#GivingTuesday is a movement. It’s a way of giving that mobilizes the #globalvillage to which we all belong. Individuals, families, communities, and organizations unite to inspire philanthropy and generosity. My Refuge House invites you to participate and know that you make an impact.
Our 2018 #GivingTuesday Campaign will help fortify a safety wall at My Refuge House. Before we can provide emotional healing for our girls, we must first provide physical safety (Refuge). A section of our 20 ft. perimeter security wall is damaged from time and typhoons. The estimated cost for replacing and fortifying a section of the wall and a gate is $30,000. We NEED your help to cover these necessary costs. Through your generosity, you’ll provide a safe place of healing for the girls of MRH.
Between November 7th and November 27th, we are grateful to share a story from Jim Hammond (an MRH Restorer who lives in North Carolina) in short chapters each day on social media. Click here if you missed the first 7 chapters, and stay tuned for the final chapters!
During this campaign, you are also encouraged to change your facebook profile picture (search for MyRefugeHouse at www.facebook.com/profilepicframes) and/or download and post your picture with one of our campaign posters (http://bit.ly/MRHRestorerPic).
Be inspired. Be unhindered. You are a #Restorer.
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Chapter 8. At the conclusion of our trip, my life had been changed by the experience for sure, but I hadn’t shaken that feeling that there was something more that I was “supposed to do”. I shared my frustration with a number of my teammates who assured me that I was already doing it by leading the team, but that did little to soothe this feeling that continued to bore a little hole in my brain.
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When I came home, I put on a new “Unhindered” bracelet but wore it for a different purpose. Now, it served as a reminder to pray for the people that I had met, the country that had welcomed me, and the girls that didn’t even know what MRH was yet.
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Chapter 9. In 2015, I was fortunate enough to return to MRH. Our church was sending a small team to help the organization develop marketing materials to help with future fundraising and awareness efforts. Having worked in video production, it was a perfect match for me. Maybe this was the thing that I was “supposed to do”.
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Chapter 10. I flew halfway around the world (again) to spend a week at the now finished house and cried tears of joy when I saw it being used for its intended purpose. This thing that started as an idea, became a vacant piece of land, matured into sketches for an entire campus was now a real place and, more importantly, there were girls in the house benefiting from it. It was overwhelming.
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Chapter 11. The majority of that week was spent at the house documenting the daily lives of the girls. I followed them virtually everywhere and shot video of everything they did from morning devotions, to school lessons, to volleyball.
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During some of the downtime, I got the chance to visit with Hope. She was in her mid-teens at the time and was struggling with questions about how her life had taken the turn that it had. You can watch a short video of Hope’s journey here.
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We talked about the nature of God and the nature of sin. We talked about the free will of people to reject the plans that God has laid out for us in favor of our own flawed aspirations. We talked about the difficulty of living in a fallen world that was not the one of God’s original design. It was a heavy talk. But, I was thankful for the opportunity to comfort this girl that simultaneously exuded unending strength and heartbreaking fragility.
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Chapter 12. During that talk, I shared with Hope that there were people all over the world that prayed for her and all of the girls on a daily basis. I showed her my “Unhindered” bracelet and explained that I wore it as a daily reminder to pray for MRH. Going forward, it would be a reminder to pray specifically for my new friend, Hope.
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She asked what the word meant, and I explained that it meant “free; not held back by anyone or anything”. I told her that whenever she felt like she was alone, she could walk to that spot in the wall where I had dropped my bracelet into the concrete and be reminded that there were people all over the world thinking of and praying for her.
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Chapter 13. On the last night of our visit, the girls were scheduled to head down to the beach where they would release paper lanterns in the shape of lotuses into the ocean. They had spent the day writing their hopes and prayers on the petals. You have probably seen pictures of that event on the MRH website or on the blog before. There is a 99% chance that I am standing in the water just outside of the frame of those pictures shooting video of the moment. It was magical and my privilege to stand amidst the prayers of these girls as they floated into the ocean created by the same God that created and loved them.
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Toward the end of the evening, I sat on the beach with Hope as we watched the last of the lanterns disappear into the darkness. She knew that I was leaving the following day. It was then that she asked me one of the toughest questions I have ever been asked.
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Chapter 14. Tuesday, 11/20: “Jim, am I ever going to see you again?” she said.
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Ooof. How was I supposed to answer that? It went without saying that I needed to be honest with her. After all, we had shared some pretty honest conversations over the last 72 hours. But, the truth was that the odds of me ever seeing Hope again were slim to none. There was no conceivable reason for me to return to Cebu, and, even if I did, she would likely be gone by the time I got back. That didn’t seem like an acceptable response, so I answered the best way that I knew.
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“I certainly hope so,” I said. And we left it at that.
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Stay tuned for the rest of the story! Click here or below to participate and help build safety and build lives as part of our #GivingTuesday campaign.
