What If You Didn’t Have Clean Water?

Clean water is likely the most valuable resource in the world, yet, so many of us cannot imagine what our lives would be like if we were one of the nearly 1 billion people on earth who lacked this vital resource of life.

What would your life be like if instead of being to walk into the kitchen to find clean water within your faucet, you had to walk 6 miles to fill a bucket with contaminated water – water that you knew would cause sickness – simply to survive?

What would your life be like if showers, bathing, and hand-washing didn’t exist in your world, but your entire community was filled with disease and malnutrition?

Water greatly impacts every aspect of our daily lives. It enables the growth of our food and every aspect of caring for our health. We who have free access to such a vital resource likely rarely give a thought to what our lives would be like if we did not have the plentiful supply of h2o streaming from our sinks and faucets. But we should.

I do not propose that the thought we should have is one of what it would be like to suffer as millions do without clean water; rather, our thought should be one of compassion and sharing what we do have with others who do not. Charity is not an act of pity for someone, but an act of generosity and recognition that others are just as valuable and deserve to live a quality, healthy life with the same opportunities and access that come with having clean water.

We not only have the opportunity to share clean water with those who do not have it, but we can do so in a very simple and easy way. Just $1 can provide clean water to someone in need for an entire year.

Consider the things we spend $1 in a day to purchase, and consider whether or not it may be something unhealthy. Would we be willing to change habits in order to give someone else clean water, the most important thing we need to live?

If you’d like to give $1 or more to provide clean water, take a look at the organizations I have connected with to provide clean water, and visit their links to learn and get involved.

 

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• Child Sponsorship and Clean Water in India (hopeastounding.wordpress.com)
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The Child Who Will Die If We Do Not Act

We are all familiar with the images spread by non-profit organizations of starving children with flies covering their bodies as they rot in the streets of impoverished villages around the world. This post isn’t going to be one of those advertisements. This post is not meant to guilt trip anyone into doing anything, but to inspire us with the notion that we can make a difference in someone’s life now.

In 2006 I had a dream. In that dream I was walking the streets of one of those impoverished villages of which advertising has made us familiar. I came upon a small child, sitting in the street, and instantly knew that his life would end tomorrow because he didn’t have clean and safe water. I also had the revelation in the dream that I could give my life for him to have another day, and I did.

From that moment I was changed. I now had a mission in life: to do anything I could to see that the child in my dream, as unknown as he was to me personally, would have a chance at living. And each of us has that opportunity right now.

Clean water is the most fundamental element of life. It is technically illogical that nearly 1 billion people on earth lack access to that vital resource. We have the ability, engineering capacity, and finances to make it happen – clean water for the world. But it has to be a priority. Providing clean water must be seen as highly relevant not only to those who are in need of safe water, but relevant to those of us who simply walk into our kitchen or step into our shower to quench our thirst and clean ourselves.

A water well, costing as little as $5,000 can provide clean water to 250 – 500 people for 10 – 20 years. This means that merely $1 can potentially give clean water to that child who was dying in my dream for an entire year.  Clean water not only impacts lives with quenching thirst and sanitation, but impacts nearly all other aspects of the health of the individual and community. Water enables agriculture and the growing of food. But more importantly than simply the physical benefits of clean water, it provides hope, and when a community has hope, everything changes.

Will you join with me in committing to eliminate the lack of access to clean water around the world? Please connect with me to discuss projects you may know about working to provide clean water, let me know about organizations I should support through my long-distance walking, or make a donation to fund the projects I support. Your donation, even if just $1 will have a huge impact on the life of someone in need.

Thank you for your time,

Dylan

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