Her name is Dulce Milagros, Sweet Miracle. She showed up on the doorstep of the mission at the ripe old age of 12 hours old. She was found abandoned in a warehouse still attached to her umbilical cord. I knew the moment I saw her I was in love.
The mission we are working at this month is a refuge for women and children who have been abandoned or are victims of violence. Dulce Milagros had been abandoned with no sign of her mother. Over the past few months the mission has taken on several new children as permanent residents because the child welfare system in Honduras collapsed last fall. The staff here have been serving well, but this latest arrival was that much more overwhelming, so my team and I have been taking care of her for overnights. I had never held a newborn before. Earlier that day was the first time I had ever changed a diaper in my life, but as soon as I saw this baby I knew I couldn’t wait to be up all night with her screaming if that’s what it meant to love her. I got my wish.
Dulce’s first night with us was tiring. She had to eat every two hours, so my friend Taylor and I were up every two hours feeding her, burping her, and commiserating with her as she fussed her way back to sleep. It by far has been my favorite night on the race so far. I had never even met this baby before, had no connection to her, yet I know I would do anything for her.
It hit me all of a sudden. If it is possible for me to feel this way about a tiny human I’ve never met before, how much more then must my heavenly Father, my Abba, love me that He sent His son to die for me? It’s awe-inspiring. God grieved His own heart, Christ sacrificed his own life, to save me from my own sin. For all the sacrifices I would make for Dulce, for all the uncountable more sacrifices parents would and do make for their children, God sacrificed Himself to bring me into His heart eternally.
“But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him and by his wounds we are healed.” Isaiah 53:5
