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By any measure, Dr. Tom Greidanus is a successful man.
Together with his wife Janet, he has managed to raise three doctors, a dentist and a nurse. Child number six, they say, is “leaning” towards medicine.
 As an athlete, he’s relentless; now in his sixties, Tom has competed in three or four marathons each year for the past eleven years.
Around the office, Tom is known for his philanthropy. For the past decade he has organized medical trips to South America. This year he will lead 51 team members to perform two weeks’ worth of surgeries in Ecuador.
Yet it isn’t his parenting skills, a sports achievement or a heart for the poor that landed him in Alberta’s largest newspaper, the Edmonton Journal. It’s how he stitched all three passions together.
The story begins after a visit to Rundu, Namibia where Dr. Greidanus was visiting an outreach for AIDS orphans initiated by his son, AIM missionary Dr. Rob Greidanus.
In partnership with a local church, the Kaisosi project aims to provide food, clothing and Christian teaching to some of Africa’s most vulnerable. The program also provides medical care and helps enrol these children in school.
"They were singing ‘Our God is so big, so strong and so mighty' ...But it struck me and my wife too—is God asleep to all this? Does he not see this?"“It was on my mind daily after we came back,” says Tom. “These kids are so poor, they have nothing—no parents, no adult supervision...
“They were singing ‘Our God is so big, so strong and so mighty'...But it struck me and my wife too—is God asleep to all this? Does he not see this?”
And so Tom decided to run his November race—the New York City Marathon—on behalf of his Namibian friends.
“I mailed out 600 letters to colleagues, neighbours, and people at church [asking for sponsorship]” says Tom. “I figured I would sow the seed and see what the harvest would bring in.”
In the weeks leading up to the race, Tom kept close tabs on his sponsorship levels. He was shocked at the overflow of generosity, so much so that he was reminded of an old truth.
"God works through people," he says. "That's how it works!"
Read Tom's story in the Edmonton Journal:
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Kaisosi project Tom's "harvest," according AIM Canada’s Finance Director, was plentiful. “I was hoping for $10- 20 thousand,” says Tom.
He ended up raising $90,000.
“It is actually quite overwhelming,” writes Dr. Rob Greidanus from Namibia. “We have support over and above what we will use at Kaisosi.”
In dialogue with Greidanus Jr. and Sr., AIM has decided to distribute the overflow to other orphan-related projects in Namibia. Ultimately, Tom’s decision to act will have a lasting impact on children he never even conceived of helping.
Now that is how God works. |
