God Girl Magazine

After our first trip to Africa, in 2011, Alea announced that God was telling her to sponsor her own little girl in Africa. You can imagine how skeptical we were as her parents, to let our 10 year old take on such a serious long-term financial commitment. We don't give our kids allowance, and even if we did it certainly wouldn't be as high as the $30 needed each month to sponsor a child. We knew her plan of making earrings & scarves to sell, having lemonade stands & garage sales, babysitting, etc. would not raise enough money to last the whole year. And what about the next year and the next? We tried to convince her to just pick one of the girls we already sponsored and we would let her be HER girl. But she could not be swayed from her convictions. "Mom & Dad, if God wants me to sponsor a girl He'll provide the money." How does a parent argue with the unwavering faith of a 10 year old child? 

 

***Jesus said, "I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven." Matthew 18:3***

So we contacted First Love to see if there were any 10 yr old girls who needed sponsoring and thus began Alea's sponsorship of Dorothy, one of the girls we had met. It has been 4 years, and God has indeed provided the finances for Alea to sponsor her! There were some very slim months that the struggle to raise the money was real and there were sacrifices involved on Alea's part. For example, she packed cold lunch every day her 5th grade year of school so that she could get the $100 out of her hot lunch account. She didn't get any birthday presents for her 11th, 12th & 13th birthdays because she asked only for money for Dorothy. Friends from church were extra generous in what they paid her for babysitting. She made $54 on one lemonade stand by putting out a photo of Dorothy. Month by month she managed to scrape by for 3 years until finally God gave her an idea that would "seal the deal" in raising money for Dorothy....a Chrisitan magazine for girls. Once again, she stepped out in faith and obeyed God's calling on her your life, despite the doubts of her parents in pulling this off. 5 magazines & approx 300 subscribers later, Alea got to hand deliver the summer 2015 issue of God Girl Magazine to Dorothy:

God has been faithful in providing the computer, the printers, the website, the stories and the subscribers. How exciting for an orphan girl in Kenya to see herself in a magazine and to know there is a magazine published in her honor and for her benefit!

The magazine eagerly gets passed among the girls at the children's home:

Even the high school girls told her they love the magazine and what a good job she does, and even the boys were passing it around at dinner! 

Alea shared the story of the magazine with the girls one afternoon. Even though every magazine has made it to First Love the last year, it was neat for them to hear form Alea thirst hand how she started it and the process. We explained that, even though Dorothy is the one the funds from the magazine go to, it is really a magazine that represents & advocates for all of them! 

Posing with 3 out of the 5 issues:

Dorothy giving Alea a thank you speech:

Two God Girls united across the ocean!