for helping these kids! The money was used for toilet paper, toothpaste, feminine hygiene, and soap.....and I'm sure you're sick of me repeating myself!

My sister unraveled her ideas to me, I was just overwhelmed by how much I could personally give to help. We asked for help, people started helping. We wrote letters. The students felt a purpose, a reason, a meaning for their individuality. Someone cared that they had unmet needs.

The dream matured into a reality.

We have been working on a website for Hope in His Vision, while also moving forward with the official non-profit organization "stuff"--for lack of a better word. I'm in the process of creating a page full of individual photos of the students along with their name and information about who they are. You know, so you can get a more personalized experience out of this whole thing!

In the meantime, head over to the website!!! This HOPE IN HIS VISION LINK will take you to the homepage where you can navigate your way around the site. We are trying to make it as user friendly as possible, and please stay tuned for the individual photos. For now, we are only able to get very low quality photos. We thank you for your patience until the more pleasing portraits are captured!

Again, I am more than appreciative of your support. My sister and John are grateful for the crowd of advocates this blog alone has attracted, and feel so loved and cared for by those that stop to read the updates. If there are specific areas you feel called to aid in toward Support John Hope or Hope in His Vision, please contact us. We want to assist you!

Thanks guys,

-Aurora