It is a great project dedicated to helping disabled and impaired youth, and it has changed thousands of lives for the better. For WER, our partnership with this project has been one of real significance and the funds invested have undoubtedly been well spent.
Children and young people have received wheelchairs and prosthetic limbs, special needs education has been provided and local attitudes to disability have been turned around, so that in the local community disabled people are now regarded with proper respect.
Yet in recent years our partners have struggled to manage the growth in demand for assistance from disabled youth. They’ve struggled to raise the funds and strengthen the management structure in a way that would allow them to increase capacity and effectiveness.
Let me be clear, our partners have not failed, but are struggling to balance the complex pressures of running such a project. The immediacy of a patient needing urgent medical treatment and surgery, which can cost up to £20,000, has to be balanced with the fact that this amount could cover at least two weeks running costs for the project overall.
Over the years WER has invested money and given a lot of time to encourage and mentor the personnel involved. At times our partners have not taken our advice and often we have been frustrated. We could easily turn round to them now and say ‘We told you so …. If only you had put into practice what we recommended …’ and so on.
A few years ago when we uncovered corruption in a different partner organisation, WER decided to stand by that partner and help them through whilst another major Christian charity pulled out and suspended all funding. I could understand this decision on one level, but there is no doubt that it made it much harder for our partner to survive its difficulties and continue its good works.
So this morning as I grappled with all the different scenarios, I was thankful to be reminded of the verses in John’s Gospel, chapter 1v 14.
‘The Word was made flesh and lived among us … full of grace and truth.’
As I read the above verse about the coming of Jesus I was reminded that I and WER, as a Christian and a Christian charity respectively, need to live up to these same words.
We need to be truthful in our relationship with our partners and our donors.
We need be honest and open in our discussions and communications.
We need to recognise that we have benefited from others allowing us to learn from our mistakes.
We also need to be people who exercise grace.
