Scroll Top

Author: CEDAR Fund

The Letter from CEDAR | February 2017

Dear Friends of CEDAR, “You are the light of the world… let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.” (Matthew 5:14 & 16) Happy Chinese New Year! For a long time, “eating” has been a core part of our Chinese culture, especially in times of festivities. Over Chinese New Year, I was “food overloaded” and felt a strong sense of guilt as many people in the world are still undernourished and suffering from hunger. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, around 800 million people are facing hunger, representing 11.1% of the world population. From experience and observation, we know that their hunger

Continue reading

Spread the Love to City Edges

Interviewing and editing: Canace Chiu & Tsun Wan Yan The rapid economic growth of India did not significantly reduce its population living in poverty. Although halved from the 90’s, the number of poor people living in India still reaches 600 million, with 300 to 400 million of them living under extreme poverty. The country is not spared from the plethora of social problems experienced by other developing countries, such as a large income gap and rural-urban migration. CEDAR hopes to share with you the stories that took place in the lesser known areas of India, and we wish you could remember the suffering people and God’s servants in your prayers in this New Year season. Love among the

Continue reading

The Poor You Will Always Have with You, But…

Author: Dr. Chan Nim Chung (CEDAR Board Member) A common response to Jesus’ words in Matthew 26:11 that we often hear is that, “Why should we prioritize helping the poor over evangelizing?” Such argument has dwindled in recent years (people might just have been too embarrassed to talk about it publicly) until Rick Perry, one of the 2016 US president candidates, Texas’ former head of state, and a conservative Christian, definitively reciprocated the exact thoughts while being interviewed by the Washington Post about the large income gap in Texas. Today we are going to take a closer look into some possible explanations of this verse. The Bible did not treat poverty in urban and rural areas separately, hence

Continue reading

Rekindling the Hope of Poor Suburb Children

Children are the hope of our society, and most parents would stop at nothing to provide the best for their growth. However, life is different for the children born in the slums who struggle to obtain necessities daily, consequently giving them more obstacles to a bright future. Our partner in Ethiopia, the Addis Ababa Guenet Church (AAGC), has been tasked to giving the slum children and their families a better environment for over 20 years. AAGC provides basic living, education, and health support to the children admitted to their programme, and it holds regular parent self-help groups where they would learn how to manage their finance and do business, to give them a more stable income. It keeps

Continue reading

Living with the Poor – An Interview with Sir Mok

Interviewing & Editing: Tsun Wan Yan The acts of distributing necessities and visiting elder homes are still the dominant means of social involvement for some of the churches and Christian groups in Hong Kong. Mr. Mok Hing Luen (Sir Mok), a veteran in the field of Hong Kong’s social involvement and social work education, thinks that there are much more we could do to our society. “The church is complacent in giving the resources it has received from God to the people it sees that has a need,” said Sir Mok, who argues that such a downstream mindset of social involvement and poverty solving adopted by churches is self-limiting. But first we must cease boasting our roles among

Continue reading

‘SHARE’ 222 – Urban Poverty

Articles of this issue Spread the Love to City Edges Interviewing and editing: Canace Chiu & Tsun Wan Yan The rapid economic growth of India did not significantly reduce its population living in poverty. Although halved from the 90’s, the number of poor people living in India still reaches 600 million, with 300 to 400 million of them living under extreme poverty. The country is not spared from the plethora of social problems experienced by other developing countries, such as a large income gap and rural-urban migration. CEDAR hopes to share with you the stories that took place in the lesser known areas of India, and we wish you could remember the suffering people and God’s servants in

Continue reading

The Letter from CEDAR | December 2016

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Isaiah 9:6 This is the verse we often see and read in this time of the year. As we have already entered into Advent, have you made any plan in response to the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ? Last week, I just returned from a trip to Bangladesh. I paid a visit to some of our partners and their projects. One of them is the Outfall Telugu Community School. It is an elementary school incepted by

Continue reading

Keep Haiti in Our Prayer

The Haiti hurricane happened a month and a half ago and we have been keeping in touch with the rescuers and organizations. The restoration progress was far from optimal, in some case degrading, in Haiti with emerging health and sheltering challenges. Our prayers and awareness to the conditions of this island country in the Pacific is still sorely needed though media interest has died down. Pajé, a teacher who fortunately escaped to a town nearby with her mom during the hurricane Matthew, was greeted by seriously destroyed debris when she returned home. Tears came down as she found that place could no longer be called home with the entire roof gone. She is in desperate need of a

Continue reading

Haiti Hurricane Matthew Update

Integral Alliance launched a Disaster Response for Hurricane Matthew on 6/10/16. Seventeen Integral Members have now opted into the response, with a further one considering how they can be involved … Overall it is estimated that 1.4 million people have been affected by this Category 4 Hurricane which struck the southwest coast of Haiti 0700 local time (1200 GMT) on 4 October. According to the latest government figures, 1,410,900 people, including 592,600 children, are in need of humanitarian aid. So far, at least 1,000 people have been reported dead. More than 200,000 houses have been severely damaged or destroyed. [Source here]. Six of our Members have existing long term work in Haiti – Food for the Hungry (USA), Medical Teams International

Continue reading

Pray for and Support the Hurricane-Affected Haitians

According to the Haitian Ministry of Interior, more than 19% of the Haitian population -2,1 million persons- has been affected by the hurricane and more than 12% -1,4 million persons- are in need of urgent assistance in different departments of the country. [ReliefWeb] After years of drought, Haiti was predicted to have a good harvest this year; however, the hurricane destroyed most of the crops in affected areas. Please pray for the affected families, particularly those who are most vulnerable. Pray that they will have emergency food assistance and plenty of food supply in the coming months. Madam Viergela Sainmistil standing by the remains of her belongings Up till now, at least 14,530 people displaced. Pray for God’s protection to them and for safe shelters.

Continue reading