By Heather Mustain
On this World Communion Sunday, we celebrate the global Church and particularly the ways Wilshire’s courageous and perseverant partners, alongside God’s Spirit, are healing the world.
It can be hard to find goodness, beauty, mercy, justice or compassion in today’s headlines, but the hope is this small report will serve as a reminder that it all can be found and that it all exists. We just have to look for the helpers.
• Bukabwa, Tanzania: This year 80 new students with Twelve21 Global will be enrolled in kindergarten, putting the total school enrollment for 2026 at 553 students. These are children from families facing extreme poverty, abandonment, trauma and spiritual darkness. Many come from homes where food is scarce, education is out of reach and hope feels like a distant dream.
• Skopje, Macedonia: Jeff and Alicia Lee, Cooperative Baptist Fellowship field personnel, continue to build a beloved community as their adult friends with developmental delays at Poraka help harvest their first season in the vineyards and distribute food boxes to those in need. All profits from the vineyard will be used to help with economic and agricultural development work.
• Gaza City, Gaza: Bright Stars of Bethlehem continues to enroll students at the only arts and culture university in Palestine. As the region has faced genocide and indescribable devastation, Dar-al-Kalima students hosted the first Cinema of the Camp initiative, where 120 boys and girls from Gaza City sat together under the open sky and viewed films that reminded them that their voices matter, their dreams are valid and joy is still possible, even in the harshest of circumstances.
• Dallas: On any given Sunday at Gaston Christian Center, church services are held in seven different languages. GCC is also home to 21 nonprofit organizations that provide important programs and services to the Dallas community.
GCC tenant Gateway of Grace continues to minister to refugees by providing critical services that are no longer provided by other local refugee resettlement agencies. Through Gateway of Grace, refugee women are empowered through education, men are equipped with the language to find meaningful work and children laugh safely once again.
Light of Hope Immigration Law Center, also housed at the Gaston Center, provides reliable legal assistance, free citizenship classes and a safe space for immigrant families to dream big.
Hope is being found, beloved community is being made and lives are being changed. Let us not forget the joy and love that flows from the people of God all around the world. And let us not forget to join them and pray with them.