Today, Ethiopia is facing a food crisis that is threatening millions of people. According to this report by the BBC (article and video), the situation is worse than a similar famine in 2003. Late rains and the high cost of food are to blame.

The U.N. believes that 3 million Ethiopians will need emergency food support in the coming months.

To give you a picture of what extreme poverty and hunger look like, "A BBC correspondent who visited a feeding centre says she saw a child whose arm was as thin as a man’s thumb."

Melodie Monberg sent me this article this morning, just days after Children’s HopeChest committed to provide one month’s worth of breakfast food for Hanna’s Orphan Homes in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. We reached out to Hanna because the need is so great we must respond now. She wrote to us:

Although it is a global problem, the cost of living in Ethiopia has become very, very expensive. The money you have planned to send me could cover the need of wheat to be used only for one month breakfast purposes.

Hanna Teshome is a hero. She has operated Hanna’s Orphan Homes in and around Addis Ababa, Ethiopia for the last 14 years. Hanna has taken these children off the streets and out of the hospitals where they watched their parents die of AIDS. Now they are in a home. We have recently begun our initiative to partner with Hanna and other Ethiopian leaders like her to care for the millions of orphaned children in that beautiful and historic country. Along with Red Letters Campaign, we are working to raise funds, mobilize churches and faith communities, and identify Ethiopian partners like Hanna.

Today we are sending her money for breakfast for the children for one month. But I think we can do much more. You can help us provide food for Hanna’s children–and protect them from the spreading famine in Ethiopia.

Click here to go straight to the 5 for 50 donation page. There, you can sign up to provide $25/month in support for providing food to Hanna’s Orphan Homes.

As an added bonus: Some close friends of the ministry have agreed to match the first 10 gifts of $25. The first ten people to sign up with a $25 recurring gift with have their gift doubled for the first month–helping us get the food to Hanna’s kids faster.

We need to cover 162 children at Hanna’s Homes who are facing a food shortage in Ethiopia. When you sign up, leave a comment on this post, and encourage others to join you. Thanks for your support! I’ll report back as the support builds.