God is the Father to the fatherless

Wow. It is always intimidating to start a blog, knowing that so many are thirsty for words regarding our mission work. We've been preparing for months-God has been preparing our hearts for even longer. But now the moment is here, and all I can say is, "Wow!"

This trip has so far been the most challenging and most rewarding journey I have ever been blessed to be a part of. But God is always faithful, and His plan and love always shines through, even when the Light is dim in a place like Transnistria.

Obviously, bed building is one of our main priorities, so every morning we have commenced with breaking out the sheets and screws and breaking into a sweat. Some of the older boys at the orphanage (around age 13-16 or so) had been given permission to come help us everyday, and let me tell you, help they certainly did! Many of our boys back home could use a lesson from these guys in the art of chivalry, as not a one would hesitate to take something heavy from your arms or let you walk through a door before they did. It is amazing to me that these kids, despite their lack of food, education, etc, made sure that our female, American arms were relieved. Ha, what gentlemen!

What struck me the most, though, about these boys is their utter desire for an older male figure to look up to. Our team has been blessed with two amazing, Texan, hard-working men (Wes and Rob!), who the boys immediately latched onto. They follow Wes and Rob everywhere, paying close attention to instruction about using drills and how to assemble beds, and laugh and smile and ask so many questions when shown pictures of families back home. The boys so desired the attention of Wes and Rob, and love they certainly received. This is one thing that has struck me the most-I have such a wonderful dad, and these kids literally only have 6 men in their lives, all teachers. And while this is unfortunate for the girls, it is an utter tragedy for the boys. So, to see the beautiful smiles, joy, happiness, and love that Wes and Rob gave to these boys, though temporary, there is no doubt that a life-long impact has been made.

And above all, while these children may not have earthly fathers, God is the Father to the fatherless, and loves these kids more than words could every say.

There is so much more I wish I could write, however I fear that there is not enough room in the world to store up words to describe what has occurred in the past several days. However, it is the images of the smiles, hugs, and beds that are literally worth a thousand words.

Please continue to pray hard core for us. It already has made a huge difference, and will continue to do so. God is good, all the time, and all the time, God is good.

With all my love, in HIS mighty name,
Katie Huey

See more photos on at www.facebook.com/sweetsleep.

Moldova team struggles but God is faithful

Currently a team is serving, quietly and faithfully, in Moldova.  Seeking ways to pray for the team, Sweet Sleep staff reached out for an update from the team leader.  Following is an excerpt from the email sent by Tony Black.  Please continue to partner with this team in prayer as His faithful servants work tirelessly to bring hope, love, and the Word of God to the children in Transnistria.

We're doing fine. We haven't been able to blog much, primarily due to daily changes in the program. We have been faced with daily adjustments to our schedule which has required us to regroup and re-plan almost from scratch. We don't arrive back at the hotel until 9:00 pm or after and then have to prepare for the next day. Many of us are getting to bed well after midnight.   We came to Moldova with the the belief we would have two and a half hours each day to do the VBS. This is one hour- to one and a half hours less than usual.

When we arrived we were told that time was reduced to one and a half hours by the director of the orphanage. After our first day of VBS the director reduced our time to a mere one hour as they had issues with how excited the children got about the program.  This was a devastating blow to our team and it took much prayer and discussion and tears to work through how the program could  change that significantly and still have impact.

God, as always, is faithful. We gave ground to the director in this battle so that God could ultimately achieve the victory.  Yesterday was a long, difficult day  but it was very rewarding as smiles and hugs from the children proved God was still working here. The director and assistant director were very complimentary of the day and actually getting to see children sleeping in their new beds during their nap time yesterday was precious.

We've had sickness run through the team. At least 5 of the team members have terrible coughs and fever.

The Internet has also not been reliable.

We will hopefully have more stories ready later today. There are some amazing ones.

Thank you for your concern and continue to pray for strength and health for the team.

