With a successful career as an actor, director, and producer, Melissa Joan Hart continues to juggle the craziness of raising three boys and focus on what’s important. The born-again Christian lives out her faith in tangible ways.
Hart recently took her second trip to Zambia and shared with the Christian Post her heart and experience with prayer with the local people with, saying, “They couldn’t understand why we pray when we have so much. They’re like, ‘It’s weird to see a family pray that already has everything, like what would you pray for, or how would you pray?’”
“As an ambassador for World Vision, as someone who has been there twice now, it is life-changing,” Hart explained. “It’s so inspiring to hear what you and your family have been able to do.”
‘I Wanted the Family To Go to Africa’—Melissa Joan Hart Continues Fieldwork for World Vision
To celebrate their 20th wedding anniversary, Hart and her husband took their family to Africa. They spent quality time being regular tourists—including seeing Victoria Falls and going on a safari—and engaged in fieldwork for World Vision in Zambia.
Hart reflected on her longstanding relationship with World Vision. “I have always looked for an organization that will work around the world and in the U.S. in a deep and meaningful way—the kind that doesn’t gloss over a problem,” Hart said. “An organization that has levels and layers and someone’s thought deeply about how these programs work and how to really empower people to get out of poverty.”
With three growing boys, Hart quickly realized that there were a number of things she still wanted to do as a family before the kids grew up. “This trip was like a long time planning in different ways. My oldest is about to start his senior year, and I always wanted to take them to Africa before the oldest graduated.”
The family had partnered with World Vision for years and personally sponsored three girls in Zambia. “We have three boys, so we wanted to have three girls there,” Hart explained.
“The work that World Vision does is so sustainable. Complex,” Hart reflected. “You could see the hope. You could see the pride.”
This wasn’t Hart’s first trip to Zambia. Back in 2019, “Hart introduced her oldest son, Mason, to her work with World Vision in Africa (Zambia)—and [Entertainment Tonight] was invited along on the good works mission.”
“Hart is making sure that her passion for giving back is passed down to her three sons,” World Vision wrote at the time. “The actress has maintained a successful Hollywood career for decades, but in between projects, she’s all about doing what she can for others.”
“We were like, we only brought our oldest with us. We have to go back and take the younger ones and show them,” Hart said, adding that she wanted her entire family to “meet the family that we’ve been praying for all this time. We want to show them all the work that they do and the work World Vision does.”
The Harts sponsor three girls from the same family and their mom, Edna. “The difference between Edna—last time showing us around, showing us the farm and their house—and she was just like downtrodden,” said Hart. “They didn’t have clean water nearby. They weren’t going to school. And, World Vision started working with them.”
Years later, Hart and her family visited the family in Zambia again and saw hope. “Edna just smiled so big,” Hart exclaimed. She “hugged us. It was so emotional. So powerful. They now have a well nearby because we helped sponsor a well.”
Together, World Vision and sponsors like the Harts have transformed communities around the world. They dig wells to provide clean water, make it possible for children to attend school, and provide everyday needs for families. Sponsors can gift goats to families in need. Along with the goats, families receive supplies and education on how to care for the goats, milk them, and breed them in order to have a sustainable source of income.
“They build dip tanks,” Hart said. “They put goats in, and they had to swim across, and it basically washes off the ticks and bugs. They do it once a week, and it keeps their goats healthy.”
Born Again Christian Melissa Joan Hart Makes a Mark in Hollywood
Hart was raised in a Catholic family. She and Mark Wilkerson, her husband, who was a Baptist, decided to attend a Presbyterian church after they wed.
Hart told the Christian Post about a time that transformed her own prayer life. Hart was a young mom at the time, and another mother in her mom’s group was in a coma due to an aneurysm. Hart and other moms in the group prayed around the clock.
“I feel like that’s the moment that really opened up my prayer life. I had a big moment there where my prayer life changed and where I started to understand more about how to pray and then my husband also helped me,” Hart said. “My husband taught me to pray for mercy.”
Hart rose to stardom as the lead in “Sabrina the Teenage Witch.” Since then, she has acted in dozens of television shows and films, including the Christmas movies, “Mistletoe in Montana” and “Christmas in Tune.” The actor also enjoys work behind the camera as a director (“iCarly,” “Young Sheldon”) and producing (including “Broadcasting Christmas,” “The Watcher in the Woods”).
