30-Hour Famine…17 hours in

It’s 7:00 AM.  We went to sleep somewhere around 1:00 AM.  I didn’t sleep much, if at all.  It was too quiet for this brain.  Not feeling all that hungry.  I only missed supper, which isn’t the first time.  I was able to skip home for a bit to shower and hydrate with the water necessary to take the meds I forgot to bring with me.  Doh!

The kids must have been super tired because once the lights were out, it was quiet (although, I did threaten their morning cracker if they weren’t!).  I’ll prefer to think they were just tuckered out.

It was a full evening – games, PowerPoint presentation, videos.  Lots of information thrown at these kids and they respond!  We have a great group of kids in this church and community; I’m so proud of them.

We have more games, a few service projects around the church and community, and what we’re all looking forward to – breaking the fast with a pizza party at our local bowling alley.

The harsh reality is, those who suffer from hunger can’t just break their fast.  This church does a great job collecting food for local food pantries year round.  My department, in particular, collected over 1,000 pounds of non-perishable items in a few months last year.  It’s an important mission to not forget those in our own communities who we would never imagine are hungry.  Our own school districts have homeless and un-/under-employed just a paycheck away from poverty.

Here are some facts we shared with the kids last night (straight from World Vision’s 30-Hour Famine):

Hunger Facts

The number of hungry people in the world may shock you. In fact, it should.

Fact #1

In 2012, more than 18,000 children younger than 5 died every day — most from preventable causes. It’s estimated that nearly 8,000 of these deaths were tied to hunger. That’s about one every 10 seconds.

Most of these kids died not from starvation, but from malnutrition — meaning too long without the right kind of food. Eating just enough to stay alive weakened their bodies so much that disease could strike the final blow.

*Based on the most current United Nations data available during creation of 2015 Famine materials
**Based on an average bus capacity of 85 people

Fact #2

Worldwide, 842 million people — about 1 in 8 — are hungry.
That’s over 2.5 times the population of the United States.

Many families depend entirely on what they can grow, so they’re never more than one natural or manmade disaster away from hunger.

Fact #3

Nearly 1 in 5 people survive on less than $1.25 a day. And the poor spend most of their money (up to 80 percent of it) on food. How do you pay for shelter, school, healthcare, and clothes with what’s left? You don’t.

Related:
Just how big is this Famine army of hunger-fighting students?
What does extreme hunger actually do to your body?
So what is malnutrition, anyway? (This activity will bring it to life.)
Where do most hungry people live?
How the funds your group raises actually fight hunger.
People like you helped make big headway against hunger in 2014.

So, the next time you see Sally Struthers on TV, take her out of the equation and focus on what’s really important – making fun of her or making it a mission to help those she made the trip to see?  Do something – give to your food banks, donate money world-wide, take a mission trip and make a difference first hand.

SOMETHING is better than NOTHING.  AMEN!

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