Give Safe Water to Girls like Sumaiya

Help Serve 100 Children

Project Funded!

Your monthly gift will provide clean water to children just like Sumaiya in Lifewater programs.

Your gift provides a clean water source, health training, and hope to families like Sumaiya living in East Africa and Cambodia.

  • Story
  • Why Give Monthly?
  • FAQ's

Your monthly gift will provide clean water, improved health, and hope to children and their families in Lifewater programs. 

Sumaiya is just three years old. She lives in Dodola, a rural region in Ethiopia, with her parents and her brothers and sisters.

Sumaiya is full of life. She’s always laughing and loves chasing her brothers. But each day, her siblings walk down the mountain to reach a spring, and they fill it with water that isn’t safe to drink. It makes her and her siblings dangerously sick.

At three years old, unsafe water can be fatal for Sumaiya; her immune system is still developing and can’t fight off the infections like adults. Globally, a child dies from a preventable waterborne illness every 90 seconds.

Still, the family has no choice but to drink the water.

This is entirely preventable. But, we can’t do it without you. We need your help to reach children just like Sumaiya every month with clean water.

Help us meet our goal of serving 100 children like Sumaiya in East Africa and Southeast Asia every month! 

Give any amount today, and we’ll double your gift to reach twice as many children in the first month. Together, we can make sure no child ever dies from a preventable waterborne illness.

 

Join a community of monthly donors bringing clean water to those in need.

Overflow partners are passionate about making a difference in the world. They’re on a mission to give safe water, improved health, and the hope of Jesus to every person in need.

 

Why Become a Monthly Donor?

  1. Get Special Updates. As a monthly donor, you’ll get one email every quarter just for you from our field teams. That way, you know your gift is making a difference.
  2. Help us Plan Ahead. Your monthly giving helps us plan ahead so we can construct lasting safe water sources to reach every child.
  3. Maximize Your Impact. Your gift is an easy one-time set up, helping reduce overhead costs. More of your gift goes directly to families.

 

With happy hearts we give monthly to Lifewater and it’s one of the best decisions we have made.” – Kevin and Ashley P., Monthly Donors

“Everyone deserves a healthy home, with clean water, good sanitation, and hygiene. My monthly donation can make a difference in the lives of many.” — Sally

“Lifewater is our hands and feet to a community we will never be able to serve. We consider our gifts not in the least as a sacrifice but as a rich blessing to the community and especially to us.” — Bill and Laura

 

Learn more at www.lifewater.org/overflow.

Am I sponsoring a specific village?

No, your monthly gift will help provide safe drinking water and improved sanitation and hygiene to children and their families in Lifewater’s global programs.

Will I receive updates?

Yes! You can expect quarterly updates on how your gift is changing lives.

Can I visit programs?

Lifewater has local staff that live and serve among the communities and schools where Lifewater works. Our staff know the language and the culture and are best equipped to serve communities. Because we seek to ensure sustainable water projects and community buy in, we do not allow donors to visit the regions they help sponsor. However, we do commit to sending real-time updates, photos, and stories from the projects themselves.

Where does Lifewater work?

With more than 40 years’ experience, Lifewater is the longest-running Christian clean water charity in North America. Over those 40 years, Lifewater has worked in more than 45 different countries. Currently, our work is focused in Sub-Saharan Africa (Ethiopia, Uganda, and Tanzania) and Southeast Asia (Cambodia).

Why these countries and regions?

Lifewater identifies countries and regions that are unreached and underserved with basic water access and sanitation, which means we focus on areas where other organizations are not serving.

Although great strides have been made in the past 20 years to solve the global water crisis, remote and rural populations still remain unreached with adequate water and sanitation. These distant regions are difficult and often costly for governments and NGOs to serve well. Many of these communities feel as though they have been forgotten.

Can I request a water project in a specific country?

Currently, Lifewater has programs in Ethiopia, Uganda, Tanzania, and Cambodia. You can go to lifewater.org/projects to select a specific water project to help. Because our programs are regionalized and made in partnership with the local governments, we are not able to take requests for specific water projects outside of our existing programs.

What percent of funds go towards programs?

Lifewater budgets 80% of expenditures for programs. The remaining 20% is split between administrative/management and fundraising expenses. This ratio is best in class for nonprofits and is why Lifewater has received the highest rating from Charity Navigator.

Administrative/management expenses are used to ensure that we are effective in managing the funds entrusted to us and include the following types of expenses: accounting personnel, leadership time, professional development of staff, external auditors, legal counsel, government registration expenses in every U.S. state, credit card fees for processing donations, bank fees, database maintenance, and office expenses.

