It's tempting to think that you can pluck sweet babies young and old out of horrible situations from around the world and land them in your loving, clean, first world life. And they all lived happily ever after...welcome to our American dream...
It's a stiff wake up call when what you thought were the biggest obstacles turn out to be the easy part! You start out worried about things like money. Then later you look back tempted to laugh at your previous, naive self because money is a laughable obstacle.
The truth is, these sweet babies are caught in a tangle of misinformation, out right lies, governmental debates, lost paperwork, misguided activism, corruption, abuse, injustice, opportunism, inefficient systems, and even spelling errors just to name a few...you did know that if a child's name is spelled incorrectly on one document that the sweet child is not entering the United States, right?
God leads us into places so much bigger than we are.
Yesterday's church service started with weeping and gathering and praying around the couple that Haitian courts called "parents" who now are told they cannot bring their daughter home... Is she in a good place? A bad place? Suddenly we are very small and helpless. We just don't know. Only God knows and we bow to Him and pray He rises from His throne on behalf of the orphan and the oppressed and we trust Him with things to big for us. Just like everyone who was there, I am guessing, I woke up with her face in my mind's eye...and I am praying as I go through the motions of my day. I pray to the God who has the hairs on this baby girl's head counted, to the God who loves her far beyond what we are even capable of...and I am trusting the God of miracles!
Our sermon yesterday, the end of Jonah's story, reminded us all that WE are not the center of the story. We are God's vessel. We are privileged to be used of Him in the making of His story. We lean on His promises, we trust His faithfulness. We believe He is not done.
Arise, Lord! Lift up your hand, O God.
Do not forget the helpless.
Why does the wicked man revile God?
Why does he say to himself,
“He won’t call me to account”?
But you, God, see the trouble of the afflicted;
you consider their grief and take it in hand.
The victims commit themselves to you;
you are the helper of the fatherless.
Break the arm of the wicked man;
call the evildoer to account for his wickedness
that would not otherwise be found out.
The Lord is King for ever and ever;
the nations will perish from his land.
You, Lord, hear the desire of the afflicted;
you encourage them, and you listen to their cry,
defending the fatherless and the oppressed,
so that mere earthly mortals
will never again strike terror.
Psalm 10:12-18
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