A Different Kind of Orphan

Tomorrow is orphan Sunday. I have a huge heart for the orphan, and I am excited to see how God may one day use that passion to His glory in serving these kids He loves so much. I want to use this post, however, to talk about a different kind of orphan.

I hear the statistics all over...There are 163 million orphans in the world today, depending on where you do your research. I admit it...When I hear this, my mind immediately goes to pictures of kids with swollen bellies in Africa, kids who are obviously in desperate need of medical attention and the love of a family. However, just yesterday God opened my mind to something.

If you do the research, you may discover that roughly 13% of the 163 million have lost both parents. So, what about the other 87%, you say? Well, the other 145 million are missing one parent.

77% of the 163 million are missing a dad.

Wow.
That's 126 million kids, worldwide, without a dad.
Wow.

You know what blew my mind even more? On July 31, 2009, my little brother became part of that statistic.

I don't want you to think that, by including my brother in this number, I am discounting the terrible, horrible circumstances facing millions of children around the world who are suffering ALONE tonight. My brother is loved and cared for, has a warm bed to sleep in tonight and a full belly...while many kids are starving to death and dying from preventable diseases--with NO ONE to hold them or kiss their foreheads. There is a desperate need for people to adopt, foster, and sponsor children around the world...children who are missing one or both parents and enduring conditions not even conducive to life. Tonight, I pray that you will think about these needs and what you can do to alleviate them in some way. {If you want to know how, shoot me an email and I will gladly suggest some ways to get involved.} However, I also want you to think about something else.

Many of you may look at the daunting reality--163 million orphans--and think, "What could I possibly do to change that number???" I often wonder myself. For those of you who easily find yourselves overwhelmed when you think about the possibility of adoption, foster care, or even child sponsorship, I want to remind you that you do not have to look very far to find a fatherless child. They are all around us. They are in our churches, in the same schools as our children, in the homes next to us and just down the street...they are all around us. Maybe you think international adoption is out of reach for you and your family. The fatherless are not.

Not a day goes by that I don't long for my brother to be pursued by a godly man who will willingly invest his time in the life of a now-fatherless kid. And my brother had the best dad known to man...for 13 years of his life. There are millions of other kids around the world who have gone much longer without a dad in the picture.

Maybe you feel like you cannot adopt, foster, or even sponsor a child. Can you find the time to invest, even in some small way, in the life of a fatherless kid? Even by taking the time to call, to ask how the child's day was? Even by attending one of the child's sporting events so he or she has someone to cheer from the stands? Even by writing a card, sharing an encouraging Bible verse? Can you commit to faithfully pray for a fatherless child?

You don't have to spend thousands of dollars on an adoption in order to care for the orphan. You don't have to take hours and hours of training to become a foster parent in order to care for the orphan. You don't have to travel around the world on a mission trip in order to care for the orphan. All of these things are good, and maybe you should ask God if He wants you to do one or all of them. BUT. The fatherless are right before you, and their needs are not necessarily complex.

They want to know that someone cares.
They want someone to ask how school is going.
They want someone to shoot hoops with them after school.
They want someone to offer to help with their homework.
They want someone to give them a big hug, the kind that only a dad can give.
They want someone to take them out to dinner, just because.
Really, they just want to know that someone cares.
Can you care?

Tonight, I want you to think about these words in a different light:
"Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: To look after orphans and widows in their distress {yes, even and especially the ones who go to your church and live next door and attend your schools} and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world" (James 1:27).

Am I pro-life?

Many people might want to throw their computers out the window after they read what I am about to write. Keep reading anyway.

Here it goes....

Being pro-life is not everything.

Are you still there?

Let me elaborate...

There is a difference between being anti-death and being pro-life. One can oppose death and at the same time not actively support life.

Understand where I'm at?

A couple of months ago, I sat across from a young girl, holding her hands and welcoming her tears. Let me tell you her story. "Lashawna" is homeless. She sleeps on friends' couches and takes a meal where she can get it. She has no contact with her family...if you can even call "them" that. Her father abandoned the family when Lashawna was a baby. Lashawna's mother was physically abusive to all 3 of her kids, but especially to Lashawna's younger sister, who has some special needs. Lashawna and her sisters were removed from the home and passed from foster home to foster home until, at 18, Lashawna aged out of the system...which pretty much brings us full circle. Homeless. Familyless. Hopeless. And now pregnant. Lashawna came to me considering abortion.

It is easy to check a box on a ballot. It's easy to spout off an easily defined conviction at a cocktail party. But what do you say to Lashawna?

Homeless. Familyless. Hopeless.

