Here’s your chance to be involved on Orphan’s Sunday!

 
From Christianity Today <http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2010/july/11.23.html>  to Catalyst <http://www.catalystspace.com/content/read/june10_love_for_orphans_transforms/> , the biblical call to “defend the cause of the fatherless” (Isaiah 1:17) is on hearts and minds of Christians in a way not seen in generations.  Even the New York Times this week wrote of “Evangelical Christian churches, which have increasingly taken up orphan care as a tenet of their faith…”
 
Last year, the national Orphan Sunday campaign helped stoke this movement to a new intensity, including more than 1,500 local Orphan Sunday events nationwide.  The 2010 campaign aims for more than 2,000 events across America the weekend of November 7, 2010 calling Christians to adoption, foster care and global orphan ministry.  
 
Each Orphan Sunday event is led by local Christians stirred by the plight of the orphan.  For these advocates, Orphan Sunday is an opportunity to spread their passion in their church and beyond.  It’s also a chance to add echo to a nationwide movement.  Events are as diverse as their organizers, from prayer gatherings and sermons on God’s heart for the orphan to student-led fundraisers and foster family recruiting.  
 
Alongside these local events, a national concert will be simulcast live from Colorado Springs to college and high school groups nationwide on the Friday of Orphan Sunday weekend.  Featuring The Desperation Band and other artists, the event will challenge American youth to a vibrant, Gospel-centered faith that includes real sacrifice for “least of these,” including orphans.
 
“Orphan Sunday calls the Church to make the Gospel visible,” said Jedd Medefind, President of the Christian Alliance for Orphans.  “When Christians open their hearts and homes in adoption, foster care and global orphan ministry, we mirror the God who did the same for us.”
 
More than 75 national organizations have joined forces in the Christian Alliance for Orphans to promote the 2010 campaign, including household names like Bethany Christian Services, Buckner, Focus on the Family, Show Hope and Family Life.
 
The website www.orphansunday.org <http://www.orphansunday.org> serves as a hub for the campaign, offering event ideas, downloadable materials and ways individuals can partner with orphan-serving ministries to hold local events. The site also contains a map of the country that will highlight local events nationwide as they are scheduled.
 
“The need of orphans is so vast that no government, no nonprofit can overcome it,” said Jodi Jackson Tucker, national coordinator for the Orphan Sunday campaign.  “There’s only one potential source of the love, nurture and belonging that every orphan most needs: that’s the Church.”
 
There are more than 500,000 children in the foster system in the U.S. today, with nearly 130,000 waiting to be adopted.  Globally, an estimated 15 million children have lost both parents.  The Orphan Sunday campaign invites Christians to be God’s answer to these needs.  As the 2010 Orphan Sunday video puts it, “We set the lonely in families because God set us in His.”
 
Even as the 2010 campaign gears up, effects from Orphan Sunday 2009 are still being felt.  Orphan Sunday at Morningside Baptist in Sioux City, IA was the catalyst for launch of a new
orphan ministry, including an adoption and orphan care fund.  It also spurred many church members to consider adoption, including one of the church’s elders, Russell Nordstrom.  “God specifically used that day in our lives to lead us to adoption,” said Nordstrom.  “We’re thankful for those who shared their passion so that others might hear the message and hear the need and follow the call.” The Nordstrom will welcome an orphan from Ethiopia later this year.  [Hear the Nordstrom’s Orphan Sunday story in four minutes here <http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2809712/Russell%20Nordstrom%20Testimony.mp3>