It is less than a month now until I go to Africa. So many emotions, so much anticipation. Tonight as i was praying about going to Mother Teresa's Orphanage I was overwhelmed at the thought.
"Such a beautiful day . . . to meet Christ face to face in the poor. He was there -- the hungry, the sick, the naked Christ -- and the thought of Him in this distressing disguise gave me great joy, peace and strength. The greatest disease is not TB or leprosy, but the feeling of being uncared for, unwanted, deserted by everyone. The greatest disease is the lack of love. The unwanted are hungry -- not for food -- but for love. They are thirsty, not just for water, but for peace. They are homeless, not just for shelter, but for understanding. Be the living expression of kindness -- kindness in your face, your eyes, your kind greeting. Let no one go away from you without being better and happier." -Mother Teresa.
We will spend only one day at this orphanage, one day...is it long enough to change anything? to love a child for a day, it seems impossible to imagine. I don't want to be a tourist to despair, to walk through and pity, I want to...what? I don't know, change it all, bring them home, heal them, but none of this is in my power...Christ in His most distressing disguise...in the emaciated child, the innocent born with a death sentence, the children living with HIV.
Sometimes I don't know why I am going to Africa, really what is the point of an 11 day trip, am I changing anything? I have moments that I am so excited to go and then I think why am I excited to see poverty like i have never known, to walk into orphanages where children will never leave to a forever family, to witness the innocent living in dumps, is this really something to be excited about? Its an odd place to be, but I am excited. I don't really have a lot of gifts...I make the best chocolate chip cookies ever and I can talk for hours, that's pretty much all I got...except love. I can love, especially a child. I know that I will fall in love with every child I see, with every pair of dark eyes staring at me. I guess right now that is my plan for this orphanage, to love the way God created me to. To see the child behind the sickness, to find the joy beyond the circumstance, to see God's sovereignty in their reality. To make a child smile, if only for a day, to let them know a mother's touch, kiss, hug and pray that it will be enough.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Monday, March 1, 2010
I cried myself to sleep last night asking the question, how am I supposed to live in this world? I recently started reading Linda Smith's first book, "From Congress to the Brothel" which is describing the horrors of India's sex trade, children forced to have sex with 20 to 40 men a day. This is not new information, I have met Renu, heard her story, I read "Sold" last summer and "Renting Lacy", but reading this yesterday and then watching the 20/20 my friend sent me last night about child sacrifices in Uganda I just don't know how to live in this world. Falling asleep in my safe home crying for the children that I don't know how to save, for the mother whose child was decapitated for "good luck", for the hungry, the thirsty, the displaced, for the women who are shunned because of fistula which has been eradicated in the US over a hundred years, for the hopeless, the lonely. I'm overwhelmed and horrified and completely at a loss of how to change anything. All i know is I'm tired of this American dream, I'm tired of being so comfortable while the rest of the world is in pain. I don't know what any of it means but I know I can't just live this life the way I have. I am so excited for my trip to Africa, maybe there is an answer there, something to pour our hearts into, our time, our money. I don't know the answer but I hope God shows us soon....
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Haiti
We are heavy hearted tonight. Found out that Pastor Lavaud is in the Dominican Republic looking for food...we are overwhelmed by the destruction in Haiti and the lack of basic necessities. We are sending him money and researching how to get him food, if anyone wants to help just let me know. Most of all please do not forget about Haiti and the incredible people who live there and the battle they are fighting just to survive. They need our prayers and they need our help.
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Praying for Haiti
We have heard that Pastor Lavaud and family are safe tonight. There was little damage in Hinche. I have emailed A New Arrival to find out about Rock and the orphanage. Praying tonight for the homeland of our daughter, for the beautiful people we met there, and the children....not a lot of words.
Monday, January 4, 2010
Adoption
It seems like it is all around us these past few months!! Most recently with Miss Meili coming home followed shortly after by Miss Zuri and Miss Zinea, the beautiful faces of God's promise. How incredible to see them, to touch them, to hear their laughter. When Meili giggled the other night, be still my heart, I soooo loved the sound.
