What Jesus Does

Remember Luke's 7th birthday?  I know.  It was a while ago.  If you need a reminder, you can go back and read the post.  In a nutshell, Luke raised money for clean water in Haiti for his 7th birthday.  Guess what we received yesterday?

It was an amazingly special email from Living Water International with an attached pdf telling a story and sharing pictures that made me burst into tears of absolute joy.  First a little back story.

After Luke's birthday, Erik and I looked at the money that had been raised with utter amazement.  While it wasn't enough to fund an entire well, it was still a TON of money.  We knew that Erik's company does fund matching up to a certain amount.  Obviously none of the money raised from outside sources was eligible for matching.  After doing the math and looking at our funds, we saw how God was going to provide the money necessary for what we thought would be a well in Haiti.  So, we submitted the necessary paperwork to Takeda, wrote our personal check to Living Water, and waited.

The matching funds were a VERY long time in coming.  There was a bad storm on the east coast, I can't even remember which one, that took out the matching funds processing center used by Takeda.  Delay after delay and Luke began praying each night for the funds to come through.  It's been close to a year since his birthday, and this Mama Bear is ready to send angry emails and make irritated phone calls.  Luke?  He prays every night and has a happy heart, super sure that God is going to make all this happen.

The funds FINALLY come through!  Our contact at Living Water International sends an email with a request.  They have a project already going in Haiti.  It's actually bigger than a well and already has two donors.  It's called a spring box and provides an enclosure for an already established mountain spring.  Luke's funds would give this project exactly the amount necessary to go forward.  Are we willing?  So, we checked with Luke.  His response:  Sure!

Wanna see the results?  First my apologies...I extracted the photos from the pdf they sent using a free extractor I downloaded and they are all watermarked.  But I did ask Living Water and they gave me permission to use the photos, so no copyright is being broken.  :-)

Here is how this community formerly acquired their water:

Their previous water source was "open and left subject to contaminates."  Um...no joke.

What the spring box gave them:

I love this picture.  A lot.

That middle plaque isn't quite right, friends.  It should say "Donated by the awesome friends and family of Luke Bangsund in celebration of his 7th birthday and in honor of Jesus Christ."  But I guess that is a little long.  Thank you all SO very much.  Thank you for helping our boy understand that Jesus Christ does amazing things when we pray and submit our ways to Him.  We are already praying and contemplating what God would have us do next as a family.  Despite all the waiting, this project has been a HUGE blessing to our family.  It has drawn us closer to each other and to the One who is our source of true Living Water, Jesus.