"I will not leave you as orphans..."

The poorest country in the western hemisphere, hit with a massive earthquake and it still shows 4 years later.
Places half torn down or half built up. People not able to finish rebuilding because the money ran out.
Broken. 

 

Going, I knew it would be the poorest place I have ever been, but I didn't understand until I got there. It wasn't the normal poverty I was use to seeing.  I've been to third world countries, I've lived and worked in the middle of slums, but nothing quite prepared me for this poverty.
 
Babies driven in the back of truck 14 hours down the mountain because his mama has to give him up so he might live. 12 year old children who cannot read because school is too expensive. 9 year olds weighing 15 pounds because food is scarce.  

The poverty and brokeness, devastating.
The babies, beautiful. 

One thing I have learned: kids are kids and they desire to be loved. No matter the country, language, or skin tone.  No matter their eye color, hair color, or social status. 

Walking into the orphanage for the first time I cried. I cried because the realization that these babies don't have mamas to hold them and love them, to tuck them in at night and kiss them all over their faces. They don't have mamas that rock them to sleep or rub their backs when sleep won't come.


"I will not leave you as orphans, I will come to you."

"For my father and my mother have forsaken me, but the Lord will take me in." 

Many times I can't see how their situation will get better. Why won't He allow me to just take them all home? 
  
"A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in his holy dwelling."

God's heart is orphans. Not a single one of them goes unnoticed by Him. And even when the situation of these precious little once seems hopeless, His is still God. He is still good. And He still holds them in the palm of His hand.


So while I was able, I kissed their sticky faces and brushed the flies away that they couldn't and I pray that they will know love, the love of the Father poured out on their precious lives. Because God, the God of the universe cares for them. And how will they know if they have not heard. And how can they love if they have not been loved.