Thankfulness Day #4.

Thankfulness Day #4. Well, it's Orphan Sunday.
But Merissa was so right; every sunday should be orphan sunday.

I want you to do something for me.
Read this out loud.
I'm sorry if you feel weird doing it, but read this out loud.

I wish I could speak words that would make you feel the weight of 143 million+ orphans in the world that need the love we're supposed to be sharing.
I wish I could explain my frustration towards Christians who do nothing about it.
I wish I could write something in this blog that would make everyone who reads it drop everything and start the adoption process right now, but I can't.

So for today I just want to say that I am thankful for a broken heart.

I have seen orphans crying.
I have seen them alone, naked, sick, and dirty.
I have watched them scream and cry and grab rice off of each other's plates while they were eating.
I have looked into a child's eyes and seen years of anger, hurt, loneliness, starvation, sadness, and sickness take their toll and turn that beautiful smile into a blank stare,
into a limp body that just hangs there when I hold it.
I have held a child who didn't know love; she only knew anger, so as I kissed her cheeks, she hit and pinched mine.

And I'm thankful.
I'm thankful that it crushes me every day.
I'm thankful that I can hardly sleep at night.
I'm thankful that it haunts me.
I'm thankful that I can't get those faces out of my head.
I'm thankful that I can't get dressed or eat a meal or lay in my bed without thinking of those kids.

I'm thankful because my perfect God is going to use this broken heart.

I'm thankful because if I didn't have this pain in me, I probably wouldn't do anything about it.
I'm thankful because I used to just "feel bad". I used to just want to sit back, be comfortable, donate some money and that would be "good enough". I used to think it was terrible, but leave it at that.

But that was before I met them.
Before I fell in love.
That was before I held them in my arms.
Before I gently held those pinching hands and tried to teach them to love again.
Before little fingers tried to rip the earrings out of my ears because they were so desperate for just anything.
Before I found rice hidden in their school desks in case no one ever fed them again.
Before I knew that 26,000 children like them die every. single. day. for reasons that we can do something about.

And now my "feeling bad" is an unquenchable burden and passion to end their suffering and teach them about the Jesus who loves them more than anything.

My prayer today is that you would be broken for those children like He was broken for you.
Because those kids' broken hearts aren't going to be healed unless ours are broken too.
I pray that this wouldn't be just another Orphan Sunday but that this would be THE orphan sunday that we stand up and do something about it.
I pray that these broken hearts would get on planes and would scoop up those kids and love them with everything we have until we carry them all the way to Him.

I'm thankful that my eyes have been opened and that now I can never forget; I can never turn away.

Today, I'm just thankful for a broken heart.