Emma Tucker and Hannah Troughton are part of Windsor Park Baptist Church in Mairangi Bay, Auckland.
As our plane descended over Cebu in the Philippines, we peered out the window, catching a glimpse of the city we’d soon be traversing in our week-long trip with nonprofit organisation Tearfund. The houses appeared like tiny, orange smudges from up so high, but it wouldn’t be long before we were immersed in the city. We were travelling with a group from our church, Windsor Park Baptist Church, and we were all eager to meet the children we sponsored through the Tearfund child sponsorship programme. As well as giving us the opportunity to meet our sponsor child, this trip was designed to expose us to a different culture and expand our worldview. And it did just that.
From the moment we drove away from the airport, we were greeted by this new city. The food was more delicious than expected, the temperature hotter, the roads busier, the colours brighter, the people friendlier - a total engulfing of our senses! On our first day, we went for a walk around the block as a group to take it all in. One thing we were not expecting was how the wealthy and poor areas neighboured each other. On our fifteen-minute walk, we passed the biggest mall we’d ever seen and squeezed through the narrow streets of the tiniest homes we’d ever seen. There was no gradual transition. As our time there went on, this hit closer to home.
One day, we visited the home of a family who told us how they hunted for crabs for their children to eat and how, as parents, they would often go hungry so the children could have food. It was deeply moving to hear of their hardships, but we caught a glimpse of their overwhelming gratitude and faith in God. We cried together, prayed together, and left pondering it all. It was a daily wrestle to witness the reality of poverty for many people in Cebu. We tried to reconcile this with our situation as we headed back to our hotel every night to eat plentiful food and sleep in comfortable beds, knowing the families we met lived just ten minutes away. This experience forced us out of a comfortable place of ignorance and required us to ask hard questions of ourselves.
We were also told that most people living in poverty believe that there is no way out of their situation, so children are told that they, too, will live in poverty for the rest of their lives. Their dreams are limited from a young age.
However, we noticed a strong undercurrent of hope in all of the churches we visited, palpable in the songs we sang, the smiles and shy “hello”s from the children, how the members interacted with each other, and how we were welcomed. We saw the way caseworkers and children’s church teachers, often alumni of the Tearfund sponsorship programme, intentionally taught the children there is hope for their future. They often told us that the best way to show children that there is a way to escape poverty was for the alumni of the sponsorship programme to come back as workers and be living examples of hope.
We saw, too, how the sponsors provide hope to the children; it’s impactful to have another person standing beside them (even from the other side of the world) showing interest in them. The children spoke with fondness and familiarity of their sponsor families, holding tightly to the titbits of information they received about them in their letters. One ten-year-old girl excitedly shared, “My sponsor family likes maths, and I like maths too!”
One of the most impacting experiences we had on our trip was meeting Rudge, the 19-year-old we have jointly sponsored for almost two years. Because we get really long letters from him once every couple of months, we thought we already knew a lot about his life before meeting him. But spending the day with him, chatting and having lunch, gave us a different level of connection with him. We now know what his weeks look like and how his different activities fit in with each other. We also got a glimpse of his humble, respectful and creative personality through the stories he shared. For us, Rudge is a living testament to the hope provided by the sponsorship programme; he lives his life wholeheartedly for Jesus. Despite working full-time designing websites, he attends Bible study courses in the evening, training to become a pastor. Asking for his prayer requests and praying for him right then and there was a surreal and memorable experience that we will hold onto for the rest of our lives.
All too soon, we found ourselves standing outside the airport, suitcase in one hand and passport in the other. We took a moment to memorise the sounds and scents of the Philippines. With our camera rolls packed with photos, journals rich with information, and minds brimming with new faces and stories, we were leaving the Philippines truly changed. This trip opened our eyes to our privilege, our poverty, and God’s presence. We have steady incomes, sufficient food, structurally sound homes, and safe neighbourhoods. But so often, we experience a poverty of spirit, lacking gratitude, joy, and faith. As a whole, from this trip, we were most encouraged by what God is doing in Cebu through child sponsorship and beyond.
