This blog was submitted by Kevin Selders

A 27-year-old Nashville resident recently returned from his 2,200-mile journey toward saving lives. Chris Hennig completed the grueling Appalachian Trail, which crawls through 14 states, in an effort to inspire child sponsorships through World Vision. The hike comes at a time when nearly 10,000 children have lost their sponsorship this year due to the economic crisis.

“It’s such a tangible way to know you’re making a difference in the life of somebody who, because of where they were born, doesn’t have the same opportunities that we do here in the United States,” says Hennig, who has worked as a World Vision tour representative for four years. “It puts you in contact with the Third World or a developing country and that changes your perspective. We’ve been blessed with a lot being born in this country, so now we need to bless others with what we’ve been given.”

In hiking up to 20 miles a day, Hennig originally had the goal of inspiring a sponsor per mile. “A fellow co-worker said, ‘The goal is one,’” Hennig says. “‘If you get one kid sponsored, you’ve made a difference.’” At the conclusion of his trek a total of 16 children had been sponsored.

Hennig got the idea to hike the trail after reading Bill Bryson’s “A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail.”

The hardest part of the journey, he says, is dealing with unexpected injury. It can also get lonely on the trail. “You definitely can get homesick,” Hennig says. “Mentally, it’s hard to get up every day and know you have to walk 10 to 25 miles, then go to bed knowing you have to get up dirty and to do it the next day.”

An important component to Hennig’s journey has been connecting with people through his Web site, www.2200miles.com. Through the site, people could keep up with his trek through videos, pictures and blog posts, as well as connect with World Vision. Sponsoring a child costs $35 a month, which provides the child, their family and surrounding community with things like clean water, healthy food, schooling opportunities, health care and economic opportunities.

Hennig himself has sponsored two boys through World Vision for the last four years: Fabricio, 9, from Honduras and James, 9, from Kenya. “Looking at their pictures and knowing right now this is a kid who’s alive halfway around the world because of World Vision’s work and because of me financially supporting World Vision’s work is amazing to me,” he says. “These kids have a better future. They have more hope than if World Vision had not been working in their community.”

While the hike has ended, Hennig is still using the experience to encourage others to sponsor children through World Vision. Visitors to his site who click through a World Vision banner to become sponsors are registered with World Vision toward Hennig’s goal of inspiring sponsorships.

Sponsors help change the course of a young child’s future forever. “My small monthly payment is like sending hope overseas to these kids,” he says. “It’s such a small donation to make such a big difference.”

World Vision
www.2200miles.com

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 17th, 2009 at 10:16 am and is filed under Volunteers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.