--Tony Black, Team Leader

Faith – Devotion from our Board Chair

We have added a few more photos from the Moldova trip to the FaceBook page, click here to see them.

Many hands work behind the scenes to make these trips possible. David Ward, Sweet Sleep Board Chair, helps guide the Sweet Sleep team to reach our mission of providing a clean, comfortable, healthy place to sleep for orphans across the world and change their lives in the process. David shared his heart with us last week in staff meeting. We want to share that with you.

FAITH: Observations on faith and mission

    •    I have been involved with Sweet Sleep for over two years now and I have come to realize that we can’t accomplish any of our goals. They are two big, too bold and too hard to get our arms around. The only hope we have is to step back each day and allow GOD to show us a path that he wants us to follow. The successes we have achieved and the miracles that have occurred in the lives of these children have been a result of moving in faith and staying close to his will. Many of the unexpected turns in the road to us may look like coincidence but are a part of a plan that is slowly revealed to us. I don’t think that GOD thought it a coincidence that we ran into Health Alert or Open Door. I think that the more faith we have the greater the revelations that occur because of our obedience.
    •    I think that one of the most difficult things to do when working for a mission like Sweet Sleep is handling the daily details of our individual roles with as much joy, enthusiasm and faith as we do when we hold an orphan in their own country.
    •    While the importance of both are the same the daily grind of doing the necessary to reach the important is more difficult
    •    So I want to challenge you to keep to the picture of just one of these orphan children who has touched you fixed in your mind each day.
    •    Over the last two years I have watched Sweet Sleep grow and change. We have made our share of mistakes because of our humanness, but we have pushed forward and achieved great successes.
    •    I believe that faith is a walk manifested most clearly by action. So many say that they believe but don’t follow through. So faith is a commitment to keep walking.
    •    In the New Testament, when talking about faith Jesus seemed to deal with two kinds of people. One set were those who exemplified too little faith and Jesus called them about out that like he did those who were in the boat with him during the storm. They seemed to cry out with fear not faith. Yet he calmed to waters and quieted the wind. The other set were those people, who not always named, showed such visible and undeniable faith they knew Jesus would answer their prayer, such as the one who knew if they just touched his garment they would be healed. I wonder which camp our faith falls in.
    •    There are two verses in the New Testament that I would share with you today
    •    For we live by faith, not by sight.  2 Corinthians 5:7
    •    Jesus replied, “Truly I tell you, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only can you do what was done to the fig tree, but also you can say to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and it will be done.
Matthew 21:20-22
    •    I also think that it is belief that GOD’s power is transformational and that if we are focused on his will in this ministry we can overcome our shortcomings to overachieve for these children.
    •    I have told Jen on a number of occasions that I am not interested in just being a figure head for Sweet Sleep, I want to leave Chairman’s role in Oct knowing that we have meet our strategic plan; that we have exceeded our funding goals and that the organization is running like an efficient business so we can reach the number of children in GOD’s plan for Sweet Sleep. Knowing, for example, that we are the only organization in Uganda providing beds to orphans is an overwhelming piece of information that shows how we have been singled out by GOD for service. What an opportunity, what a responsibility… it takes faith.
    •    As we prepared for our mission journey to South Africa last November several times I heard the prayer that the names of the children are already known and that GOD is preparing the way for us. Did you ever think that somewhere in the world there is a child who already knows one of you and that if you are faithful both of you will be blessed because of your faithfulness?
    •    My prayer for each of you is that you will look at your responsibilities at Sweet Sleep as an important part of this master plan GOD has for Sweet Sleep and your life and that you will make this a transformational ministry.
    •     I want to leave you with a quote from Patrick Overton “When you have come to the edge Of all light that you know And are about to drop off into the darkness Of the unknown, Faith is knowing One of two things will happen: There will be something solid to stand on or You will be taught to fly”

 David Ward, Sweet Sleep Board Chair

Support the Team in Moldova, Be a Bedhead

The Moldova team is well under way distributing beds to orphans. Click here to see photos on FaceBook and keep up with their progress. We are able to provide a clean, comfortable and healthy place for these children to sleep because of the support of our donors and especially our monthly Beadhead donors. Below are rerunning a story from Bedhead, Kristen Jackson. Pray for the team currently in Moldova but more importantly, support these orphans and Be a Bedhead.


