Stories of Hope from Compassion Ghana
It’s hard to pick a highlight from my recent trip to Ghana with Compassion UK.
What began as a charity supporting children experiencing profound poverty in South Korea now delivers development programmes across 29 nations. Remarkably, churches and individuals in South Korea are now the organisation’s second-largest funders—proof that things really can turn around, even at a national scale.
That theme—those who once received support becoming powerful forces for change themselves—ran throughout the trip.
I could tell you about the young women we met at a mum-and-baby survival centre in a rural part of Greater Accra. There, mothers are not only accessing nutrition and antenatal support for their babies, but also gaining practical skills to join with micro-enterprises that benefit entire families and communities.
Each baby supported at the centre then has the opportunity to enrol in a Compassion sponsorship programme, and later attend a child and youth development centre—like those we went on to visit in the Volta Region. These are just two of hundreds of Compassion projects reaching nearly 100,000 vulnerable young people across Ghana.
We were welcomed by — I kid you not — the most talented under-tens brass band I have ever encountered. This was all the more remarkable after visiting the homes of these budding young musicians. The committed teachers and volunteers who run the centre’s Saturday programme are cultivating the gifts and talents of a generation, while teaching them about the God who designed them that way.
The first wave of graduates from sponsor-supported schemes like these is now emerging, and our final day in Accra gave us the privilege of hearing from them. At lunch, I sat next to Eva*, a striking young woman whose mother enrolled her in a Compassion project when she was just six years old.
Eva’s mum supported the family by splitting rocks in a local quarry. The youngest of six children, Eva began attending her local development centre every Saturday, and year by year the wellbeing of the entire family was transformed through the support offered. Eva took full advantage of additional tertiary education opportunities, worked tirelessly, and—remarkably—gained the qualifications needed to study midwifery at degree level. She is the first in her family to do so, and her achievement feels nothing short of miraculous.
Compassion’s support didn’t stop there. Every potential barrier to Eva completing her studies was overcome through her own tenacity and the commitment of local project staff working on the ground.
Like the other graduates we met—a fashion designer and a pastor among them—Eva is now committed to sharing her story and her skills with young people from her community. Her hope is that some of Ghana’s most deprived areas will see wave after wave of young people, and their families, released from poverty and empowered to reach their full potential, in Jesus’ name.
Could you consider becoming part of a future just like Eva’s?
If you’ve never explored sponsorship or church partnership, can I encourage you to take a look at Compassion’s website .
NB. If you are part of a New Frontiers church can I encourage you to contact Tim Robertson from Compassion UK who has been working with Newfrontiers churches for many years,facilitatingstrong partnerships.