Bryan posted this picture on Facebook along with a comment about the program that we ran at Crossroads Teen Center two weeks ago.

 

 

This led to the following Facebook post by Janet, the Empangeni Smart Choices Team Leader.

 

 

It was a pleasure to have you all. I have a testimony from one of the girls who attended the training, she came to thank me and told me that it saved her from giving her virginity to a boyfriend that had been pressuring her. That week we were there she agreed to give in, but after watching in your face she went and broke up with him and now she is only focusing on studying at the moment.  She will be joining university next year.

This is a great testimony to the purpose of the Beacon of Hope Smart Choices mission.  When we turned the Smart Choices activity in to a mission by going back to South Africa for the second time in 2006,we went back with the attitude that we “we don’t know what we be able to accomplish but we knew that we could not sit back and do nothing.”  Also we had that attitude that if we can impact the life of one young person then it will be all worthwhile.  Know we know for sure that at least one young girls life has been impacted positively in a major way.

 

I’m not implying that this young lady is the only one that has been impacted in this way because we have thousands of testimonials written on the Smart Choices response card from young people who have expressed how the program has impacted them and has changed their attitude and outlook on life.  The whole program is about character development and behavior change to effect the very changes that this young lady chosen to do.

 

In the class that we just finished teaching in Kitwe Zambia, 100% of the kids committed to a path of abstinence until marriage.