When I first got to our ministry in Ethiopia, I felt like we had entered into a picture of what Heaven might look like. The land open and free and running with the orphan children, who have a Heavenly Father who has adopted them into His family.
They love you no matter the hurt they have been through. We spend time with them in the morning and then teach them English in the afternoons and play sports with them in the evening.
A lot of the time, I will be walking and one of the little ones will come up and hold my hand and walk with me.
They think I am guiding them to where I’m going, but really they are guiding me into more child-like wonder, more dependence on the Lord, and more humility of not caring what I look like.
They walk me into more freedom each time they grab my hand.
Being on this compound, with kids always interrupting your time with the Lord, I was shown how our time with the Lord doesn’t always have to be how we want it to be.
He wants us to live lives that are interruptible and public.
We can commune with the Lord while playing with a child. We can commune with the Lord just sitting with the women who pour into these children every single day.
It made me think of leaving the 99 for the one. To have such a deep love for each of them. I understood how Jesus left the 99 found sheep for the lost one.
It made me think about if my whole life was meant to lead one person to Christ, to invest solely in that one person, pray for that one person, fight for that one person, and to unconditionally love that one person no matter the mean things said and done, it would be worth it.
That’s the love these kids have shown me. That I care more about the one than the crowd, more about the one sitting in the corner feeling unloved and rejected, and more about the one who has been told all his life that he’s not good enough, that he doesn’t measure up.
Another thing these kids are teaching me is showing me what God feels like when we run into His arms. When these kids run into my arms yelling my name, I think that the joy I feel must be a similar joy to the joy that God feels when we run straight into His arms. I can’t even describe how it must feel for one of His lost children to run into His arms.
My prayer is that more would return home, to the Father’s heart.
That more prodigals would realize the love they have waiting for them at home.
I encourage you to pray for the one. Leave the 99 for the one.
Here’s a short video of our time at HopeEthiopia.
