Bestselling author Max Lucado has done many things to put God's Word into action over the years and has inspired many others to do the same. This year, in commemoration of Max's 25th year of inspirational writing, he has made it his personal goal to help World Vision raise up sponsors for 25,000 children, in conjunction with this fall's Make a Difference Tour.

One hundred percent of Max's royalties from Outlive Your Life products will benefit children and families through World Vision and other ministries of faith-based compassion.

ConversantLife is excited to partner with Thomas Nelson, Inc. and World Vision in a unique and biblical campaign called "God's Word in Action." Through this comprehensive campaign, Thomas Nelson's Bible Group is donating at least $100,000 through March 2012 to World Vision to help eradicate poverty and preventable deaths among children.

At ConversantLife, we're all about content that encourages conversations about faith and culture. So when we heard about a leading Bible publisher teaming with the world's largest relief organization, we immediately wanted to be involved. The way we see it, the Bible contains life's most important content, and helping "the least of these" is at the heart of the gospel message.

Boys usually get only two cracks at attending their high school prom, and girls not much more. I, on the other hand, am one of the few people who have finally lost count. I started my prom run as a nervous Texas teenager in a hoop skirt before I was promoted to student teacher at the water table in a tiny high school in Missouri. Since then I’ve been the chaperone with the flashlight, the door checker, the dress code enforcer, the clean-up crew, the impromptu romance counselor, the freak dancing monitor, the restroom attendant, and ticket-taker.

My memories of each one are shaped by the themed photo backdrop created in the fantasy-driven imaginations of an eleventh grade committee:  the NYC skyline, a jungle tiki room, an English garden, the red carpet at the Oscars, a Paris boulevard, and even a ghastly pumpkin carriage made of light blue crepe paper, presumably waiting for a bootleg Cinderella.

1/15 UPDATE: Kristen and her daughter are back on US soil. They were evacuated in the middle of the night to a military base in New Jersey. They will be home by this evening. 

My sister-in-law, Kristen Howerton, was in Haiti with her infant daughter and soon to be adopted son when a 7.0 earthquake struck. You know her as the author of the Mama Manifesto blog here on Conversant Life. Kristen has not updated her Conversant column but, she has been able to post to her personal blog. You can click here to read her story so far.

She has been in contact with her husband, Mark, and all three are safe. The Livesays, the American missionaries she's with are also OK. The children at the orphanage made it out of the building safely. You can read updates from the Livesays and Kristen at http://www.livesayhaiti.blogspot.com/. They are updating as often as they possibly can in the midst of power outages and general chaos.