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Welcome to Trinity Sermons.

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Thanks for joining us today here at Trinity Church, Streetsville, as we journey together

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to love Jesus, live like Jesus, and lead others to Jesus.

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This is a very special message today from guest speaker, Karen Ramos, from World Vision.

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Karen is the program director of World Vision in Honduras, and today she shares with us

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the needs of the children in Honduras and about the impacts that programs such as the

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Chosen Program through World Vision have had on the lives of these children as they become

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empowered to move towards the vision World Vision and Jesus have for all people to live

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life to the fullest.

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Definitely a relevant and important talk today that you don't want to miss.

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God bless.

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I'm reading this morning from Micah chapter 6, verses 6 to 8.

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With what shall I come before the Lord and bow down before the exalted God?

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Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old?

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Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousand rivers of oil?

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Shall I offer my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?

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He has shown you, O mortal, what is good, and what does the Lord require of you?

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To do justice and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God.

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This is the word of the Lord.

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I will share to you a little bit about Honduras, about Nueva Frontera.

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You already saw that amazing video.

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I was really touched by that video, seeing the images of the previous director, Oscar

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Chica was there in the video.

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It was very good to see how this church has been working with World Vision Honduras for

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so many years.

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But before we start, I want to say it's Chosen Day.

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So it's a great day to remember and to see the children that are around the world, but

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in my case, to talk about Honduras.

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This is me in the Chosen event last year.

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I was with the pastor and the team there.

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And these children are part of the children who chose their sponsor during that celebration.

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In Honduras, we face a really complex social, political, economical environment.

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There is more than 70% of population is in poverty and more than 40% is in extreme poverty.

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And what that means is that we have a lot of inequality, violence.

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Some people have no jobs, so there is food insecurity for children especially.

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And I want to start telling you about a girl that I met on Friday during a visit that I

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did in the morning because that was our celebration day, but I had a field visit in the morning

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and I talked with Lisbeth, a woman.

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She's now 22 years old.

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And Lisbeth and his family is a face of this inequality and poverty and violence that leaves

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many children in Honduras.

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When she was 12, 13 years old, her father lived in the house.

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More than 40% of the homes in Honduras are lived by women, are held by women because

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men live in the house and live with the wife and the children.

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So this mother also lives in the house and lives with Lisbeth with her two siblings,

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one of the two or three years old and the other one a little bit bigger.

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But Lisbeth was only 13 years old and she has to take care of her siblings, brothers

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and sisters.

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And Lisbeth was telling us how difficult it was to her, so she decided at that age, it's

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a very difficult age, she decided to leave the house and to go to the streets.

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And she lives in an urban neighborhood in Tegucigalpa, so in Tegucigalpa the violence

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is very complicated, especially in urban neighborhoods.

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And she started using drugs and the gangs were trying to support her and she started

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to see that that could be a way to leave all her work and to start a new life, a bad life

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and a new life where she could belong to something.

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And she told us, I just wanted that someone sees me, I just wanted that someone know about

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me and my family and help me.

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And everyone was listening to this story and everyone was crying.

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Of course her story is very long and she told us a lot of details, but Lisbeth is one girl

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that represents the story of many other women, men, boys and girls in Honduras.

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Not only in urban but also in rural areas like Nuera Frontera.

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In Nuera Frontera because of food insecurity and the lack of opportunities, economic opportunities

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for families, many children are at risk of child labor.

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We made a research in the last month about child labor in Honduras and we found out that

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around one million of children in Honduras are at risk or are in child labor.

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Child labor that makes them to leave the school, that makes them to go to the fields and to

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work in dangerous places like fishing or cropping coffee beans or in other agricultural activities.

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When we think about these children we think that the importance of remembering that we

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need to bring hope and love for these children because they felt like Lisbeth alone.

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They felt that no one is seeing them.

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They felt that no one loves him and they don't have hope.

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I can continue telling you stories but I'm not here just to tell sad stories.

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I want to remember two children from the Bible, Ishmael, do you remember Ishmael?

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Son of Haram.

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He and his mother Hagar had to leave the house and she was desperate.

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She was crying.

