{"id":2945,"date":"2014-08-15T18:22:07","date_gmt":"2014-08-15T18:22:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.covchurch.org\/covenantkidscongo\/?p=2945"},"modified":"2014-08-15T18:27:03","modified_gmt":"2014-08-15T18:27:03","slug":"a-tale-of-two-child-sponsors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blogs.covchurch.org\/covenantkidscongo\/a-tale-of-two-child-sponsors\/","title":{"rendered":"A Tale of Two Child Sponsors"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: left\"><em>\u00a0by Katelyn Tresh<\/em><\/p>\n<p>We have an opportunity to bless the children of the Democratic Republic of Congo in a very<br \/>\nimpactful way. These children live in mud homes, walk miles to their<br \/>\nnearest water source, and experience death of loved ones due to PREVENTABLE illness on a regular basis.<br \/>\nYet for more than 7,000 children there is new hope.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left\">Our partnership with World Vision and the CEUM (Covenant Church of Congo) seeks to provide these children and their community with<br \/>\nclean water, health care, education, nutrition, and renewed hope for the future of their village. This is<br \/>\nmade possible in part through child sponsors.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left\">Dave &amp; Diane Peterson from Naperville Covenant in Naperville, IL, and Sandra Gutknecht from Peninsula<br \/>\nCovenant in Redwood City, CA have graciously shared their sponsorship experience with us.<br \/>\nThe Peterson&#8217;s had sponsored children for many years through other organizations, but when<br \/>\ntheir church held a Hope Sunday, and their daughter Denee decided to travel to DRCongo (<a href=\"http:\/\/covchurch.tv\/sponsor-child-meet\/\">video here<\/a>) ,<br \/>\nthey chose to sponsor 6 children through Covenant Kids Congo that day.<br \/>\nMechaque, Jocelin, Zabwa, Falonne, Prisca, and Dorcas are now looking at a future with better education and more opportunities.<br \/>\nThrough pictures, letters, and gifts, Dave &amp; Diane have been blessed as well. They get to see<br \/>\npictures of the children receiving mattresses, suitcases, school clothes, and even a baby pig<br \/>\nthat one of the families was able to purchase because of the Christmas money that had been<br \/>\nsent.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_2950\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/97\/2014\/08\/DSC04082.jpg\" rel=\"prettyPhoto[2945]\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-2950\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-2950\" alt=\"DSC04082\" src=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/97\/2014\/08\/DSC04082-300x225.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"http:\/\/blogs.covchurch.org\/covenantkidscongo\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/97\/2014\/08\/DSC04082-300x225.jpg 300w, http:\/\/blogs.covchurch.org\/covenantkidscongo\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/97\/2014\/08\/DSC04082-1024x768.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-2950\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Diane with her sponsored child in Gemena.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Diane remarks, \u201cWe have been blessed to have been born to a life with more than enough of<br \/>\neverything and [we] just think it is our responsibility to help others that don\u2019t have what we do.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left\">Sandra Gutknecht also became a CKC sponsor during a Hope Sunday at her church. She<br \/>\nchose to sponsor 10 year old, Micheline, last February. This decision intensified the desire in<br \/>\nher to travel to Congo and get a taste of what life is really like for these children.<br \/>\nSandra says, \u201cI do not have children of my own, I never married, so these girls, although not<br \/>\nmine, are girls I can try to pour into, encourage and inspire. It is a way of investing in the future,<br \/>\nof giving hope and love to a child&#8230;\u201d<\/p>\n<p>A little while later, Sandra got the opportunity and the blessing to meet Micheline. She was<br \/>\ntold by the World Vision staff not to pick up the children and to be very careful about how they<br \/>\npresented themselves around the children. This barrier was immediately broken when Sandra<br \/>\narrived; \u201cI stepped out of the van and around the side and she started running to me.\u00a0 I dropped<br \/>\nto my knees and she threw herself into my arms.\u00a0 I was stunned and speechless.\u00a0 I looked at<br \/>\nthe World Vision staff to see if it was ok to pick her up and they smiled at me and nodded.\u00a0 I was not<br \/>\nprepared emotionally for this greeting.\u201d<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_2951\" style=\"width: 213px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/97\/2014\/08\/Oh-my.-Face-to-face-at-last..jpg\" rel=\"prettyPhoto[2945]\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-2951\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-2951\" alt=\"Oh my.  Face to face at last.\" src=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/97\/2014\/08\/Oh-my.-Face-to-face-at-last.-203x300.jpg\" width=\"203\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"http:\/\/blogs.covchurch.org\/covenantkidscongo\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/97\/2014\/08\/Oh-my.-Face-to-face-at-last.-203x300.jpg 203w, http:\/\/blogs.covchurch.org\/covenantkidscongo\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/97\/2014\/08\/Oh-my.-Face-to-face-at-last..jpg 356w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 203px) 100vw, 203px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-2951\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sandra with Micheline.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Micheline, along with her family and friends, introduced Sandra to their life. They talked about<br \/>\nschool and friends, and she received a doll and some crayons that Sandra had brought.<br \/>\nMicheline didn\u2019t leave her lap the whole time that she was there. This was unexpected for<br \/>\nSandra, but a clear representation of how her gifts and support had affected her life. It was a<br \/>\nhard goodbye. She clung to Sandra, crying, and would not let her go. Sandra told Micheline to<br \/>\ndo well in school, and the two parted ways.<\/p>\n<p>Looking back, Sandra says, \u201cCongo is a hard place to stay alive. We spent 11 days in Karawa<br \/>\nat the CEUM hospital and there was death every day we were there, from things that are<br \/>\nprevented or treated in this country&#8230;and there is that little girl with her mom and dad and now I<br \/>\nhave met her. It makes it all personal and real and I feel very connected to this faraway place.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-report-this\"><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.covchurch.org\/covenantkidscongo?moderation_action=report_form&#038;object_type=post&#038;object_id=2945&#038;width=250&#038;height=300\" class=\"thickbox\" title=\"Report This Post\">Report This Post<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u00a0by Katelyn Tresh We have an opportunity to bless the children of the Democratic Republic of Congo in a very impactful way. These children live in mud homes, walk miles to their nearest water source, and experience death of loved ones due to PREVENTABLE illness on a regular basis. Yet for more than 7,000 children [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":123,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16702],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2945","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-child-sponsorship"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>A Tale of Two Child Sponsors - Covenant Kids Congo<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.covchurch.org\/covenantkidscongo\/a-tale-of-two-child-sponsors\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A Tale of Two Child Sponsors - Covenant Kids Congo\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"\u00a0by Katelyn Tresh We have an opportunity to bless the children of the Democratic Republic of Congo in a very impactful way. 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