18th November, 2009

MICHELLE WHITE

100 WELLS: A poster advertising PPF's '100 wells campaign'.

American Brad Phillips began Persecution Project Foundation (PPF) in 1997 to mobilise Christians to engage in 'active compassion for the persecuted'. Brad had traveled through war ravaged areas of Africa as a teenager with his father and had seen the devastation caused by religious persecution, in 'terms of blood, disease, starvation and death'. In 1998, he traveled through Southern Sudan and documented on video the persecution of Christians by the National Islamic Front government.

PPF has continued to work in Sudan, helping plant churches, supporting orphanages and providing emergency relief to refugees. In 2004 PPF began working with refugees on the Darfur border, providing wells, a clinic, educational services, and pastor training.

They are currently one of the few NGO's still in Sudan, working with the hundreds of thousands of refugees most of whom are women and children, the men having been killed in the war.

According to the PPF website, "100,000 people in Jaac, Sudan, need clean water to survive. The devastating genocide in Darfur has forced refugees to resettle in rural desert areas like Jaac-desert areas where clean water simply doesn't exist. Our goal is to build 100 wells to serve this community."

Watching the video on their site made me think. We are able to go to any tap in our house (or even our yard) and get water which is drinkable. The water in the refugee camps I wouldn't even give to my animals, and yet they drink it - as do any animals there.

PPF wants to dig 100 wells in the region (they already have 36) to enable the people to have clean water, which will help stop the spread of water-borne disease, and also (in my small way) show the people of Darfur that there are people outside of their country who know about them and care about them.

Matthew 25:36: "For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in."

PPF have a store on their site with T-shirts (for a donation of $US35) with 'This Shirt Saved A Life' on them, how many of us can say we saved a life by buying a t-shirt?

~ http://persecutionproject.org

~ www.100wellscampaign.com

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