My involvement with Sweet Sleep began a few years back when I was looking for a faith-based organization that would provide mosquito nets to children in Africa. And the more I learned about Sweet Sleep's work with orphaned children, the more I wanted to get involved financially. I became a bedhead because I can't think of anything greater to do with my life than to positively impact the lives of others, in Jesus' name.

As an elementary teacher, I work daily with children, some of whom have much, and some of whom have little. My heart is filled with compassion for children when I think of Jesus' command to care for the poor: the orphans and the widows. And I can't imagine not doing my part to carry out Jesus' command. In my eyes, this command isn't optional. It's imperative.

Sweet Sleep is an organization whose sole mission revolves around Jesus' command to care for the poor and to spread the Good News! And I want to help! I feel honored to be involved in spreading the Good News, while fulfilling tangible needs of children around the world. To whom much is given, much is required.... And its a blessing to do my part!

Join me in becoming a bedhead! It's just $30 a month and you can sign up at www.sweetsleep.org/donate. You'll even get a soft, cozy "I Helped An Orphan Sleep Sweetly" t-shirt for signing up! So join me in helping provide these beds, life-saving mosquito nets, and Bibles to orphans through Sweet Sleep!

Kristen Jackson teaches elementary school in the Pulaski County Special School District. She is married to Jeremy Jackson, a firefighter with the Little Rock Fire Department. Kristen and Jeremy live in Little Rock, Arkansas and have one 7-month-old son, Logan.

...Don't be polluted by this world.

We have arrived for what is my third trip in this wonderful, but little known and lesser understood country of 3.5 million. For those who have never been here, it makes little sense for someone from East Texas to make his way to this place during what is Spring Break for many, unless you understand the context under which I and 12 others come. We don't come because this is a vacation mecca just waiting to be discovered, we don't come here because of the allure of great shopping and amazing amusement areas. We come here because God asked each of us to follow through with the word the apostle James gave the early church in James 1:27. "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress..." I know as you read that scripture, you think..."Okay...okay so you're building beds for orphans...that was an easy scripture to quote that fits your circumstance..."
The truth is, that's not really the part of the scripture that's most applicable to what we're doing here. The last part of James 1:27 (which is rarely quoted) says..."and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world."

Why is this more applicable than the other portion of the verse?...for this reason...just as a body of water needs an inlet to allow water to fill the reservoir, it must have an outlet to sustain life. Without the outlet, the water becomes stagnant and the precious life-giving liquid becomes a cess pool of polluted sludge. The seeming, counter-productive out-flow of water is actually the very thing that ensures a constant influx of new, refreshing nourishment.

In the very same way, this group of 12 that I am serving with this week, have made the decision to let the time, talents, and other resources they might have flow from themselves to those less fortunate in the orphanage in Tranistria, Moldova. It would have been so very easy for all of us to use those resources for ourselves and in essence be polluted by the world as we have been so many times before: To become complacent;
predictable; stagnant.

May this choice to follow the instruction of James have eternal significance this week for those children we have been allowed to share life with. We pray that the love that God has so graciously given to us will flow out to those who so desperately need it.

May God Bless you! Continue to pray for us as we serve this week and may Jesus be exalted in this place.

Message from Lucia in Moldova

Tomorrow a team leaves for Moldova to distribute beds in the Transnistrian region. Here is a message from our Program Manager, Lucia Hmleic about that trip.

