Pennies From Heaven to support children with cancer
CABOT — Faith Baptist Church’s Keep the Faith Foundation in Cabot aims to collect 1 million pennies within 100 days through its annual Pennies From Heaven campaign.
The campaign began March 5 and will end June 12, but the Keep the Faith Foundation accepts donations throughout the year.
Keep the Faith Foundation, an extension of the church’s Faith Support Ministry, serves the families of children with cancer from birth to 17 years of age.
Melissa Garvin, co-director of the Keep the Faith Foundation, has been a board member for nine years.
Garvin said the organization’s mission is to share the love and compassion of Jesus Christ with families who have children with cancer, and to provide financial assistance when it’s needed.
Garvin said KTF was founded in memory of Dakota Hawkins, Jazlyn Ferguson and Caleb Sims.
“Dakota’s motto was ‘keep the faith,’ and he
really inspired a lot of people around the world,” Garvin said.
Sharon Hawkins, Dakota’s mother, said Dakota had an amazing ability to fight and persevere.
He was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia at age 11.
“The day he was diagnosed, he drew a picture in Arkansas Children’s Hospital, and on the picture he wrote in large letters, ‘I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength,’” Hawkins said. “That was his fight verse.”
Hawkins said Dakota always wanted visitors and welcomed them to sit on the edge of his bed.
“He loved people and wanted to serve people. He did not want people to serve him while he was sick,” she said. “He was very selfless.”
Hawkins said Dakota would receive gifts in the hospital, keep a few for himself and load the rest up in a red wagon to hand out to other cancer patients at Arkansas Children’s Hospital.
“He wanted the other children fighting cancer to have them. He’d load [the gifts] up in the wagon and have his IV pole attached to it, and he and I would go up and down the hallway, and he’d give his things away to brighten their day,” Hawkins said.
Hawkins said children fighting cancer happen to be some of the happiest children in the world.
“They have an uncanny ability to bring people together,” Hawkins said. “Dakota was very much a warrior. I learned from him.”
“He went through two bone-marrow transplants, and his younger brother Riley saved [Dakota’s] life twice by giving him his cells. [Riley] was the perfect HLA (human leukocyte antigen) match for his brother.”
“We asked for healing but received an eternal healing rather than an earthly healing,” Hawkins said.
You redefine normal when your child is fighting a tough disease, she said, and you learn to live day to day and moment to moment.
Hawkins said Dakota was thankful for each day of living.
“It has been 11 years since we lost Dakota, and I look at it differently than some people might. I don’t look at it as 11 years without him; I look at it as being 11 years closer to him,” she said.
“I think I birthed an angel,” Hawkins said. “Dakota knew how to live. My husband and I will never be the same.”
“KTF was created to honor those three courageous children who all fought very hard, but all lost their battles to childhood cancer,” Hawkins said. “We could not function as a ministry without people who have a servant’s heart.”
Garvin said it all began with Faith Support Ministry, which was started by Elaine Moran in 2005.
Moran had breast cancer and really enjoyed the uplifting cards she received while going through treatment, Garvin said.
Garvin said Moran felt she was being led to reach out to other patients, so she initiated the Faith Support Ministry, which provides support to adults who have been diagnosed with cancer.
Faith Support Ministry provides encouragement cards, a financial-assistance program, monogrammed blankets, patient advocacy and prayer groups to adults with a cancer diagnosis.
Garvin said the church eventually realized they needed to start a program for children with cancer and their families, as they had a different set of needs than members of Faith Support Ministry.
The Keep the Faith Foundation will turn 10 years old this year, Garvin said, and the church has been participating in Pennies From Heaven for nine years.
“Funds raised through Pennies From Heaven provide financial assistance to the families of children with cancer,” she said.
Garvin said this includes utility-bill payments, car payments, house payments, hotel stays and things of that nature.
Jeremy Holloway, executive director of Keep the Faith Foundation, said the foundation has impacted 330 families in Arkansas.
“Before coming on board as the executive director, I had no idea what an impact KTF had and continues to have on families who have a child battling cancer,” Holloway said.
“When a child is diagnosed with cancer, the inpatient time a child spends at Arkansas Children’s Hospital can be weeks, and sometimes months, at a time. So not only is the family dealing with the physical and emotional aspects of their child having cancer, but also the financial burden that can occur when one parent must take time off work to care for their child while [he or she is] receiving treatments,” Holloway said.
“Herein lies the purpose of KTF, to not only minister to the families’ spiritual needs, but to also show the love of Christ by relieving some of the financial burdens the family experiences,” Holloway said.
Holloway said he became executive director in 2014 and focuses a lot of his attention on directing the financial and administrative sides of Keeping the Faith.
The organization uses $35,000 a year to assist families across the state, he said.
Garvin said KTF has raised about $8,000 in this year’s Pennies From Heaven campaign so far, and the foundation has provided financial assistance exceeding $250,000 over the years.
Schools are often the largest contributors, she said.
“We recently had a little girl in kindergarten donate $100 to the campaign,” Garvin said, smiling.
“She was saving up to buy a horse, but she decided she wanted to give some of her money to help children who are battling cancer,” Garvin said.
“Keep the Faith provides children with a blanket, a Bible, a coloring book, a tooth brush, ChapStick and a bracelet inside of a backpack,” Garvin said.
“We send the backpacks to patients at Arkansas Children’s Hospital to introduce ourselves and let them know we’re here for them,” she said.
Garvin said she was asked to be a part of the KTF Foundation Board, not knowing just how much the foundation would end up meaning to her.
“For most people, you might ask what Keep the Faith Foundation for kids with cancer is or does, and they would tell you they have never heard of it. But to a family that KTF has helped to keep their electricity on, or paid to have new tires put on their car so they could take their child back and forth for treatment, or maybe paid their mortgage for a few months, those families know about KTF and the reason it exists,” Holloway said.
“The impact on the community might not be great, but the impact on the individual families going through cancer with their children has been significant,” he said.
For more information, to volunteer or to make a donation, visit ktffoundation.org or contact Keep the Faith at (501) 843-5291.