Fundraising expenses generate the income needed to do the work that we set out to do. These include the cost of direct mail appeals and communication, marketing projects, donor relations personnel, and email communication systems. Last year, every dollar invested into Lifewater fundraising efforts resulted in $10 in donations for the organization.

Is Lifewater approved/vetted by 3rd party organizations?

Over our 40 year history, Lifewater has received the highest accreditations from the most respected rating organization in the industry. Lifewater is recognized as one of the top-rated charities in the United States by independent reporting organizations, including:

Charity Navigator (four stars – the highest ranking)
Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability (ECFA)
Guidestar (Platinum)
Great Nonprofits (five star)
Excellence in Giving
Learn more at https://lifewater.org/top-rated-charity.

How does Lifewater integrate faith into its work?

Lifewater’s work is founded on the belief that every person is made in the image of God. It is with this conviction that we seek out the globe’s most unreached, marginalized people groups in need of safe water.

Both nationally and internationally, 100 percent of our staff are Christians. These Christian staff help facilitate Lifewater’s Healthy Church strategy in communities. And, where there are no churches, we work with church planting partners to start new churches.

To create Healthy Churches, Lifewater first trains church leaders in foundational theology. These leaders are equipped with the basic story of the Christian faith and the biblical mandate to love others. Leaders learn that stopping the spread of disease and caring for the vulnerable aligns with our responsibility as Christians to love our neighbor.

Second, Lifewater ensures churches have safe bathrooms on their premises, handwashing stations, clean water nearby, and the education to promote health within their congregations. It’s imperative that churches are early adopters of healthy hygiene practices.

Third, Lifewater encourages churches to help vulnerable households become Healthy Homes. Church leaders undergo a training to become WASH (water access, sanitation, and hygiene) advocates in their communities. These advocates are encouraged to identify widows, child-headed households, the elderly, and the disabled to help them meet the health standards of Lifewater’s programs.

What is Lifewater’s process? What does the organization do, and how does it do it?

Lifewater’s Vision of a Healthy Village strategy is a relationship-first method. This model transforms entire regions house by house, village by village, and school by school. It is among the most intensive household-level work happening in the entire developing world and is closely tracked for progress, sustainability, and overall impact.

We construct custom-engineered safe water sources and teach life-saving health and sanitation practices in local villages and schools in need.

Story

Your monthly gift will provide clean water, improved health, and hope to children and their families in Lifewater programs. 

Sumaiya is just three years old. She lives in Dodola, a rural region in Ethiopia, with her parents and her brothers and sisters.

Sumaiya is full of life. She’s always laughing and loves chasing her brothers. But each day, her siblings walk down the mountain to reach a spring, and they fill it with water that isn’t safe to drink. It makes her and her siblings dangerously sick.

At three years old, unsafe water can be fatal for Sumaiya; her immune system is still developing and can’t fight off the infections like adults. Globally, a child dies from a preventable waterborne illness every 90 seconds.

Still, the family has no choice but to drink the water.

This is entirely preventable. But, we can’t do it without you. We need your help to reach children just like Sumaiya every month with clean water.

Help us meet our goal of serving 100 children like Sumaiya in East Africa and Southeast Asia every month! 

Give any amount today, and we’ll double your gift to reach twice as many children in the first month. Together, we can make sure no child ever dies from a preventable waterborne illness.

Why Give Monthly?

 

Join a community of monthly donors bringing clean water to those in need.

Overflow partners are passionate about making a difference in the world. They’re on a mission to give safe water, improved health, and the hope of Jesus to every person in need.

 

Why Become a Monthly Donor?

  1. Get Special Updates. As a monthly donor, you’ll get one email every quarter just for you from our field teams. That way, you know your gift is making a difference.
  2. Help us Plan Ahead. Your monthly giving helps us plan ahead so we can construct lasting safe water sources to reach every child.
  3. Maximize Your Impact. Your gift is an easy one-time set up, helping reduce overhead costs. More of your gift goes directly to families.

 

With happy hearts we give monthly to Lifewater and it’s one of the best decisions we have made.” – Kevin and Ashley P., Monthly Donors

“Everyone deserves a healthy home, with clean water, good sanitation, and hygiene. My monthly donation can make a difference in the lives of many.” — Sally

“Lifewater is our hands and feet to a community we will never be able to serve. We consider our gifts not in the least as a sacrifice but as a rich blessing to the community and especially to us.” — Bill and Laura

 

Learn more at www.lifewater.org/overflow.

FAQ's

Am I sponsoring a specific village?

No, your monthly gift will help provide safe drinking water and improved sanitation and hygiene to children and their families in Lifewater’s global programs.

Will I receive updates?

Yes! You can expect quarterly updates on how your gift is changing lives.

Can I visit programs?

