DEEP OR WIDE?

There is constant tension in orphan care over the question, “Do we go wide and save as many little lives as possible, or do we go deep and give 24/7 total care for only a few?

Mostly it’s a matter of resources.

Both needs are real and heart-crushing.

At Children’s Cup’s level of resources it has been an easy decision to go wide and save thousands of hurting little children. We know this is the best use of our resources. Currently we take care of as many as 5,000 children daily in Africa.

But anybody who has understood what happens to the children that live in the slums at night cries for a home to put those hurting children in where they won’t be raped and made to do heavy work for the abusive adults who dominate their nights.

‘Cup’s 5000 AIDS orphans and vulnerable children (OVC’s in UN parlance) get food, medical care, education and the Gospel. Almost all of them have accepted Jesus as Savior. It can’t be wrong to go as wide as we can.

But neither can it be wrong to strive to go just as deep as we can and find or provide 24/7 care for our precious kids.

There is always the cruel truth that when you decide which lives to save you are also choosing which children you will let die. That agony never leaves our hearts.

“Wide or deep?” is not question of “either/or.” It’s a matter of “both/and.”

Can’t help but remember the delightful kids’ chorus out of my childhood: “Deep and wide, deep and wide, there's a fountain flowing deep and wide…”

We’ll go as deep and wide as our partners’ dollars will take us.