‘The Lord is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation. He is my God, and I will praise him’

Exodus 15 v 2

Babies abandoned in Guatemala

In the last year alone, a child was abandoned on the streets of Guatemala City every 4 days. Over three quarters of these children were babies. 20 abandoned children found on Guatemala City’s streets were already dead*.

Guatemala City continues to be a crucial place of need for so many children. Still a hot-spot of violence and corruption, the city is no place for a child to be alone, let alone without food or shelter. Many families and parents in this area abandon their children because they feel they have no other option.

But there is good news... Click here to read about what Toybox is doing to help these abandoned babies and please pray for them and their families.

*All stats taken from the Joint Council on International Children’s Services position paper, Feb 4th 2009.

A weekend of prayer

Toybox operates in partnership with Viva, a Christian organisation working with children living in poverty all over the world. This weekend, 6th & 7th June, all of their projects worldwide were invited to join in a weekend of prayer for children at risk.

Many of the projects that we support played an active part in this weekend, last year in Bolivia a total of about 5000 children and 1000 adults attended the services on the Saturday.

Every project has the opportunity to prepare a performance, a song, drama, music or a prayer activity, so the children direct about 80% of the event. As you can imagine a large event like this attracts the attention of the press and the local authorities so this is a great weekend to educate the rest of the country in what is being done for children at risk in local communities. Events take place in local churches and it was estimated by the Viva Bolivia team that last year about 15,000 people in churches across Bolivia were praying for children at risk over the weekend.

• Pray that the children will have learnt new things from the weekend, that they would be inspired and motivated to continue praying each day.
• Pray that their prayers may be answered so that they may see God’s love and provision even more in their lives.
• Pray thanks that the children are given this opportunity to come together with so many others just like them, with Jesus at the centre.
  
  

Protests in Peru

In the last email we wrote about violence between the indigenous people in the north of Peru and the police and authorities. Sadly this situation has continued to worsen and needs more prayer!

Last week, 400 police officers tried to break through a blockade that the indigenous people had made on a jungle highway in Bagua, northern Peru. Met by around 2500 tribes-men wielding spears and machetes, the events led to terrible violence and deaths of civilians and police officers alike.  The authorities have now put a curfew in place and 72 arrests have already been made in response to this. President Garcia has referred to the events as ‘an aggression against democracy’ and any dialogue between the two forces is now seen as a ‘distant possibility’. An order has been given for the arrest of the indigenous leader and he has now gone into hiding.

• Pray for peace and stability in Peru.
• Pray for the authorities involved- for wisdom in any decisions made and that these decisions would be for the benefit of all Peruvians.
• Pray that resolving discussions can be held to put a stop to the violence and that a compromise can be agreed.
• Pray for the children of families living in the area, that they may be kept safe in the midst of all the violence.
  

Thanks

When one project in Peru - Vaso de Leche (Glass of Milk) - received funding through Toybox for the repairs to the walls and floor of their building, the mothers of children attending the project decided to do some fundraising of their own...

They raised $300 from the local community for a new roof! $300 is the equivalent of one month’s salary in the area, so it really was an amazing achievement to do this, and a sign of the ladies personal commitment to children in the community. Eight of the mothers also actually helped to build the roof along with the builders!

Vaso de Leche (Glass of Milk) is a project in Lima, Peru which is part of the Red Alert network. The project helps 117 children aged 0 to 6 by providing food in the morning, and day-care as many of the children’s parents have to work for a living. Without the project, their children would be at home alone and at high risk of going on to the streets. There are also a high number of single-parent and dysfunctional families benefitting from the project.

This is such an inspiring story of local people being motivated throughToybox.

• Give thanks for God’s goodness in blessing and motivating the mothers.
  
• Give thanks for this new building which provides the project with much better facilities and help more children and families in the future.
  
• Pray for all the children and families who benefit from this project, that they may have seen something of God’s love and provision through this.

Join our email prayer team

We will send you e-prayer news - normally fortnightly. We would also like to be able to send you our bimonthly newsletter by post, to give you more background information about Toybox for prayer.