Lifewater has local staff that live and serve among the communities and schools where Lifewater works. Our staff know the language and the culture and are best equipped to serve communities. Because we seek to ensure sustainable water projects and community buy in, we do not allow donors to visit the regions they help sponsor. However, we do commit to sending real-time updates, photos, and stories from the projects themselves.

Where does Lifewater work?

With more than 40 years’ experience, Lifewater is the longest-running Christian clean water charity in North America. Over those 40 years, Lifewater has worked in more than 45 different countries. Currently, our work is focused in Sub-Saharan Africa (Ethiopia, Uganda, and Tanzania) and Southeast Asia (Cambodia).

Why these countries and regions?

Lifewater identifies countries and regions that are unreached and underserved with basic water access and sanitation, which means we focus on areas where other organizations are not serving.

Although great strides have been made in the past 20 years to solve the global water crisis, remote and rural populations still remain unreached with adequate water and sanitation. These distant regions are difficult and often costly for governments and NGOs to serve well. Many of these communities feel as though they have been forgotten.

Can I request a water project in a specific country?

Currently, Lifewater has programs in Ethiopia, Uganda, Tanzania, and Cambodia. You can go to lifewater.org/projects to select a specific water project to help. Because our programs are regionalized and made in partnership with the local governments, we are not able to take requests for specific water projects outside of our existing programs.

What percent of funds go towards programs?

Lifewater budgets 80% of expenditures for programs. The remaining 20% is split between administrative/management and fundraising expenses. This ratio is best in class for nonprofits and is why Lifewater has received the highest rating from Charity Navigator.

Administrative/management expenses are used to ensure that we are effective in managing the funds entrusted to us and include the following types of expenses: accounting personnel, leadership time, professional development of staff, external auditors, legal counsel, government registration expenses in every U.S. state, credit card fees for processing donations, bank fees, database maintenance, and office expenses.

Fundraising expenses generate the income needed to do the work that we set out to do. These include the cost of direct mail appeals and communication, marketing projects, donor relations personnel, and email communication systems. Last year, every dollar invested into Lifewater fundraising efforts resulted in $10 in donations for the organization.

Is Lifewater approved/vetted by 3rd party organizations?

Over our 40 year history, Lifewater has received the highest accreditations from the most respected rating organization in the industry. Lifewater is recognized as one of the top-rated charities in the United States by independent reporting organizations, including:

Charity Navigator (four stars – the highest ranking)
Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability (ECFA)
Guidestar (Platinum)
Great Nonprofits (five star)
Excellence in Giving
Learn more at https://lifewater.org/top-rated-charity.

How does Lifewater integrate faith into its work?

Lifewater’s work is founded on the belief that every person is made in the image of God. It is with this conviction that we seek out the globe’s most unreached, marginalized people groups in need of safe water.

Both nationally and internationally, 100 percent of our staff are Christians. These Christian staff help facilitate Lifewater’s Healthy Church strategy in communities. And, where there are no churches, we work with church planting partners to start new churches.

To create Healthy Churches, Lifewater first trains church leaders in foundational theology. These leaders are equipped with the basic story of the Christian faith and the biblical mandate to love others. Leaders learn that stopping the spread of disease and caring for the vulnerable aligns with our responsibility as Christians to love our neighbor.

Second, Lifewater ensures churches have safe bathrooms on their premises, handwashing stations, clean water nearby, and the education to promote health within their congregations. It’s imperative that churches are early adopters of healthy hygiene practices.

Third, Lifewater encourages churches to help vulnerable households become Healthy Homes. Church leaders undergo a training to become WASH (water access, sanitation, and hygiene) advocates in their communities. These advocates are encouraged to identify widows, child-headed households, the elderly, and the disabled to help them meet the health standards of Lifewater’s programs.

What is Lifewater’s process? What does the organization do, and how does it do it?

Lifewater’s Vision of a Healthy Village strategy is a relationship-first method. This model transforms entire regions house by house, village by village, and school by school. It is among the most intensive household-level work happening in the entire developing world and is closely tracked for progress, sustainability, and overall impact.

We construct custom-engineered safe water sources and teach life-saving health and sanitation practices in local villages and schools in need.

Your gift reflects your trust in Lifewater International. We commit to honor your generosity by using your gift to help further the mission and vision of Lifewater International. Your donation is used by Lifewater International according to the project objectives to provide safe drinking water and improved sanitation and hygiene. Lifewater International is a charitable organization as described in 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code, registered in the United States. All donations are tax deductible to the full extent allowed by law.

Donations are non-refundable. Lifewater International will honor a donor’s request for any pre-approved program or project whenever possible. In rare occasions where this is not possible, gifts will be used where needed, in accordance with the organization’s charitable purpose. In accordance with this policy, donor’s explicitly release Lifewater International from further restriction on such funds.