Meet Awake & Alive's New CEO!

Awake & Alive is pleased to announce that Darin Shrock will serve as the organization’s first chief executive officer.  See a video introduction of Darin here and connect with Darin on facebook.

Darin has served as Awake & Alive’s general counsel through its formation and first year of operation. “I am unbelievably excited. I have a passion for what Awake & Alive is doing—helping widows and orphans help themselves. The co-founders have laid a great foundation for Awake & Alive and we will celebrate the opening of the school in Kechene in a few days. This is a great springboard for the organization and I look forward to working with the co-founders for future expansion.”

Darin has spent his legal career as an attorney serving corporate clientele, including numerous nonprofit organizations. Darin is a graduate of Bethel College (2006) and The Thomas M. Cooley Law School (Lansing, 2009). Darin is also a member of the Crystal Valley Exchange Club and serves on the Board of Directors of his church, Immerge. Darin lives in Goshen, Indiana with his wife, Jolene, and three children (all adopted from Ethiopia). In his free time, Darin enjoys spending time with family, reading, watching a good movie, and running.

Pre Trip Prep

Epic Church has been an amazing support of Awake and Alive from the very beginning. We are so thankful for the church family there. They truly "Live In + Live Out Gods Love."

Last Sunday they held a commissioning for the team during the church service. It was a beautiful time to reflect on each person that God has called to this trip and to be reminded to pray for the hearts of some many people that will be touched by our presence in Kechene, Ethiopia.

 After the church service a lot of the team members got together. We brought all of the donations that you all have so generously given to the children in Kechene. We were blessed to be able to go through and organize all of the donations and pack our bags FULL of all of the goodies you have given for the Bright Future Academy as well as for the children in the orphanage that we will be visiting.

Thank you for all of your continued love and support. We are ready to get on the ground in Ethiopia and start loving on the community of Kechene! Thank you all for giving us the opportunity to go with our hands FULL of supplies for the school!

Keep checking our blog for updates!

If you would still like to give please click here.

The Team!

It is with great pleasure and joy that we are able to introduce you to the Project Presence Team. We are a group of individuals who have all felt called to this special place in Ethiopia, called Kechene, and because of that call we are a TEAM, 13 strong.

God has called each one of these precious people to this trip for a reason. And some of the team members are still not sure why. But they said YES anyway! We thank God for their obedience and their willingness to travel around the world to show love to orphans and widows in Kechene, Ethiopia.  We are excited to see what God has planned for each one of our team members. This trip will be life changing for many of them. And we ask for your prayers now, before we leave, during our time in Ethiopia, and for our team after we come home from Ethiopia.

Thank you.  

While you are here checking out our team, we ask you to follow the blog and LIKE us on FB. 

While we are in ET we will be posting pictures and blogging daily as long as the electricity/Internet is working.

With out further adieu we are thrilled to introduce you to: 

THE TEAM:

AMBER from Indiana

AMANDA from Indiana

 GRACE, from Indiana

 

 KATE from Indiana

TODD from Indiana

 

ANNA from Indiana 

JEN from Massachusetts

SABRINA from Indiana

BRANDON from Indiana

 CARA from California

 PAIGE from Chicago

 Team Leaders:

JOLENE from Indiana

   

DANIELLE from Indiana

JOLENE AND DANIELLE
Best Buddies
& your team leaders!

Prayer Requests:

•   Kechene: that the people there would know God’s presence and feel His love through us.

• Unity:  with local churches in Kechene, the Vineyard Church in Switzerland, Bright Future, and each other.

•   Relationships: that Christ would shine through the way we treat each other on the team and the way we treat the people in Kechene.

• The children: that they might transition well into their 1st day of kindergarten at the Bright Future Academy and the rest of the school year. 

Thank you for your continued prayers. 

Do you love books?

Free shipping on book orders of $25 or more and help send Ethiopian children to school in Kechene
Do you love books?  Could you ever have enough of them?  Or do you have some books you want to buy as gifts?  How about getting what you need or want and having it go towards a great cause at the same time?  Isn’t that just the best of both worlds?!?  Well, the folks at Christian Books Bibles have agreed–willingly and excitedly, I might add–to help us out.  Or, I should say, to help the children out in Kechene, Ethiopia.  Go to their website (http://www.christianbooksbibles.com/) and place an order, you will also be giving to Awake and Alive, helping us reach our goal to start a school for vulnerable children ages 4-6 in the capital city.  Here’s how it’ll look:
1.  Go to ChristianBooksBibles.com
2.  Order your items.
3.  At checkout, enter the promo code (AWAKE&ALIVE)
4. If your order is $25 or more (that’s a decrease from $50), you get free shipping on what is already one of the cheapest sites for new books around, and we get a portion of the profits!
You see how it’s a win-win?  So, what are you waiting for:  GO ORDER SOME BOOKS!

