“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever”.  Hebrews 13:8    “Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need”.  Hebrews 4:16 

In the past week, the extent of COVID-19 across the globe has become more extensive, more sobering and yet more confusing. Countries are adopting different measures at different times, but if there is a common thread, urgency is increasing.  In this unprecedented global pandemic that is impacting every one of our field and fundraising countries across the world, directly or indirectly. Mission Without Borders affirms that we are extremely grateful for your prayers and ongoing support. We are prayerfully seeking wisdom, asking for protection and our supporters are also very much in our prayers at this time. As a Mission we are also praying for you, our supporters, our staff and our boards.

This is a challenge that Mission Without Borders is responding to with unity and God’s ever-present help. We know God is sovereign through all of this.  We are taking action to make sure that our staff remain safe and well, and that every Mission Without Borders Partner feels supported and connected. As you would expect, Mission Without Borders is working as quickly as possible to assess how coronavirus is affecting our most vulnerable communities in Eastern Europe and how we can best support our partners and churches to make a meaningful, sustained response.  Currently, we have needed to stop all of our face to face relational support work in our communities, to protect the communities and our staff.  In communities where we are still permitted to deliver food and hygiene in an outside space, we are still doing this, but this will be stopped this week.   This is being reviewed on a regular basis.   Please continue to visit our website for details of the impact in the countries where we work and the impact on our communities and staff.

Please join us in continuing to pray for God’s protection for those affected and wisdom to deal with this unprecedented global situation and for those making decisions  – our governments and health experts around the world - as they look to contain the spread of this virus.

If you are able to continue to support MWB in prayer, in raising awareness of what we do and the current impact on this work, and in continuing to support us financially we would be incredibly grateful.  We do thank you for your ongoing and loyal support and your commitment in joining us in God’s mission to the poor and marginalized.

Stephen

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In recent weeks the world has changed dramatically. The Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has hit all of our field countries as well as our fundraising countries. In these situations it is those in poverty who suffer most.

The prices of food and hygiene items have been increasing, and the poor will feel this most severely. Sadly, it is also the case that the long-term malnutrition that is a consequence of poverty has a huge impact on people’s ability to fight any infection. This means that those we work with are particularly vulnerable to the effects of coronavirus.

The situation is changing daily as governments try to stop the spread of the disease. A number of the countries we serve have declared a state of emergency and are seeking financial aid from the world community in order to be able to manage the crisis.

The spread of the virus has meant that there have been changes in terms of how we are able to work with those we serve in Eastern Europe:

• Travel restrictions are limiting what is possible in terms of visiting families, children and communities
• Increasing cases of the virus in the communities we work within resulting in less or no visits to those communities
• Restrictions on events and people gathering together means our soup kitchens cannot operate in the same way in many instances.
• After school clubs and events where we seek to provide Christian input are closed. As Easter approaches this will be particularly hard.
• Transportation of Gifts in Kind is no longer possible in some countries
• Prices of food and hygiene items is increasing as people worry that they will run out

Our local staff are continuing to support people as best they can, providing alternative meals to the elderly where soup kitchens are not taking place, handing out food to the homeless, and keeping in regular phone contact with families they are unable to visit.  As we saw with the recent earthquake in Albania, the trust that our families have in our local staff is invaluable and strong when disaster strikes.

At the same time our fundraising offices around the world have been affected. It has become necessary to work from home and planned supporter events and fundraising activities are being cancelled. It seems likely that this will have a negative impact on our ability to raise funds that are needed for us to carry out our work.

If you would like to make a practical impact and help fight the effects of this virus around the world, please consider supporting our work.

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