It seems to me that each year goes much more quickly than it used to. Christmas and the end of the year is already upon us. We, at the SA Foundation want to take this opportunity to wish each of you a very Blessed Christmas. We thank you for your prayers and support this past year (and truly over many years for many of you).
We have no illusions about the year that is coming to a close. For all of us it has been a difficult year and one that was full of adjustments. We have had to make many adaptations to our program delivery methods to meet the ongoing requirements of the pandemic that is the reality for all of our programs. God has been so good and we have continued to deliver our program to the women he has called out of sexual exploitation and trafficking. We have not had to skip a beat in delivering the program. The programs globally and the women and children in the houses are all doing very well thanks be to God.
We also realize that many have suffered during these months – some silently and some very vocally but in both cases the suffering is real and painful. We have kept each of our donors and families in our prayers as we have navigated these days. You all remain in our hearts during this season.
We wish to focus our thoughts this Christmas – not backwards to what has happened in the past year – but on what is ahead of us all in the new year. Christmas is a reminder of God’s incredible love for us. In that great love he sent his Son to be the Redeemer of his people. He came not on a white horse as a conquering King but as a child. He took not just our form but also our entire existence. Through his life and death he brought the separation between God and us to a close. His death conquered death for us who believe. This is the gift that God gave to his children.
He also calls us to care for one another in the same manner he cares for us. In Philippians 2:6-11 the Apostle Paul calls us to remember the incredible gift that Jesus Christ gave to us and calls us to have the same mind with one another. He says:
Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
7 rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
8 And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!
9 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
and gave him the name that is above every name,
10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
11 and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.
It is out of that love so freely given to us that we seek to serve the women and children he has trusted to our care. Not a day goes by that we don’t pray for each of them and take the opportunity to point them to the one who alone can give wholeness and recovery. Join us in our prayers for these lovely daughters of his and yet to be daughters. May each and every one of them come to meet him as their Saviour and Lord.
Once again we at the SA Foundation thank you and we send our warmest Christmas Blessings on each of you no matter how you will celebrate this strange 2020 Christmas. May you never forget his great love for you and also never forget to pay it forward to those whose paths you cross by his providence as the year closes and in the year ahead.
SAF Prayer Blog 