All this adoption had got me thinking...from Worship for Orphans, to Orphan Sunday, then Voices, and the coming home of my friends sweet daughters, and of course Hope's referral anniversary and then on December 20th her adoptions day. 4 years ago I saw my girl for the first time in the Miami airport, quiet, shy, covered in scabies, and patches of dry hair on her head...and now she is loud, silly, joyful, has glowing skin, and for the first time can tuck her hair behind her ears...she is so very excited about that. Anyways it got me thinking about adoption and what it is and most of all what it is NOT. It is NOT a mission, it is NOT saving a child, it is NOT a cause. Adoption is how God builds families. I know I have told our call to Hope many times but maybe what I have not told is what God did NOT say. He did NOT say Malia did you know that Haiti is the poorest country in the western hemisphere? It is the 4th hungriest country in the world? Did you know that Haiti has the highest rates of infant, under-five and maternal mortality in the Western hemisphere. Diarrhoea, respiratory infections, malaria, tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS are the leading causes of death? He said none of these things that night in October of 2001, no He said, Malia you have a daughter in Haiti. He planted a seed of adoption in my heart and over the next three years He watered it until Hope grew. I do not believe that Gods plan for the world would leave children as orphans, that war, famine, and disease would rob children of their parents. That mothers would be put in a position to place their children up for adoption because they could not afford to feed them, this is the reality of a fallen world, but Psalm 68:6 says, “God sets the lonely in families”. I believe that in His sovereignty God knew that Emilia would not be able to keep Hope and so He placed her in my heart, to grow as my child and in His perfect way and in His perfect timing He brought Hope home to her forever family. That is adoption. I say this because at the Orphan Sunday event something happened that only fueled my fire that i need to make this clear, please do not get me wrong, it was for all intents and purposes a great success and I love Steven Curtis Chapman and have NO doubt in my mind that God is using him mightily to aid the cause of orphans. Ok that being said here is what happened, in the beginning of the show they had all these pictures of children and a challenge of sorts to help the fatherless and orphan and that a way to do that would be by adoption, it was proposed in such a way to meet a need, not answer a call. My dad always says as Christians we don't meet needs, we answer His call. I'm sitting there thinking in my head that I might have said it differently when I glanced down at my daughters sitting next to each other and I watched Damaris look at Hope in a way that I had never seen her look, and quite frankly never want to see again. As she sat and listened and saw pictures of waiting children she put her hand on Hope and looked at her with a look of sympathy, she looked at her like she was an orphan.
Damaris has always looked at Hope as her sister, yes she knows Hope's birth situation, she knows she was in an orphanage, she knows that she was born in a third world country, but she has always known that Hope is her sister, that God placed her in our family, we were not adopting to do our part in saving the world, we were obeying our Lord when He said go get your daughter.
I think what really gets me upset about this is thinking that Hope might one day think that she was adopted because I was trying to do good, to save her. The thought of that hurts me and scares me and so I will continue to tell her daily that I love her, just as Jesus tells me daily that He loves me. He adopted me because I grew in His heart and He brought me into His forever family. He never felt sorry for me or pitied me, He simply loved me as His own....amazing.
I was reading a blog the other night and a mom has two adopted sons from Ethiopia and is faced with the question by many, why Ethiopia, why not America, why not this or that? Jen and I talked about this with Meili when someone asked her why China? my answer to all the questions, why Haiti, why Ethiopia? why China? why Uganda? why domestic? because that is where our children are. Because God builds families through adoption and He knows our children while they were in their mothers womb, whether my womb or Emilia's He knew them, the plan for their lives, the parents and the siblings they would have.
Life is back to normal, Damaris looks at Hope like her pesky little sister once again, but it was a good reminder for me as an adoptive mom to not let anyone else label my girl, to continue to remind all of my children of God's sovereignty, His plan, our spiritual adoption stories.
