Tomorrow is Blog Action Day 2008.  It’s not too late to get registered.  This year, the topic is near and dear to my heart - poverty.  I’m a major supporter of Compassion International.  I believe wholeheartedly in their approach to releasing children from their social, educational, physical and spiritual poverty.  Won’t you join me tomorrow for Blog Action Day?  Then, take action; change the world; let God use you in a special way; sponsor a child with Compassion.

Also, here’s 88 other ways to get you started in fighting poverty!

Compassion is organizing a day of prayer and fasting for the global food crisis on June 25th. That’s Wednesday.

It breaks my heart to hear about the current global food crisis and how it affects children and their families. Rice, beans, corn and other food staples have become dramatically more costly in recent months, creating extreme hardship and suffering. This need cannot be overstated. For families earning just $2 per day or less, there is just no margin. The impact is truly devastating.

There’s a lot I don’t understand about the world. I don’t understand why I have everything I need and then some. I don’t understand why the world that had so little food before has even less now. I don’t understand why I have to run on the treadmill to burn off extra calories when the rest of the world is literally dying for those calories. Especially though, I don’t understand how we can sit back and do nothing. This thing is real. It affects real people with real families and real lives.

C’mon now - Take action: pray, then give.
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Well, I’m not exactly a parent, but I do sponsor three kids with Compassion (you should too, by the way).  I realized that I’m a bad “parent” today.  See, I was walking down the street and the iPhone told me that it was my day to write them a letter.  I’ve been pretty poor about doing this lately.  The past few times, I’ve gone to Compassion.com and “e-mailed” them, but you know, it’s just not the same to the kids as receiving an honest-to-goodness letter.

I was trying to figure out what changed.  Why have I gone downhill in this area that I used to excel in.  Do I have too much on my plate?  Am I over-committed? The truth is, I’ve been too absorbed in my life to care about theirs.  That’s a pretty bitter realization, a hard pill to swallow.

As I began pondering this more and more, I kept thinking about that old adage, that “anything worth doing is worth doing well.”  I don’t want to half-heartedly do anything.  So, do I have too much on my plate?  Do you have too much on yours?

Well, as it turns out, I have allowed my work to overpower everything else.  God has called me to release children from poverty, but I have allowed my job to steal that.  Notice that the blame is placed firmly on me.  I’m not working more because it’s expected of me - it’s just because I do.  I have set firm boundaries in the amount of time I spend at the office, never more than 40 hours a week unless a major emergency comes up.  However, with computers, the office comes easily to my living room.  So, I’m actually working 60-80 hour weeks.

Here’s my recommendation to myself, and to you.  Leave work at work and don’t spend too much time there.  Meet and exceed the requirements of the job, but realize that you’re no good to anyone if you burn out.  If you’re single, like myself, consider this time preparation time for having a family.  The habits you form now will most likely stick with you.

Our largest area of need for enhancements was in the Checkpoint product.  Thankfully, a number of changes are on the way with this product in the July release.  One of the R&D guys told me that I was the reason for a number of these things.  I think they’re just trying to make me feel good, but it’s so encouraging to know that ACS really does listen to their customers.

Now, there are many changes that still need to be made, and those are on the list to be done.  I’m looking forward to seeing this product in 2009 with the 11.0 release.

Some of the changes that are coming this year in 10.0 are:

• “Background” Image - It is now possible to add a custom image to the express check-in screen so that it looks more personal and professional.
• Bigger buttons - The buttons on the express check-in screen are now bigger and have more space between them to make the experience with the touch screen easier.
• Add person from express - Now, the ability will exist to add people to the database from the express screen (unmanned) rather than the manned screen.  (I probably won’t use this)
• Sessions - Major changes have been made to the sessions setup.  Sessions are the “events” that you are checking in at one time.
  • Now, you can use different sessions for the same master group.   You can use Sunday School Children and Sunday School Adults at the same time on the same day in different ways on different machines.
  • Also, the big change that we’ve been pushing for is the number of security badges that can be printed.  With 10.0, this can be changed.
• Badge Design - It will now be possible to change the layout of the visitor badge!  Also, you can include a barcode on the label for use in check-out.
• Visitors - one-time visitors are now included in session statistics.  They’re still not posting to attendance though.
• Offline check-in - It’s now possible to run Checkpoint disconnected from the church database.  You sync the database with an offline machine, run check-in, then sync back with your live data.  Pretty cool stuff.

The first three days of this week were Revival services at my alma matter.  I am an advocate with Compassion International, and I was able to work their table at the event.  Jeremy Kingsley was the revival speaker, and he told a story about visiting India and serving lunch to a group of kids.  They had a lunch assembly line set up and he was on chicken duty.  The bowl would be passed to him, full of rice, and he’d put the chicken in.  He came to a point when he was running out of chicken pieces and all that was left was the claw, and the teacher at the school was saying that he needed to give the claw to the child.  He talked about how he just couldn’t bear to do it.

The point is simple - we walk into KFC and we get meaty, tender thighs and legs.  These kids are fortunate to receive the claw of the chicken.  There’s no meat, but it’s better than what the other kids in the neighborhood get.  We have to work to burn off calories because we’ve eaten too much.  The developing world longs for those extra calories that we essentially wasted.

So, what are you going to do about it?  What are you doing about it?  We know that God has called us to respond.  How are you responding?  I encourage you to sponsor a child with Compassion.  It’s not the only way to impact people living in abject poverty, but it’s one of the best ways that I know.

Compassion is Christ-centered, child focused, church based, and committed to integrity.  They know that God is working through the church, and as such they have joined Him where He is working - by partnering with evangelical churches in 25 countries around the world.  Every child in Compassion’s ministry receives assistance from the local church that runs their Child Development Center.  Last year, over 100,000 of them made first time decisions for Christ.  So, they get services that can save them physically and spiritually.

Won’t you join me and speak up for these kids who cannot speak up for themselves?