Mary focuses deeply as she makes another attempt at stitching a straight line across a long strip of fabric. This is her third week in a Samaritan’s Purse tailoring class at a local church in the town of Mankien, South Sudan. Each week for five weeks she kisses her children and leaves early in the…
Bringing Medical Care to Sudan’s Displaced Women and Children
Wrapped head to toe in a loose, floral fabric, Amira takes the hospital bucket from beside her cot and steps outside the pediatric ward to do some washing. The ward is one of eight tents that make up the Samaritan’s Purse Emergency Field Hospital, which has been operating since Christmas Day beside the government hospital…
Health & Medical Ministries
Sight Restored for Hundreds During South Sudan Cataract Campaign
Cataract surgery—a simple enough procedure in Western countries—is nearly impossible to access in South Sudan. When people’s eyes begin to cloud with cataracts, it is typically only a matter of time before they reach complete blindness. To help meet the great needs of this East African nation, Samaritan’s Purse sent a medical team to Tonj,…
Discipleship, Education & Training
Military Couples Start Fresh During Alaska Adventure
Mike Woodard’s muscular frame stands six-foot-four. During his time as a soldier in the U.S. Army, there’s no doubt the enemy should and would have feared him in close quarters. He served bravely in a 2011-12 combat tour to Afghanistan, though it came at great cost. He got blown up three times—once each by a…
Health & Medical Ministries
‘God Calls Us to Hard Places’
An 8-year-old Kenyan child with spina bifida stands upright and walks for the first time. A man whose name means “deformed” marvels at his reshaped mouth following cleft lip surgery in South Sudan. God’s healing power in the life of a toddler with a congenital heart condition leads to the planting of a church now…
Operation Christmas Child
Shoebox Gifts Encourage Venezuelan Migrants in Colombia
Well more than 2 million Venezuelans have left their nation over the past few years, many fleeing to neighboring Colombia. They’re leaving because the situation in Venezuela is bleak—with runaway inflation, increasing crime, and critical shortages of food and medicine. As the economy collapses, families simply can’t afford to eat. Some Venezuelans go back and…
Operation Christmas Child
World War II Veteran Sews Hundreds of Quilts for Children’s Shoebox Gifts
Former U.S. Army Staff Sergeant Theron Jennings, 98, lives alone in a Savoy, Illinois, apartment where he sews quilts for children around the world. Since 2014, he has handmade more than 400 of these blankets, completing 160 in just the last year. Each one is lovingly packed into a shoebox gift with other toys and…
Crisis & Disaster Response
Hurricane Dorian Roundup: Field Hospital Opens, Relief Distributions Ongoing in the Bahamas
Please see a new story on relief sent to the Abacos and another new article on our Emergency Field Hospital in Freeport, Grand Bahama. Please continue regularly visiting samaritanspurse.org for future articles on our Hurricane Dorian response. Our Dorian landing page is also a great resource featuring videos and a slide show. The article below…
Crisis & Disaster Response
Cissie Graham Lynch Encourages Bahamians Recovering After Hurricane Dorian
In the wake of Hurricane Dorian’s devastation, Cissie Graham Lynch and her husband Corey traveled to the Bahamas on Sept. 13 to see the work of Samaritan’s Purse on Grand Bahama and the Abaco Islands. The Lynches met with patients at our Emergency Field Hospital where medical teams have helped alleviate the strain on regional…
Operation Christmas Child
Shoebox Gifts Go Even Where There Is No Road
Sixty bare-chested men started running towards Dian and Sandee. The group’s leader was waving his rifle in the air and yelling. Among the throng was a man carrying a black cooking pot and more men brandishing their rifles in the air. The two women froze. But to their surprise, the horde ran past them and…