What does this mean for the orphan? Because they are out there, an estimated 143 million of them. If adoption is a call to build families but not necessarily for everyone then what do we do with James 1:27, "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." Adoption is not for everyone but caring for the orphan is. God is calling His church to respond, not the church as an institution, the people that make up the church. He is calling us.
143 million. I want to ask you to imagine these children but I know that that is impossible, it is truly beyond our comprehension to do so….so then what do we do with a number so great. A number that numbs our senses, that removes the faces, names and stories of the children it represents. How do we fight a statistic that we can’t wrap our head around? We give the statistic a face, we find out their story, and we call them by name. Personally, the way that our family looks after the orphan in distress is through World Vision sponsorship and gift catalog, through Samaritan's Purse shoebox program, and supporting missionaries. There are so many organizations in so many countries that we have no excuse but to do something no matter how small it may seem.
All this adoption had got me thinking...from Worship for Orphans, to Orphan Sunday, then Voices, and the coming home of my friends sweet daughters, and of course Hope's referral anniversary and then on December 20th her adoptions day. 4 years ago I saw my girl for the first time in the Miami airport, quiet, shy, covered in scabies, and patches of dry hair on her head...and now she is loud, silly, joyful, has glowing skin, and for the first time can tuck her hair behind her ears...she is so very excited about that. Anyways it got me thinking about adoption and what it is and most of all what it is NOT. It is NOT a mission, it is NOT saving a child, it is NOT a cause. Adoption is how God builds families. I know I have told our call to Hope many times but maybe what I have not told is what God did NOT say. He did NOT say Malia did you know that Haiti is the poorest country in the western hemisphere? It is the 4th hungriest country in the world? Did you know that Haiti has the highest rates of infant, under-five and maternal mortality in the Western hemisphere. Diarrhoea, respiratory infections, malaria, tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS are the leading causes of death? He said none of these things that night in October of 2001, no He said, Malia you have a daughter in Haiti. He planted a seed of adoption in my heart and over the next three years He watered it until Hope grew. I do not believe that Gods plan for the world would leave children as orphans, that war, famine, and disease would rob children of their parents. That mothers would be put in a position to place their children up for adoption because they could not afford to feed them, this is the reality of a fallen world, but Psalm 68:6 says, “God sets the lonely in families”. I believe that in His sovereignty God knew that Emilia would not be able to keep Hope and so He placed her in my heart, to grow as my child and in His perfect way and in His perfect timing He brought Hope home to her forever family. That is adoption. I say this because at the Orphan Sunday event something happened that only fueled my fire that i need to make this clear, please do not get me wrong, it was for all intents and purposes a great success and I love Steven Curtis Chapman and have NO doubt in my mind that God is using him mightily to aid the cause of orphans. Ok that being said here is what happened, in the beginning of the show they had all these pictures of children and a challenge of sorts to help the fatherless and orphan and that a way to do that would be by adoption, it was proposed in such a way to meet a need, not answer a call. My dad always says as Christians we don't meet needs, we answer His call. I'm sitting there thinking in my head that I might have said it differently when I glanced down at my daughters sitting next to each other and I watched Damaris look at Hope in a way that I had never seen her look, and quite frankly never want to see again. As she sat and listened and saw pictures of waiting children she put her hand on Hope and looked at her with a look of sympathy, she looked at her like she was an orphan.
Damaris has always looked at Hope as her sister, yes she knows Hope's birth situation, she knows she was in an orphanage, she knows that she was born in a third world country, but she has always known that Hope is her sister, that God placed her in our family, we were not adopting to do our part in saving the world, we were obeying our Lord when He said go get your daughter.
I think what really gets me upset about this is thinking that Hope might one day think that she was adopted because I was trying to do good, to save her. The thought of that hurts me and scares me and so I will continue to tell her daily that I love her, just as Jesus tells me daily that He loves me. He adopted me because I grew in His heart and He brought me into His forever family. He never felt sorry for me or pitied me, He simply loved me as His own....amazing.