I can tell her not to abort her baby.
I cannot guarantee she will have help raising her baby.
I cannot guarantee she will have a place to live.
I cannot promise that she will have the resources to buy prenatal vitamins and diapers.
I cannot promise that her child "won't end up like me...being passed from home to home" if she chooses adoption.
I can tell her not to abort her baby. But I can't promise her any of those other things, because there are plenty of statistics to sabotage those promises. Unless I choose to be actively pro-life for her and her child, they will end up being just another one of those statistics (and there are plenty not-so-good-ones to choose from).
~~~~~~~~

Recently, I stumbled across THIS ARTICLE. Oh my. It is pretty much my heart, summed up on a page.

Friends, we are so eager to shout to the world that we are "PRO-LIFE!" But are we truly pro-life, or just anti-death?

I am terrified to admit it, but I must say that my answer to Kinsey Thurlow's question would have to be "no." There are hundreds of thousands of kids waiting to be adopted here in the US. Millions more around the world. If we, the people of God, are not even caring for these kids, why would we be arrogant enough to think we could take on thousands more? ***I am by NO MEANS saying that abortion is right, good, or any of the like. (And I'm also not saying that GOD could not handle the thousands of lives that are in jeopardy here)***

I'm just giving you something to think about at your next cocktail party...Abortion creates brokenness. However, the faces behind abortion are complicated. They are hurting. They are also uniquely beautiful. And they need us to be pro-LIFE for THEM, too...not just for their babies.

I've heard a couple of people respond to Thurlow's article by saying that God's people have not been educated about foster care and adoption, that what we need to do is focus on educating people about the need.

As a full-time student (who has been a student pretty much since she was born), I'm here to educate YOU about...well, education.

learning [lur-ning]:
--noun
1. by systematic study in any field of scholarly application.

2. the act or process of acquiring knowledge or skill.
3. the modification of behavior through practice, training, or experience.

Let me just say this. It is the job of my professors to present information. As a nursing student, it is my job to show up to class, study the reading material, review what is presented, and apply, both to my life and to my nursing practice, the information I am receiving. My professors do not bang on my door each morning, make sure I am up and reading my textbooks, lead me to class, or watch me review. These things are not in their job description.

I'm sure there is truth to the statement: "The Church has not been educated about foster care and adoption." I'm also sure that God longs for His people to actively pursue His heart...to actively pray that He would burden them with the things that burden His heart. I'm sure that He longs for His people to study His Word, to intentionally look for ways to carry out His work here on earth.

So here is my plea. Don't let ignorance be the barrier between you and God's heart. Don't wait for someone to spoon-feed you. Take it upon yourself to learn His likes and dislikes, His passions and burdens. PRAY that God would reveal to you ways you can be not only anti-death, but also PRO-LIFE. STUDY God's Word...I'm pretty sure you'll see God's heart for the oppressed shine through. REVIEW how God might have you act. {And don't think, by any means, that I am not including myself in this plea...I am, as you read this, taking a dose of my own medicine.}

Let's give people like Lashawna a reason to believe they do not have to resign themselves to the statistics. Let's come alongside them and give them a home, a family, and a hope in the God who loves them more than they could even fathom. I may not be able to promise many things, but I can guarantee that our God is not only against death, but also very much for LIFE. And He longs to raise LIFE out of death...through the hands and feet and servant hearts of His people.

The Day the World Stopped

My Daddy and I two weeks before He saw Jesus

To be honest, I don't really remember the day I found out my beloved grandmother was dying. Brutal honesty? I had wondered when it would happen for quite some time. Gruesome, I know, but she was pushing 97...and she was oh-so-ready to leave this earth. July 2009. Pancreatic cancer, the devil of all cancers, claimed her earthly body less than a week after she was diagnosed.

Two months later, my dad was diagnosed with the same devil. I do remember that day; I remember like it was yesterday. I remember the terrifying anticipation, knowing that tests were being performed and suspicions had been raised. I remember the tears I wept, against my stubborn will to maintain all composure, as I sat in class waiting for my mom to call with the results. I remember the annoying sympathy, the he'll-be-okay looks and the i-have-no-idea-what-to-do-with-you hugs. All the while, I just wanted to scream, "You have no stinkin' idea the kind of abyss my world is slipping into!"

Then the call came. It was weird. As the words, words I already knew and had rehearsed in my head, came out of my Mom's mouth, an eerie peace sank over me. Resolution gained control over out-of-control emotions. I had to go home, to face the beast head-on. I had to save my Dad, because I knew he was dying.

Ten incredibly short--and yet, brutally long--months later, my Daddy went to be with Jesus. My world stopped. I didn't know how to live, how to have passion and dreams again. I just got out of bed and did meaningless things, watched meaningless movies, said meaningless words. All the while, I wondered why the rest of the world kept going. Didn't everyone else see what had just happened?!? The greatest man I ever knew had left the world, and people were still laughing, still going to the grocery, still saying and doing the wrong things while neglecting the right things.

