During our visit to Manado, Indonesia we witnessed the efforts of many women as they worked long tiring days to find extra money to help support their families. They ran kiosks, cooked and sold satay in the market, chopped fruit salad to sell on the street corner and collected rubbish at the local tip. Women were often the entrepreneurs of the family, not just making ends meet, but finding ingenious ways of  saving money in the event of a child requiring a visit to the doctor or some other unplanned expenditure.

For some women the story is not always as positive. There are numerous stories we’ve been told of forced labor, rape, abuse, inequality and sexual violence in war.

We stand by and support the UN in it’s efforts to insure the safety and equality of women all around the world.

The Manly Council have given us the opportunity to promote and sell Love in Action at their event to promote International Women’s Day which will be held at the Manly Library on monday 8 March 2010. All proceeds from the sale of Love in Action will be donated to Manly-Manado. Money raised will be given to the Compassion Child Survival Program. The program assists pregnant women, at-risk babies and infants and their mothers and caregivers by providing critical interventions, such as medical assistance, pre-natal and post-natal care, and nutritious food. For further information visit the Compassion website.

Watch this video and JoinRED.

This is a call out for the wonderful work that Compassion are putting into assisting the people of Haiti and to encourage you to think about supporting their efforts too. Follow this link for the stories about Compassion staff and families living in Haiti that have been effected, and then follow this link to support their efforts there financially.

The marketing campaigns “call to action” is to watch the confronting educational video  on their website and to consider taking action. It’s a very powerful message.

I spent much of Tuesday contemplating the video that I had seen, and the campaign. The thing that continues to strike me is just how alien these kinds of horrific ordeals feel to me, in my circumstances living in a big multi-cultural safe city. It’s almost as if it feels so unreal that it can’t be true, and therefore it’s ok to forget, or think someone else will help, or what will my $30 a month do to help.

Putting love into action means to go beyond our own worldview, to break beyond our own understanding and to imagine no matter how abstract or alien-like it may feel, what it would be like if our own children were to be forced into becoming soldiers.

For more information about The Australian Red Cross and their campaign to stop children from becoming soldiers, please follow this link.

Our second goal was to raise money for Manly-Manado, so the book could also directly benefit the people of Manado.

To date we have shipped 670 books. Of those books, we have given over 200 books to Compassion as a gift. Every book that they sell will be money raised that will help them continue to do the good work they do. Approx. 60 books remain in stock with our sales partners around Australia.

There are less than 300 copies of Love in Action left in stock. We do not plan to print a second run.

The 300 remaining books will raise $12,000 for Manly-Manado. 100% of the sales of these 300 copies will be given to Manly-Mando and to support the community partnership and help the people of Manado.

Will you help move the remaining copies of Love in Action that we have on hand? We would love to find a good home for them. Perhaps you have a friend or relative who has a birthday coming up? Maybe you’re a business owner and would like to help share some good news with your business partners?

Love in Action is available today from Humphreys Newsagents, Koorong, The Bible Society and directly from Manly-Manado.

Thank you for your support.

The Gap is a local community church held in a farm barnyard. The perfect setting for a nativity service

Thank you to all the folks at The Gap for their kind invitation to speak.

On our second day in the hospital (my wife and I took it in turns to stay overnight with our son), we received a telephone call from Pastor Ming of City Harvest Church, Singapore. Later he came to visit us in the hospital. He bought gifts and organised a youth worker to sit with our son to give my wife and I a few hours together alone to have some dinner as it was our wedding anniversary. The next day Andreas and Marie from City Harvest came to visit us. 6 days later we were discharged from the hospital. We were originally meant to leave Singapore on Friday 4 December but with my son not being well we extended our stay until Wednesday 9 December. This meant also extending our stay at the hotel we were staying in, however they were fully booked from Monday. Again, Pastor Ming and our new friends from City Harvest stepped in to help. They searched for a new hotel for us and put us up in the Swissotel in downtown Singapore, even ferrying us from one place to another.  One amazing blessing after another.

We are reminded that even when we are in a foreign country where we think we do not know anyone, we still have brothers and sisters in Christ willing to extend a hand, in love. We are so grateful and feel so incredibly blessed.

Thank you City Harvest Church for putting love into action. www.chc.org.sg

Christmas lights for Manado

We love some of the wonderfully innovative ideas that express the mutual transformation that is happening both in our community in Manly and in Manado. The Phillips family are shining light into their neighbourhood this Christmas (literally) as they light up their home to raise money for Manly-Manado.

Read all about it here.

Books

With Christmas not far around the corner you’ll be thinking about what gift to give to your friends and loved ones. Why not give a copy of Love in Action, and support a great cause.

If you’re a business owner why not consider purchasing Love in Action to give to your clients as a corporate gift. We’ll even give you free shipping and 10% off when you purchase 50 or more copies.

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