More than 1 billion people lack access to clean drinking water
19 Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 20 But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
-Mathew 6:19-21
In the bible, money is mentioned more than any other single subject:
Poverty is hunger. Poverty is lack of shelter. Poverty is being sick and not being able to see a doctor. Poverty is not having access to school and not knowing how to read. Poverty is not having a job, is fear for the future, living one day at a time. Poverty is losing a child to illness brought about by unclean water. Poverty is powerlessness, lack of representation and freedom. Poverty has many faces, changing from place to place and across time, and has been described in many ways.
Half of the world's population is engulfed in poverty. Worldwide, more than a billion people live in slums and the number continues to rise daily. In Kenyan slum of Kibera ther are over one million people living in crushing poverty. Slum Survivors share the stories of their remarkable courage in the face of extreme poverty.
He who is kind to the poor lends to the Lord, He will reward him for what he has done." (Pr 19:17)
Extreme poverty is one of the most pressing issues of our age. It is the source of much of the world's suffering and makes mere survival into a struggle. No doubt you have heard some of the powerful statistics on what life is like for the world's poorest people, but they bear repeating. Of the 6.7 billion people in the world today:
Extreme poverty has many causes: harsh climate, lack of fertile land, war and political strife, corruption at all levels, unfair trade policies, debt, disease, and famine. Many of these causes are themselves byproducts of poverty, creating a vicious cycle that is hard to escape.
The shape of poverty is complex. The world can no longer be cleanly separated into a group of rich nations and a group of very poor nations. Over the past fifty years, many of the poor nations have begun to slowly catch up with the rich ones. We now have a spectrum of countries from the wealthiest to the most impoverished, each with their own challenges and needs. This change should give us hope, as it shows that countries really can be pulled out of poverty through a combination of external aid and internal progress.
Regardless of the progress, we should not allow ourselves to be fooled or blinded by the complexity of poverty. Although some countries have taken great strides forward in reducing poverty, many nations have remained as poor as they were 50 years ago. In some countries poverty is endemic resulting in those people have fallen even further into the pit into despair. Some of these nations can be found in Latin America, and most in Africa or Southeast Asia.
In struggling countries of the world, the Church remains a beacon of hope for the poor. Very few government programs exist to assist the needy, so virtually all of the social services available to the poor are provided through Christian ministries. Freedom From Chains works directly with indigenous churches and its leaders to provide them with the specific resources that are required to implement anti poverty projects best suited to the communities they serve.
We at Freedom from Chains strive to provide overseas churches with the financial resources that will enable them to carry out their outreach projects and programs. We supply material resources and vocational training to Christian ministries and native missionaries who are already operating in areas of need so they can earn the trust of the people and thereby gain the opportunity to share Jesus Christ with community leaders. Some of the poverty reduction projects we undertake are:
