Today was a very crazy day i am still trying to process it fully. A pastor of 7 children came today to drop off 4 of them because he does not have enough money to feed them all anymore. He is an amazing guy and the kids love him. The kids are 2 months (adorable i fell in love!) 4, 6, and 10. Upon getting dropped off they were assigned them each a “big sister“, a girl that has already been living at the orphanage, who will look out for them, show them to their beds and pjs and we fit them for school uniforms-which since the orphanage has there own school the kids choose jeans and the His Home for Children t-shirt as their uniform. They got new flip-flops and shoes.
What hit me today was, there was something different about coming to this orphanage and having the kids that were here be here, but now i am actually seeing kids getting dropped off. i am looking into the eyes of a father while we eat lunch together who knows he is doing the best thing for his kids as he lets them go. And that’s it, a mother and father that will not see those kids grow up, not talk to them, and have no clue if they will ever see them again in this lifetime. Handing his precious children over not because they did bad things, got in trouble, disrespected him, or like some parents just gave them up because he didn’t feel like dealing with them…no this father loves those kids so very much and he knew that by doing the hardest thing he would be providing those kids with food, a place to sleep, and praying one day a family to take care of them. He sat with those children every second of being here and spoke softly to them probably telling them everything will be ok and I love you so much. This man understood that children cant be adopted past 16 and these four have a chance to be adopted and cared for whereas his other children are older now and it would be more difficult.
Without any money this man pushes on being a pastor and goes to mountain villages here to preach the gospel to people who have not heard. If there was other work here in Haiti he would work two jobs but there is no work here. So dressed in the nicest dress he had for them and the shoes on their little feet he handed over all his youngest 4 children into the hands of strangers with tears in his eyes.
As i held that 2 month old baby her eyes spoke a sense of fear and it looked like she was saying, “whose child am I?” who do i belong to? Her little lower lip would quiver and she would have the saddest face on her little tiny face and she looked like she knew she had been abandoned here and she was saying, whose child am i. She starred into my eyes forever almost asking me to answer it.
. So i sat that 2-month-old child down on my lap and looked into her eyes. Her eyes never wavering from mine once, and i said, you are God’s child. You have not been abandoned your father in Heaven has never left you, you are His and you are so loved beautiful little girl…and when you feel like you have been left behind and are scared remember you are someone’s child always
It’s not just something I read about or see on TV anymore, I actually see kids (more since these children) get dropped off here when parents can no longer take care of them. Then I fit these kids for new shoes and school clothes, I cuddle with them at night, I read them stories about puppies, I tuck them in at night and say I love you, I sing songs with them each night about Jesus, I help them at meal times with feeding, I wake up all night long to give bottles to babies, watch them in a swimming pool for the first time, and I get to be the one they come home from school to and they all run upstairs to hug us and kiss our cheeks. We also are the ones that see them cry when they miss their mommy’s. What do you say the child crying for their mother? How do you comfort them?
I could stay here the rest of the 9 months and love every second. These kids are amazing, beautiful, and loving. Thinking about leaving next Saturday brought many tears to my eyes last night and I can hardly imagine saying goodbye to these children I have spent a month with by next week. And if this is how I feel about these kids after 1 month I can’t imagine the feeling of a parent.
If you have children, love on them a little extra today and praise God that you can support them and God has entrusted them to you to care for them. Praise God that after years of raising them you get to continue to watch them grow up and not spend the rest of your life wondering what happened to those little children that I gave up. Praise God that you get to be the one to read to them, hold them, and love them….and while you are doing that pray for the little ones here, some who have been here 5+ years with no mother or father. And if your heart has ever been led towards adoption please email me at [email protected] and I will point you in the right direction of this orphanage.