Sometimes I forget that feeling. Sometimes I forget what it is like to have your world crash while everyone else seems to be living on a bed of roses {even if they are fake}. Today I remembered. Today I remembered, because today I read THIS. A sweet little girl, living on the other side of the country, found out that her respite from a silent evil that had taken root in her head was over. The devil has returned, and although she must cling to hope because sometimes hope is all one has, the odds are not in her favor. Today I remember that feeling...while she and her family are FEELING that feeling. I am sad for them.

While I am sad, I also can't help but wonder if we have it all wrong. You know, we dread death, avoid it like the plague...sometimes avoiding the plague itself with research and drugs and body-disfiguring surgeries. I just wonder, if we saw eternity through God's eyes, would we be working so hard? Probably not, but right now we don't have God's eyes. So tonight I am pleading for God to give this little girl His eyes, or to heal her physical body so that her Mommy and Daddy can blossom under her love a little bit longer...or to do both. All the while, I long to remember that there is always someone around me whose heart has been smashed...could I be the one to take him or her to the Comforter, the Heart-Healer?

Powerful video

One of the most powerful videos I've seen in a while...

God, give me your heart for your children...so much so that I am moved to act on your behalf.

God's Conviction in a Little Boy

There is nothing like sickness to make me feel sorry for myself. I have had what started as a cold for almost 3 weeks now, and to be honest, I am just tired of it. I'm tired of tissues and snot and a hacking cough and just plain feeling crummy. I'm tired of being tired. And I've complained about it--in my head, but I've complained nonetheless.

This morning I was sitting in Panera, reading my Bible and sipping on some coffee, when I noticed a little boy across the room start to vomit. His mom gently held his head into a potato chip bag and softly soothed, loud enough for me to hear, "It's okay buddy, it's okay." I looked around and saw that no one was jumping up to help this woman and her sick little guy, so I moved to get some napkins and hand them to her as she started to clean up the mess. As she wiped up the vomit, I went back to what I was doing. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed that the little boy went back to his lunch and his mom sat down next to him like nothing had happened. In my head, I started to judge her: "THIS is why we have a stomach flu epidemic! Moms like HER don't have enough polite regard for the public--aka, ME--to take this sick boy home instead of sitting with him in a public place to expose everyone to his germs!"

I have noticed that God uses the most simple, mundane moments to convict us of our most "simple, mundane" sins. As I moved to leave, I felt a hand on my shoulder and, as I turned around, I was greeted by the face of the woman I had been quietly judging. "Thanks again for the napkins," she said. Then she spoke the three words God used to convict my heart of too-quick judgments and a complaining and ungrateful attitude: "He has cancer."

I was shocked. After all, he didn't look like he had cancer. As I got in my car and drove away, conviction overwhelmed my heart and tears oozed from my eyes. While I have a nasty cold that has made life very uncomfortable, this little boy has a disease that is threatening even his ability to eat a little lunch. While I will "suffer" through my minor illness for maybe a few weeks, this little boy may not even live to "suffer" through such an annoyance. And before I even begin to pat myself on the back for merely laying some napkins on the table for this little guy, I stop to consider the great sacrifices made by his mother. She has chosen to allow her boy to live life to the fullest, undeterred by the judging stares flashed her way by strangers like me.

Today, won't you consider with me the abundance of blessings that scatter our paths? Once we see the beauty of all God has blessed us with, maybe we will have more compassion in our hearts and vigilance with our eyes to notice the hurt that also litters our path. Oh Lord, give me eyes to see past the obvious, to notice the immense hurt around me.

Amen.

Amen. AMEN. May we be men and women who seek out JUSTICE, who pray for the OPPRESSED, who LONG for the day when all will be made right again. May we be men and women who willingly TAKE UP THE cross to follow Him...into the homes of the broken...right where He's been all along. Amen.

Today I imagined my world without a Savior...

I sat through my very last lecture in a psychosocial nursing class, the discourse covering eating disorders. I've always wondered what my life would look like without Jesus, and I can't help but wonder if I would be in this place:

Shriveled
heart and
spirit scarred by
years of trying to
please the girl in the
MIRROR

Who
is she?
the image of
the tempests storming her
life barely filling out her
REFLECTION

Control
insufficiently attained
through counted calories
and lost pant sizes
while hollow, haunted eyes scream
HELP

Are you ever just aware of the pain consuming the world spinning around you? I am broken by the breaking I see, knowing that the Healer is waiting, arms outstretched, to be called upon.

Oh the joy, to be a Broken in the hands of the Healer...to then be a Restored that can be cracked by the hurts of more Brokens...so that the light of the Healer can illuminate and restore them too.

Are you cracked by the hurting world around you?