I was reading a blog the other night and a mom has two adopted sons from Ethiopia and is faced with the question by many, why Ethiopia, why not America, why not this or that? Jen and I talked about this with Meili when someone asked her why China? my answer to all the questions, why Haiti, why Ethiopia? why China? why Uganda? why domestic? because that is where our children are. Because God builds families through adoption and He knows our children while they were in their mothers womb, whether my womb or Emilia's He knew them, the plan for their lives, the parents and the siblings they would have.
Life is back to normal, Damaris looks at Hope like her pesky little sister once again, but it was a good reminder for me as an adoptive mom to not let anyone else label my girl, to continue to remind all of my children of God's sovereignty, His plan, our spiritual adoption stories.
What does this mean for the orphan? Because they are out there, an estimated 143 million of them. If adoption is a call to build families but not necessarily for everyone then what do we do with James 1:27, "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." Adoption is not for everyone but caring for the orphan is. God is calling His church to respond, not the church as an institution, the people that make up the church. He is calling us.
143 million. I want to ask you to imagine these children but I know that that is impossible, it is truly beyond our comprehension to do so….so then what do we do with a number so great. A number that numbs our senses, that removes the faces, names and stories of the children it represents. How do we fight a statistic that we can’t wrap our head around? We give the statistic a face, we find out their story, and we call them by name. Personally, the way that our family looks after the orphan in distress is through World Vision sponsorship and gift catalog, through Samaritan's Purse shoebox program, and supporting missionaries. There are so many organizations in so many countries that we have no excuse but to do something no matter how small it may seem.
Friday, January 1, 2010
My Temporary Home
It’s funny how the biggest blessings in our lives can sometimes not seem like blessings at all. It is winter, my least favorite season living in my temporary home. Building a fire everyday is NOT fun, just in case you ever wondered, it’s really not. It’s not fun when your husband hurts his ankle and can no longer push the wheelbarrow to the wood pile in the barn and fill it with the various kinds of wood needed to build and sustain fire (It’s also not fun because he is in pain and can’t play soccer or basketball and coach and what not, but this is about me:). I’m not really a fan of this, but this house is my blessing. If I did not live in this house we could not have all gone to Hawaii earlier this year, we could not go to Haiti this summer, I would not own my lovely Land Rover, or be able to support World Vision the way that we are able to, and most of all my kids would not attend the school that they attend. I had prayed and asked the Lord to help us send our kids to private school, I did not specify any conditions such as living in a home whose primary source of heat is a woodstove, and so this temporary and unusual situation is really an answered prayer….isn’t that funny? I love my children and I love what they receive from their school. I love that they are receiving a Christian education and I love that they have teachers who truly love them and pray for them but most of all I love their friends. Friendship is one of God’s greatest gifts….ha!! I sound like a greeting card. But it is true, I love the friends that God has placed in the lives of my children. And the funny thing about this blessing, that I sometimes think is a curse of a house, is that God has blessed us, Shane and I, with incredible friendships. Every Thursday this summer 5 families from the school would come over and play sand volleyball until it is too dark to see, and then we move to our backyard and have dinner together and laugh and talk and eat and have a great time. I mean really who has a sand volleyball court in their front yard? Who would have thought that God would use this house to bring me and my kids friends. I was thinking about my girlfriends and how great and different they all are and how we all complement each other and have different strengths and weaknesses and what a gift they are and how blessed I am to live in this temporary home. We were supposed to be here one year, and here we are 3 and a half years later. Thank You Lord, for humbling me here, blessing me here, letting my girl scout roots be used here, for reminding me to look at my life through Your eyes and to see the blessings in what I think is the curse. And thank You that oak will last all night long if I pull the dampers out and use my tetris skills to load up the fireplace, I really love that!!
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