Starting the 11 of March we’ll have a team of people doing a great project in Hlinoe, a small community in the south west of the Transnistrian region. It is always a challenge to go in that region: to pass the Russian military army (Peace Corps) posts; to never know if the customs officer will allow you to pass or will say “It’s better for you if you did not entered our country”; to know that there are certain things that you’re not supposed to talk about while you’re there, to wait and see if the registration with the passport office will go well…  It is a tensed time. One thing we know for sure is that there are a bunch of orphaned children that need a cozy bed, for a good night sleep.  So we’re taking our chances and let God be our guide and defender.

Despite the political situation in the region the people are very friendly. The director of the orphanage has a great heart for the kids this is why he opened the doors for us to bring the beds and alongside them the Message of God’s Love.  

We plan to provide 100 beds this time, and have a very interesting creative VBS program for a number of 230 children. Every day we’ll do a part of the beds, the children will be helping us. Have a time of sharing the story of God’s love for them and explain that the bed is the expression of that love. Help them understand that God is the one that loves them so much despite of all that’s going on in their lives. 

Yes we know that God has the orphaned children of Transinstria in His mind and would like them to know that too. He wants them to have a sweet night sleep to and know that He loves and cares.

Lucia

International Women's Day

Today is International Women's Day. So much of what Sweet Sleep does empowers women. Most of the caretakers in every country we serve are women. Especially in Africa these women are almost always widows and are as such, as vulnerable and unable to take care of themselves as the children. But by caring for the orphans, they are cared for themselves. In addition in Uganda, Sweet Sleep by purchases magazine bead necklaces from these widows, and as a result we are providing employment, security, and independence.

The caretakers in Moldovan orphanages are no different. They are teachers, nurturers and are the first line of responsibility for these children in that country as well. We want to show them how valued they are. Tomorrow we send a team to distribute beds in Moldova. Since it is so close to International Women's Day we are celebrating these women by bringing them a rose or other flower and some chocolates or other small treats as a token of how much we appreciate their presence in these children's lives.

Please begin praying for the trip next week and celebrate a woman in your life today.

Blonde Haired, Blue Eyed Ugandan orphans

One of the greatest testimonies I often make about Sweet Sleep is how relevant of a ministry it is to our children.  After all, it is a ministry FOR children.  I have seen this relevance in my home over the past four years that I have been involved with Sweet Sleep.  My  children are 4, 7, and 9 years old.  They have grown up, their entire lives practically, watching me serve with and through Sweet Sleep.

The profound impact of Sweet Sleep has not only been realized by the children of Uganda, Haiti, Moldova, and South Africa, but also by my young family, who has grown since early childhood watching my involvement.  The mission of Sweet Sleep – to show God’s love to the world’s orphaned and abandoned children by providing a bed, bible, and mosquito net – is so relevant to our children.  They understand that a bed is a safe place; this is where they rest, where they dream, where they pray.  The covers hide them from their fears and wrap them up just like God giving them a big hug.

It has been beautiful to watch my children grow in their understanding of what it means to act in service and obedience. They understand sacrifice and that God calls us to take care of the orphaned.  They know they are being obedient when they are brave while I am away.  They show their love to the orphans by drawing pictures and writing notes that I take with me.  Over the years that love and those prayers have evolved – and the once “blonde haired, blue eyed” African children’s faces are now shaded dark as their understanding of children a world away grows.

As I tell them stories and show them pictures, they have grown to know these children are just like they are and, more importantly, that God created them and loves them in just the same way that he created and loves each of us.  They know the only difference is that we were born here and that they were born there, and into those circumstances.  They know that God did not put us where we are for our comfort.  He has done so, and has given us a great responsibility – and that is to take care of and love His children in their time of need. 

Because of Sweet Sleep and my involvement in the ministry, orphan care is a part of my family’s vocabulary.  In the evening, my children pray for their dinner, and the orphans.  At bedtime, they pray for their friends and their pets, and for the orphans.  I am grateful and encouraged as I watch my children grow into their roles of service in the Kingdom and I faithfully wait for the day they deliver their written note to an orphan themselves, in person.

