Jor-El Godsey, Heartbeat International Vice President of Ministry Services
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Thank you, C. L. Sholes!
C. L. Sholes’ legacy is something affecting me (and you) nearly every day. How?
Sholes was the Milwaukee inventor of the QWERTY-style typewriter keys back in 1878. I doubt that he could foresee then the keyboards that we use today. Certainly, one hundred plus years ago, he couldn’t begin to imagine that keyboards would facilitate instantaneous communication across the globe. Nor could he predict the teeny, tiny keyboards on the mobile phones of today. Yet, his far-reaching creation endures, useful to and needed by people all over the world.
In 1971, the founders of Heartbeat International essentially created something useful, enduring, and needed, just as Mr. Sholes did in 1878. The result of their effort was not a physical product (though Heartbeat has those), but instead a federation of life-affirming service providers. Today, that federation spans the globe, counting more than 1,100 affiliate locations in nearly 50 countries.
Today, Heartbeat International affiliates belong to a network that serves an estimated one million people each year. One million people! That’s more than the populations of some 70 countries around the world. For illustration, that’s more than the entire population of the country of Cyprus, a Mediterranean island.
Each affiliate playing a part in his or her community makes us all greater than the sum of our parts.
What a legacy the founders of Heartbeat International began when they saw the need for a place that unites life-affirming efforts into a worldwide federation! So take heart, the legacy of the work you do in your center will be multiplied and lengthened through the lives and lifetimes that you are touching.