Seriously...you keep doing this to us!

You continue to knock our socks off!

Thank you! 

At the beginning of this year Awake and Alive was still almost $20,000 short of reaching our goal of $44k by September. This goal will send 30 street children in Ethiopia to school. It will be giving them education, food, support, and the chance to know Jesus.

So we sent out letters asking for support from our close friends and family members, 

AND THEY SUPPORTED! 

By May we were at $41,000, and only 3k short of our dream goal. 

So we let you all know the need, and boy-oh-boy did you all respond! In less then 2 weeks time Awake and Alive reached the goal of 44k! 

 We were in awe!

So after that big push to raise the $44K it has been pretty quiet around here.

But we know we have another school year to start raising funds for.
 It is time to gear back up.
So we set a goal of three-thousand dollars in a week and a half. And did you all ever show up!?!

 The 1st gift was $25 on the 1st day we posted about it. Then we received a gift of $500 the next day! A day later money came that we had done a fundraiser for previously, then some more gifts of a few hundred dollars and then some more!
The last few days I (Jolene) was posting that Awake and Alive was only about $900 short of the $3K goal,

 Then that evening my husband, Darin got a text message from one of his friends that he wanted to cover what we had left so the goal could be met!!!

Socks knocked off!! 

Here are just a few things we know are true. 

You are generous people.

 God is softening and breaking your hearts for the plight of these children.

God loves the children of Kechene far more then any of us could ever imagine or understand. 

Thank You.

Team Bonding

With a little over two months to go, we are working on team bonding and personal reflection in preparation for Project Presence (wow, that was a lot of Ps!) And we couldn't be more excited!  With the help of modern technology (i.e. yahoo chat and groups), we are managing to build connections and excitement within the team for September's trip.  In fact, we can't think about it enough.


You know that butterflies-in-your-stomach feeling you get when something really scary and/or exciting is about to take place?  Yep.  Got 'em.  And it's the best feeling in the world.  Right now we're working out the details, talking about debriefing, meeting with our video dude, dividing up donations, fundraising (e.g. doing a garage sale in 100+ Midwestern heat!), and, generally, just getting excited to go.  We wish you could come, too!  What's that?  You want to?  Maybe it's not too late.  Or, if it is (no promises), this is DEFINITELY (probably) going to be an annual thing, so start looking ahead to next year.  We'll be sure to tell you all about it.


In the meantime, we'll keep you posted on our progress and make you wish, wish, WISH you were coming, too!  (Can you tell we're a wee bit excited?!?)


To close, we wanted to share with you a snapshot (or four) of Binyam's stay in the United States.  In case you didn't know, our main Ethiopian contact, Binyam, was able to come visit for a few days in May, and it was amazing.  We talked, prayed, visioned, shared, laughed, ate, and tried to cram absolutely too much in (in total American style) since he was only here 4 days!  Thank you, Binyam, for all you do to make this dream a reality.  We are SO BLESSED and THANKFUL by and for you!!

Here we go again!

We celebrated!

 We stood silently in AWE. 

We giggled, laughed,  prayed and gave thanks to our All Mighty God,

 and cried at the fact that because of our awesome God,

 the Spirit moving in YOUR hearts and the hard work of Awake and Alive 

it only took 9 months and we were able to reach our (what felt like unattainable) goal!

So what does this mean? 

Because of you and your faithfulness to be broken and Awakened to what breaks the heart of Jesus, Awake and Alive will provide 30 of Ethiopia's most vulnerable children with an education. 

But it is much more then an education. It is the hope for a Brighter Future. 

It is protection form the dangers of street life. 

It is 2 meals a day. 

It is an oasis from the stresses of slum life.  

It is a chance to end the cycle of poverty. 

It is the chance to learn about our Lord and Savior.

What you all have done for these children is unmeasurable. 

It is with a truly Awakened heart that I say,

Thank you! 

I see each one of my children in the eyes of the children in Kechene. God has given that, hard to fathom, vision to me. And so I am set on fire to do whatever it takes to help as many children as possible. 

You see, if it TRULY was my child living in these conditions I would stop at nothing to change it! 

So when I say, "Thank You" it is with SO MUCH MEANING.

Thank you for making this vision a reality!

But as you will notice we are now focusing on fundraising for year #2! 

We are EXCITED to see what ways you all come up with to help!

"God is looking for people through whom He can do the impossible--what a pity that we plan only the things we can do by ourselves."  -A.W. Tozer