Madelene Metcalf
Trips Coordinator

Vote for Our Giving of Life Grant!

For the second year in a row, Sweet Sleep has applied for the Giving of Life grant. We could be one of 14 ministry category winners to receive a minimum grant of $10,000. With enough votes we could be one of three finalists to win an even bigger grant at the end of the year!

Click here to vote for Sweet Sleep now!

Voting ends on May 22, and grant recipients for the first season will be announced June 4.

Giving of Life was founded by three visionaries with a heart for transformation—Dan Maclellan and Russell Courtney of The SoulCare Project, and Kerry Bural, principal and founder of The Resonate Group. They started the unique web-based initiative in 2011 to revolutionize the way grassroots ministries grow and give life to the world—primarily by designing a hassle-free method for giving financial and promotional boosts to 501c3 organizations. Non-profits like Sweet Sleep apply for grants but we need your help to receive the reward.

Please vote for us and then share with your friends about this important opportunity to get the message of Sweet Sleep changing lives of orphans to an even larger audience. Thanks!

Mission Possible Kids, Seymour, Indiana

Sharing Love February inspired many people to do something for orphaned and abandoned children around the world. We are so grateful for the continued encouragement not to mention funding we are getting in response to the stories that have been shared. Today we hear from a group of "special agents" in Seymour Indiana who have been on a mission to help Sweet Sleep build beds.

I am the director of our local chapter of Mission Possible Kids. In this cool, ‘hands- on’ mission club, elementary aged kids are “special agents doing God’s work”. We “go on missions” each month, and in January we partnered with Sweet Sleep.

Through your photos I was able to relay to our agents the devastating conditions in which our friends sleep on the other side of the world. It left nobody in our room longing for one of those old beds! I was able to share with the children your passion and mission of providing a new, fresh bed for every head, and your chosen mission scripture of Proverbs 3:24. That night our agents worked hard and hand-made 50 heart shaped fleece pillows for your organization to distribute with every new bed you provide!

But we also wanted to be able to provide you with more than just sweet pillows. We wanted to be able to send as well a nice monetary contribution to enable you to keep doing what you do in providing complete bed sets to the orphans. So we embarked in another mission we called, “Sweet Sleep- Part Two”. Through the Saturdays in February we set up a fundraising station in the foyer of our church serving hotdogs, Gatorade, and snacks to the basketball league traffic that was passing through (see attached photos). We had prepared and set out for display a full poster board of Sweet Sleep pictures and continuously played a dvd stating our mission and including your videoclip, “We Must Go.” With God’s blessing and the hard work from the agents we were able to meet our goal of raising $1000.00!!!!

So you may be wondering, “Why Sweet Sleep”? Of all the great organizations we partner with, why the extra energy and effort in accomplishing the mission in two parts with Sweet Sleep?

Perhaps ...the other side of the world is not that far away.

You see, one of our agents was born in Ukraine. Only 6 years ago, her little bed was like one we see in your photos. If I shut my eyes I can still smell the very room where she slept, and see the all the little beds lined up side by side in multiples. Anyone who has smelled this smell and seen this sight is forever propelled to do whatever it is they can to provide love and hope for these forgotten.

The agent I speak of is my little girl.

Thank you, Sweet Sleep, for being committed in your mission. We are very happy to be able to support your worthwhile work!

Martha Brown
Director, Mission Possible Kids Seymour, Indiana


Are you looking for a missions project for your group?
If your church group or organization would like more information on how you can raise funds and build beds for orphans through our Build-a-Bed, Nickels for Nets or other programs, contact Sarah at sarah@sweetsleep.org.

We only need a few more nets!
We are so close to our goal of 568 nets for newly registered HIV+ orphans who are came out of hiding in Uganda. We still need you to buy nets for only $8 a net. Please give at sweetsleep.org/donate. Mark "Gulu net" in the comments box.