Champion Building Thanksgiving Dinners

Last month, we hosted two Thanksgiving Celebration Dinners for our Qinghai Programme’s donors and supporters. The theme was “Champion Building” and we highlighted the young Champions from Qinghai that Christian Action has helped bring up over the years.

One of our main stories was about a boy named Xan, who came to Xining Children’s Home at three months old because he was abandoned for being born without a right foot. We arranged a foster family to care for him and prepared him for adoption by a Dutch family in 2009 when he was 2 years old.

Xan is 14 years old now. He is growing up in the Netherlands and doesn’t see his missing foot as a disability but as normal. In fact, his father has the same condition as Xan and is a Paralympic gold medalist in swimming! Having one less foot has not held back either of them in life. Xan’s parents not only teach him that he can do anything, but also model such determined attitudes for him to follow.

Today, Xan loves to play hockey, football and tennis with his new sport prosthesis. He is limitless and has unbridled determination to pursue his dream of becoming a professional hockey player. Hockey is not a Paralympic sport, and Xan has been playing on non-disabled hockey teams since he was six years old. Recently, his hockey league selected Xan for the first tier team of his age group.

China is still a big part of Xan’s life and he hopes to return one day as a coach for the National Hockey Team. This young Champion is going places, and we will not miss one step of his journey! I praise God for letting us be a part of such amazing children’s lives like Xan’s.