by Rosabeth Birky Koehn for Mennonite Mission Network
As a Mennonite with a growing global consciousness, Lydia Longacre works hard at good stewardship. At age four, her money already has reached Ecuador.
Longacre’s congregation, Swamp Mennonite Church in Quakerstown, Pa., chose to participate in Mennonite Mission Network’s mission bank project. Through this program, Longacre helped support the ministry of Iglesia Menonita de Quito (Quito Mennonite Church) as it reaches out to Colombian refugees and local children.
Since September 2005, Mennonite Church USA children have been dropping their allowances and earnings into the little blue globe-styled banks in order to help fund Mission Network-supported projects around the world. In April 2008, donations topped $100,000.
According to Sandy Miller, director of church relations at MMN, “The goal of mission banks is to help children learn how to share Jesus in ways children can.”
Longacre reported, “It makes me feel good to give people money because they might not have food. I set the table to get money to put in the [mission] bank. It was hard sometimes, but I wanted money to put in the bank to help people.”
Banks come with curriculum focused on a particular area of need in an international location. Lessons geared at children’s time, Sunday school and family time at home teach children what mission workers and partner organizations are doing around the world. With a clear idea of where their money is headed, children can contribute to the work of the missional church.
According to Cindy Weaver, minister of Christian education at Swamp, kids get excited about giving when they know specifically what they are giving to.
Weaver said that between January and May, Swamp children raised more than $800 to support Iglesia Menonita de Quito’s community outreach, which includes providing temporary housing for Colombian refugees and organizing peace education for children in marginal neighborhoods.
César Moya and Patricia Urueña are co-pastors of Iglesia Menonita de Quito and have been working there through a partnership involving Mission Network, the Colombian Mennonite Church and Central Plains Mennonite Conference since 2000.
Originally from Colombia, the couple understands the situation refugees are fleeing in that country. They offer their time and energy to help the refugees find the support they need in a new home.
To explain one way their church uses funds from Mission Network, Moya and Urueña shared a story.
In March 2003, a family of Colombian refugees appeared at the doorstep of Iglesia Menonita de Quito. They had come to the Ecuadorian capital to escape violence in their home country.
The mother, father and four children arrived at the church with these words on their lips: “Do you speak of love for your neighbor? Is it true that you help people in need? Please help us for we have no place to go.”
At the time, the church could only offer the family two cramped Sunday school rooms. Today, enabled by financial support from Mission Network, the church rents a small house on the outskirts of the city where displaced Colombians can find temporary lodging.
To date, the house has sheltered 10 families, one at a time for several months each.
Ever since Iglesia Menonita de Quito started aiding refugees, congregants have generously contributed their time and material resources. However, the amount of need quickly surpassed the church’s ability to provide.
“It was then,” wrote Moya and Urueña, “that the help from [MMN] became important and this partnership provided money exclusively for the needs of the Colombians.”
Swamp member Marie Gehman witnessed first-hand how Iglesia Menonita de Quito uses money from Mission Network for this and other purposes. During the same time young Longacre was setting the table to earn mission bank money, Gehman was studying at the Universidad San Francisco de Quito (University of San Francisco, Quito) and partaking in the ministry of Iglesia Menonita de Quito.
She assisted with the Peace Education Project, a program that includes workshops about violence prevention and the formation of Christian values. This program is also supported by mission banks.
Children from neighborhoods surrounding Iglesia Menonita de Quito regularly deal with issues related to domestic violence, alcoholism, drug addiction, gang life and single-parent families. In collaboration with the local neighborhood board, the church brings these children together once a month to learn about living peacefully, even within violent circumstances.
For Gehman, however, it was obvious the peace education did not go just one way. She recalled one class when children were making bracelets to give to someone else.
“I was helping a group of about six young children string their beads and tie knots, but I still couldn’t speak Spanish very well and, therefore, was having some trouble communicating,” she said.
“Fortunately, one of the children came to my rescue and helped me with the names and decided to help me make my bracelet, too. At the end, she gave her bracelet as a gift to me.”
*Translation from Spanish by Laverne Rutschman
The opinions expressed in articles posted on Mosaic’s website are those of the author and may not reflect the official policy of Mosaic Conference. Mosaic is a large conference, crossing ethnicities, geographies, generations, theologies, and politics. Each person can only speak for themselves; no one can represent “the conference.” May God give us the grace to hear what the Spirit is speaking to us through people with whom we disagree and the humility and courage to love one another even when those disagreements can’t be bridged.