By Carol Heitgerd
    Publisher's Note: Sometime around the first of last year, I was contacted by Food For The Poor, an interdenominational, Christ-centered relief organization headquartered in Deerfield Beach, Florida. Regina Carle, who heads the organization's media department, invited me and several other Christian newspaper publishers from across the country on a five-day tour of their facilities in Florida and their primary ministry in Jamaica. The tour was scheduled for Sept. 11-15. Unfortunately, I was not able to make the tour. Because a portion of Food For The Poor's ministry revolves around caring for the medical needs of those they serve, I decided to ask one of our advertisers, Ms. Carol Heitgerd, a registered nurse practitioner and writer, to go in my place. The following is her report.

Count Your Blessings
    There is a song I remember singing as a child. The actual title and composer of the song escape me, but the tune and words are still fresh in my memory-"Count your blessings name them one by one. Count your many blessings, see what God has done."
    Life today is not simple. I don't know about you, but it's difficult to find time to just sit back and relax. Amid rushing off to work, making sure my son has something to eat for dinner, and a host of other responsibilities, I often forget to "Count my blessings."
    For most of us, counting our blessings comes to mind primarily when we turn on the TV or pick up a newspaper and see a story about homeless people being fed during the holidays or refugees struggling to survive after some natural disaster or war. However, as soon as the TV is turned off or the newspaper is set aside, those people and their plights are quickly forgotten and we return to our own little comfort zones. Seldom do we stop and think just how blessed we are not to be in those situations.
    In my case, as a nurse practitioner, I see many people who are less fortunate than myself, in terms of health problems, on a daily basis. But even then, I don't consciously stop to think about how God has blessed me with good health. If you're like most people, it generally takes a personal experience to drive home the reality of just how fragile our comfort zones are and how blessed we truly are.

Jamaica the Paradise?
    Thanks to the St. Louis MetroVoice and Food for the Poor (FFP), from Sept. 12­14, 2000, I had the opportunity to visit a part of the world that most people visualize as being "paradise" on earth-Jamaica. (My visit actually started Sept. 11 in Deerfield Beach, Florida, at FFP's headquarters.)
    When people open a travel brochure or watch a travelogue about Jamaica, they're shown the island's white, sandy beaches, palm trees, plush resorts, lavishly decorated tables brimming with all kinds of food, crystal blue water, and breathtaking sunsets.
    What they don't show you are the thousands of Jamaican men, women, and children picking through the island's garbage dumps looking for food and anything of value, which they might sell to feed their families. The brochures fail to mention that out of approximately 1.2 million people in Kingston, the island's capitol, approximately a third of the population lives in absolute poverty.
    The travelogues don't show the thousands of people living under pieces of discarded cardboard or tin, and they don't advertise that people actually bathe in and drink from the city's sewers. And, of course, you're certainly not going to see pictures of people disfigured and suffering from every disease imaginable-including leprosy.
    If you think parts of St. Louis or East St. Louis look depressed and poverty-stricken, try going to the Jamaica the travel agencies don't show you. The depressed areas of our region are truly "paradise" compared to some of the places I visited with FFP.

My Hosts
    Food for the Poor was founded in 1982 by Ferdinand Mahfood, a businessman from a wealthy Jamaican family, to minister to the spiritual and physical needs of impoverished people throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. Since its founding, FFP, an international, interdenominational Christian aid organization, has distributed more than $766 million in food, medical, educational, building and small-business supplies to 26 countries.
    Headquartered in Deerfield Beach, Florida, FFP's stated goals are to improve the health, economic, social, and spiritual conditions of the men, women, and children they serve. FFP aspires to bring benefactors, recipients, and those who work for FFP to a closer walk with the Lord.
    The ministry raises funds and provides direct assistance to the poor, usually by purchasing specifically requested materials and distributing them through the churches and charitable organizations already operating in areas of need. In this way, the organization serves the poor with dignity and ensures the most appropriate use of donors' contributions.
    From my observations, the ministry truly reflected God's unconditional love and inspired the trust and faith of the people they ministered to. Christ was definitely alive in those I met, and they were serving Him by being of assistance to those in need.

