I left something in Haiti. My heart. It is still at an orphanage with a boy named Mackenson. We found out the first day we were there that he could not speak. There is something wrong with the attachment under his tongue which doesn’t allow him proper use of his tongue. Add unnatural shyness on top of that and you have the quietest, most gentle child I have ever been around. Although Mackenson cannot speak he can laugh, and boy is that laugh the most precious thing I have ever heard. Due to his shyness even when he is happy, laughing, and smiling, he will hide his little smile behind his hand. He was the keeper of my water bottle the whole time we were there. If it was sitting on the front step he would hold onto it so tightly. He would come sit next to me and place his little hand on my knee. I can’t count how many times he fell asleep in my lap while I scratched his back.
On our next to last night at this orphanage I sat on the couch with Mackenson in my lap as he slowly fell asleep. I started to think about leaving him the next morning, how living in Haiti at an orphanage he would probably never get the out patient surgery necessary to help him speak. As I tickled his back I thought about how he deserved a mother that would tickle his back like that every night of his life. He is not able to go to school because they don’t have schools for disabled kids anywhere near where he lives. Thinking about his future in Haiti not being able to have an education, not being able to speak, it doesn’t seem like he will have much of one.
I just started to weep. I love this child. I love him more than I have ever loved anyone before. I started thinking about how I could quit all the plans I had to making him mine. How I could get him more than therapy once a month, how I could get him in school and give him a future. Then I realized I am a broke unmarried 24 year old. Realistically I am not old enough or financially stable enough to do that. However, I still believe this can happen for Mackenson. This is the sweetest and most gentle child I have ever met and he deserves a family. He deserves a better life than the one he has been handed.
Mackenson is precious, sweet, shy, timid, loving, and I miss him dearly. There are many stories just like Mackenson’s. There are so many children in the world without parents. There are so many children who go everyday without getting a hug or an I love you. God calls us to take care of the orphaned like He made us His children. Christ tells us “ I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you.” John 14:18
He also tells us that, “Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble; and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.” James 1:27
I know that children are going to be my life. I know that God has given me a burden for the orphaned. This was made even clearer with how much I fell in love with Mackenson. God has laid these children on my heart and I cannot wait to be old enough and well enough off in life to be able to have some of these children who need parents for myself. I also cannot wait to have an orphanage of my own to give them a home. These children are so deserving of more than they have and I cannot wait to be able to help them achieve it.