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Her son was crying and she thought he would die so I preferred to leave him dying alone

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and I will go to a separate place because I don't want to be there seeing how he will

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die.

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But in the Bible Genesis 21 says that God has heard the boy crying as he lies there.

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He told Hagar, lift the boy up and take him by the hand for I will make him into a great

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nation.

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So the Lord listened, listened to the children, listened to Christ, listened to us, listened

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to Lisbeth, listened to all these boys and girls in our front who are in poverty and

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that brings hope in the middle of the most difficult moments.

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And this hope comes from the hand of other people around.

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In the case of Ishmael, it was his mother who left the boy and continued the trip.

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In the case of Noa Frontera, last year many of you sponsored some kids that that brings

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hope not only for the children in Noa Frontera but also for the entire family, for the entire

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communities, for all the Noa Frontera program and especially for Honduras.

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But another story is about Moses.

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Moses, it was he born in a you remember in a moment that all children will be died and

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will be killed and his mother tried to save him and put him in this basket and throw him

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in the river and the daughter of the Pharaoh come and saw him when she was in that river

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in the bathing.

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She saved him.

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And that's why because God not only listened but also sees Moses.

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And we all know the story of Moses.

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He was the one who helped the entire Israel people.

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So that tell us that we have a Lord, we have a God who sees children and makes them feel

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love.

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He was loved by the Pharaoh's daughter.

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And that is so good that he made that his mother was the people who cared about the

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Moses during his childhood.

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This was not only the Pharaoh's daughter but also his own mother was with him during his

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childhood.

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And this reminds me again how can we be these people, these channels of hope for so many

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children in Honduras and around the world.

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Jesus also said another child who came to the world in a very difficult moment and he

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was also born in a very vulnerable moment in a very vulnerable place.

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But he as his God but at the same time he was a man, a child, he received the care,

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he received the love of his family and also of the people around him.

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And when he grew up, you remember, he said let the children come to me because children

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are very important.

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Children are in a priority part of the heaven.

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Children are a priority for God.

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And that's why we in World Vision have children in the center of our work, in the center of

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our heart.

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For us, the boys and the girls are the main, the center of all our strategies or our programs

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or the things that we do is because of the well-being of the children.

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And I will finish before we continue with the other slides.

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I will finish the study of Elizabeth.

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She didn't end with Elizabeth in the guns.

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She was seen by God.

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She was listened by God.

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And God put people around her who support her.

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It was a sponsorship program in the UCGALPA that came to the community of Elizabeth.

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And someone tell Elizabeth, hey, in World Vision they are enrolling people, youth people

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for a training, maybe you can do it, maybe you can have something there.

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And she said, I don't have anything to lose.

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Maybe they give me something, a t-shirt or something.

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So I will try.

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So she went, she enrolled herself in this training.

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And she started to receive not only a training because this is very easy.

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You can even be trained by courses in YouTube.

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But she received love.

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She received people.

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She was surrounded by people who loved her, but people who listened to her and people

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who really cared about her life.

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So she started to training.

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And she finished her training.

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And during all this time, because it was not only training, but she and her family received

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other support, when she turned 18 years, she started to work in a company in Honduras.

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It was not a great job, but she had a job.

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And she could support her sister and his brother and his grandma, her grandma, because she

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was in charge of her grandma too.

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She started to thrive.

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This was some years ago.

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Then in 2020, when COVID came to Honduras and to the world, she has to leave the job

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because most companies in Honduras closed.

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So there were no jobs for people.

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So she started again thinking, okay, I am alone again.

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I don't have a support, economic support again.

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I have to take care of my brother and sister.

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Her sister also has a disability.

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So she needs special support.

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But she remembered training that she had received in World Vision.

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And she said, okay, they trained me not only for having a job, but also to start a new

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business for myself.

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So she started to make, then she used YouTube and she learned how to bake pizzas and bake

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bread.

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And she started.

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She started and she started to sell it in the community.

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And as everyone was closed, everything was closed and people were very afraid about COVID,

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she started towing every door and people buy her pizzas, donuts and bread.

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And she started this small business that supports her until now.

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But she also said, okay, it's not fair that I received all these.