The Tour Begins
    The first stop on my itinerary was FFP's headquarters in Deerfield Beach for a tour. As I boarded my plane on Monday morning, I wasn't quite sure what God had in store for me, but I knew I was about to enter a world I had never experienced.
    Upon arriving in Florida, we were taken to our hotel to check in and then spent the afternoon and evening touring FFP's headquarters and three huge warehouses.
    On our tour of the warehouses, I saw a wide range of items including furniture; medical equipment; building, office, and school supplies; food; clothing; and a host of other items. Everything had been either donated to or purchased by FFP and was awaiting shipment to Jamaica and other areas where the ministry operates.
    During the tour, I asked Regina Carle, FFP's media manager, about the size of their staff and what percentage of the financial donations given to the organization were actually used to help those in need.
    Regina told me that FFP employs approximately 250 people and that less than 10 percent of all monetary donations are used for operating expenses. The remaining 90-plus percent goes to helping the people they minister to.
    Regina went on to explain that a portion of donations go to hiring local people in the areas FFP serves to work on various projects within their communities. She emphasized that by hiring local nationals to work on their projects, FFP not only helps those in need, but is also able to provide practical working experience and teach useful skills the workers can then apply in their respective communities to help support their families and other families as well.
    Using Jamaica as an example, Regina pointed out that because the average income of the poor in Jamaica can be as low as $1 a day (the average Jamaican earns about $3,350 a year), the money earned by those they employ is a godsend. "It's really a win, win, win situation," she said. "The poor get the assistance they desperately need; the people we hire (who are, in many cases, in just as much need as the people they minister to) earn money to feed their families while learning a skill they can apply elsewhere.
    "And, of course, the local economy benefits by an influx of capital that otherwise would have not been there. We believe this is an extremely wise use of funds which the Lord provides through those who donate to our ministry," Regina continued.
    My next question was "How does FFP actually help the people they serve?"
    Regina explained that FFP follows the principle that education and self-help must fortify charity work so recipients learn to break the cycle of poverty. She said FFP supports a number of programs to teach recipients how to be self-sufficient, such as raising livestock and food crops and developing small businesses. "In the cases where we encourage people to start their own small businesses, we often help them by first training them and then providing them with the necessary tools of their chosen trade, i.e. carpentry tools, brick making tools, etc," she said.
    She went on to explain that FFP also provides a wide range of assistance to other ministries already serving the needy in the areas where FFP has a presence. For example, the North Street United Church, located in west Kingston (an area known for its violence, crime and high unemployment) wanted to renovate a building to house a multipurpose center for the community. FFP stepped in and helped pay for construction costs, allowing the center to be completed. The center now offers medical care, daycare, job training and parenting classes. It also operates a bakery, which sells pastries and bread to local residents to help pay operating costs.
    Regina related that whenever FFP tackles a project, the first thing they do is to go into the community, ask the residents what they really need, and then try to supply those needs. "You really don't help people by just walking in and telling them what you're going to do for them, without first finding out what they actually need," she explained. "Who knows better what the community needs than the community itself?"

The Real Thing
    The next morning we departed from Miami for Jamaica. After checking in to our hotel in Kingston and attending an overview briefing, we began an intense, three-day tour of some 15 ministry outreaches and projects supported by FFP.
    Our tour guide was Romeo Effs, a native Jamaican and a great proponent of his country and people. Employed by Food for the Poor, Romeo was very well respected by the people we visited and was extremely helpful throughout the tour.
    Unfortunately, there is no way I could possibly relate everything I saw on this tour and tell everything FFP is doing to help the poor of Jamaica. As I mentioned earlier, there are approximately 1.2 million people in Kingston alone and approximately a third of them live in poverty.
    During our tour, we were actually interacting with the poorest of the poor. If I hadn't been there myself, I would have never believed people could be living the way they were. What I saw left me heavy-hearted, astounded, a bit angry, and feeling somewhat guilty. There was no shortage of tears in my heart or on my cheeks at some of the sites we visited.
    The simple lives of the people I met and observed, and the resources they used to survive day in and day out, were incredible. Everyone I met was very appreciative of any help they could acquire and put everything to good use.
    People were living in houses made of discarded tin, cardboard, scraps of wood and old buildings that were so rotten, occupants had to be careful where they stepped so they didn't fall through the floor. And, these were the "fortunate" ones who had managed to piece together or find a place to call home.
    I witnessed people sleeping on splintered wooden floors, ragged pieces of cloth, old car seats, bare ground, or discarded mattresses with springs popping through the covering. These people's meals consisted of whatever they could grow, whatever they could find in the garbage dumps, or any animals they could kill. Watching children at Riverton City dump scavenging for scraps of food was almost more than I could bear. There was a large crowd at this 25-acre dump picking through the trash and waiting for garbage trucks to arrive so they could hopefully find something of value to salvage and sell to feed their families.
    I saw sewers and leaking pipe stands, which were the most popular places the poor came to bathe and get their drinking water. I gave up counting the children I saw on the streets who had never seen the inside of a schoolhouse.
    By American standards, the healthcare system was abysmal. Medical supplies and equipment were sparse to say the least. To this day, I cannot think about what I saw without getting tears in my eyes.
    There were, however, many bright spots on our tour-the facilities, special projects, and ministries supported by FFP.
    One such site, in nearby Spanish Town, was St. Monica's Home for the homeless elderly. The facility was originally founded to house those suffering from leprosy, a disease that is rarely seen or heard of in the United States. FFP supplied the home, which housed some 134 residents, with food and medical supplies and equipment.
    St. Monica's Home was where we met George McPhee, 79, a 19-year resident suffering from leprosy. George was a joy and a blessing. At age 44, he had lost sight in both eyes, and his face and fingers were terribly deformed. However, despite his affliction, George had a sweet spirit of joy and thanksgiving about him, which brought tears of joy to my heart. His self- appointed job at the home was to play the harmonica and tell stories about God to the other residents. His tee-shirt reflected his spirit-"I am Too Blessed To Be Stressed."
    After touring the ministries FFP supports, and seeing firsthand how FFP is helping the poor, it did not surprise me to learn that the ministry had been named one of the top 100 charities in the world in 1998 by two non-profit industry publications-the Non-Profit Times and the Chronicle of Philanthropy.
    Upon my return to St. Louis, I knew my eyes had certainly been opened to the needs of the less fortunate. I pledged in my heart to do anything I could to help Food for the Poor help those to whom they minister. So far, I have sent several packages, which included medical books, school supplies, pens, pads of paper, and other assorted items, which the ministry has put to use. I certainly plan to send more.

End Note: For more information about Food for the Poor or, to send a charitable contribution, please contact Nick Adams, Food For The Poor, 550 SW 12th Ave., Deerfield Beach, Florida, 33442 or call 1-800-966-2000. You may also visit their Web site at www.foodforthepoor.org. Food for the Poor is a member of the ECFA (Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability).