Heaven's Family Magazine
March 2017 Issue

Disabilities Ministry

Special Issue: 2016 Ministry Directors' Reports

Carmen Parise

Blessed with the gift of mobility, a smiling Dharamweer
sits in his brand new trike

“You wipe my tears and fulfill my dream,” Dharamweer gratefully reported. A double-amputee from Northern India, he received a hand-pedaled tricycle in 2016 through generous gifts to the Disabilities Ministry.

Dharamweer’s situation is all too common in much of the developing world. When the poor become disabled due to accidents, unsafe work environments, diseases such as polio, or birth defects, they are often hidden away and neglected.

Adults with disabilities have few resources of their own and little or no help from government programs or other forms of assistance, often leaving them unable to work to support themselves and their families, or even perform the simplest tasks.

What’s more, in many poor nations those with disabilities are viewed as cursed, resulting in discrimination, ostracism and, for some, abandonment. Many are reduced to an existence referred to as “bed and fed”—which means barely fed and given a dirty, thin mat on which to sleep in a hidden corner of the house or shack.

The Disabilities Ministry of Heavens Family works directly with dedicated, often poor partners on the ground, who seek to meet the physical and spiritual needs of the “least of these,” offering each one love, hope and the promise of eternal life.
Last year we touched the lives of many people around the world, including those in…

• Kenya, where we worked with a Christian social worker, himself disabled from polio, who tirelessly reaches the most vulnerable and desperate cases. Many have been rescued off the streets from starvation and physical abuse and afforded housing, nutrition, and medical treatment.

• Guatemala, where we supplied a mobile medical clinic, reaching villages in the most remote regions of the country with care, therapy and medication.

• Uganda, where we provided medical care (including corrective surgeries), hope and encouragement to acid attack survivors. We’ve also helped them with Christian counseling  focused on forgiveness, and some have even received help establishing small businesses through which they are now able to support themselves.

• Northern India, where we’ve spread the gospel while providing several individuals, such as Dharamweer, with hand-propelled tricycles.

We thank all of our donors greatly for making so much possible, and for those partners standing with us in 2017.

Please keep this ministry in prayer as we go forward, seeking to serve as Christ served. May God continue to bless you.

Help care for a Christian with a disability

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