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I received love.

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I received training.

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I received, because she received many trainings after the first training.

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But it's not fair that I have this only for myself.

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And she remembered that World Vision has this program that works with the community, people

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in the community.

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We call them agents of change.

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Our volunteers who help, who are the hands of the work that World Vision do.

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And she started to, she enrolled as a volunteer in World Vision.

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Now she has reached many children in her community.

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She is a channel of hope for thousands of children in Honduras because she brings them

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training.

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She is an amazing leader.

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And she remembers me, she remembers me that we don't have to be millionaires to help others.

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We don't have to be brilliant.

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We don't have, we just need to have the heart to help.

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We just need to have the heart to support.

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You just need that the Holy Spirit give us that heart that help us to understand children.

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And as I said in the slide, and gives them a place of honor and respect.

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This is the place that Lisbeth has now.

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She's very well respected in the community.

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Everyone knows her, but knows her for the good things, not for the past.

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Knows her as a leader, as a good leader.

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And Lisbeth is one example of many others that we have in Honduras and around the world

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about the job that World Vision is doing not alone, but because of the support of many

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people who believes not only, not in World Vision, but believes that we can be, we can

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be the channel, we can be the hands of God in many hard places in this country.

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And one example of this is Chosen.

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This is a picture of that event in last year.

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This girl, this girl shows a group of children who decided to, Daniela is her name, who decided

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to sponsor a child in Honduras.

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And Daniela is a small girl in a family that is not, small family too.

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But they have been, since they have been in the sponsorship, their family have this hope

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to do something else.

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Her father wanted to leave the community.

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Many people in Honduras, especially men, leave the house because they are looking for another

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opportunity, economic opportunity to support their families.

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And her father wanted to leave the house because he said, I can't do something here in Nara

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Frontera, but I will leave the house.

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But after this opportunity, he decided, it's not because we bring a lot of things, but

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because we bring hope and something changed his mind.

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And he said, okay, I will continue working here.

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I will continue working.

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I received training in agricultural tools and agricultural, sorry, I don't remember

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the word, but training to produce better in his land.

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And he started to produce more and his family started to receive more support, training,

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but also his children are now in school.

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And this is the kind of love that we give them.

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Because it's not only that we take some gift to the sponsor child and the sponsor, and

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the child receive a gift and that ends.

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It's not like that.

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It works in a way that the entire community, the entire family, but the entire community

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receive this support.

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In Nara Frontera, as in many places in Honduras when we have a sponsorship, through the sponsorship,

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communities has water.

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Many of these communities doesn't have water.

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Women and children has to leave the house in the morning to get water.

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And when we get there, we start with our programs, with giving them water, food security, training

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for entrepreneurship, nutritional, spiritual nutrition for children.

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We work very close with churches.

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We work in Honduras with many churches, including the Anglican Church in Honduras.

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I had a meeting with Reverend Lloyd Allen, he's the head of the Anglican Church in Honduras

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on Friday too.

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So it was a very busy Friday.

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But we work with them also there.

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And in every place where we work, we have the opportunity to see and to love the children

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around us.

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And I invite you to see not only the girls and the boys in Honduras, but sometimes the

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girls and the boys that are in our neighborhood, in our house, sometimes they don't feel they

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have been seen by God or by us.

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So we have to start loving and seeing these children that needs a place of honor and respect.

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Because in the kingdom of God, every child has a place of honor and respect.

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It's such a blessing to be here today talking about Honduras.

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And from the bottom of my heart, I can tell you that Honduras is a place, is a country

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with many challenges, but also too many opportunities.

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We just need someone to believe in the communities, someone to believe in the children, someone

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to believe in the mothers and the fathers for them to thrive.

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They can do it.

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And we are the channel for that.

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Thank you very much.

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Thank you so much for joining us today.

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If you enjoyed the show today, please take a few minutes to rate and review our podcast

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so that we can continue to spread the good news with others.

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And join us next week when Rob is back for another sermon here at Trinity Church, Streetsville.

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Thanks again for listening.

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Today's talk was taken from the June 16th, 2024 service at Trinity Church, Streetsville

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in Mississauga, Ontario.