A promise that turned into a movement
Let’s Make THE Difference funds underserved refugee-led programs across eleven countries in Africa, run by the people who live in the communities they serve. This is the story of how it started, the Difference Makers doing the work, and where every dollar goes.
Love, loss, hope, and the heart of a Difference Maker
Wendy Huffman had built a successful life by every measure that’s supposed to count. Career. Family. The kind of résumé people are proud of.
And underneath it, a hunger for something more.
Not more success. More meaning.
Around fifty, she took the Landmark Forum and met Bill Spalthoff. Bill had survived a devastating stroke and lived with the effects of it every day. He was also one of the most joyful, unstoppable people she’d ever met. He’d traveled to 27 countries and was going to reach 100.
Together they spent two years traveling through South America, living simply and seeking out ordinary people quietly helping their neighbors.
It lit something up in both of them.
The same thought kept finding Wendy on those trips: if more people could see this, they’d want to be part of it.
She also noticed something about people like her. People who had built successful lives and careers. So many of them were carrying the same question she was: How do I make it mean something?
Bill and Wendy decided to build a spotlight for the good being done where no one was looking, and a community of people ready to fund it.
In 2019, Bill traveled to Africa and mentored teachers in a rural community in Zambia.
Days later, on his birthday, he suffered a fatal stroke and died there.
He died doing the work he loved. In the place he chose to be.
And Wendy made him a promise that she has kept it every day since.
That promise became Let’s Make THE Difference. A movement now spanning eleven countries, hundreds of leaders, and thousands of lives changed.
And Wendy is the heart of LMTD, and our Chief Difference Maker. She responds when you have a question about your gift. She connects with you when you join The Collective. She travels to the camps to stand in the work herself.
That’s what the heart of a Difference Maker looks like. It turns love and loss into hope, and hope into a life of generosity.
Our Mission
To equip and empower Difference Makers to create lasting impact in the world.
LMTD funds programs that serve refugee and under-resourced communities all over Africa and connects the people who fund the work to the people doing it. Together we create communities of Difference Makers.
Community Leaders
run the programs and are paid a living wage to lead them.