It’s funny how life turns out sometimes.
At the age of 21, I spent Mother’s Day Weekend 2004 graduating from college, packing up my tiny West Texas apartment, and then heading to Little Rock, Arkansas, where I entered this crazy thing called motherhood as I took on the role of co-houseparent to nine pregnant teenagers. In 2009, after 5 years and 300+ kids, I spent Mother’s Day Weekend closing that chapter as I finished grad school and began this ridiculously random adventure known as The World Race. And now here I am two years later in 2011, spending this exact weekend sick in bed with typhoid in Nairobi, Kenya…
For me those five years were some of the best, yet hardest, years of my life. With movie nights, playing Santa at Christmas, prom dress shopping, accidentally cooking upside-down pizza, staying up at night to protect from nightmares or sickness, and helping out in labor and delivery, these kids were my life. Even in the hard times… the runaways, the sucide attempts, the miscarriage, the baby funeral, and all the meltdowns that result with recovering from abuse/ neglect… I wouldn’t have changed a thing. Which is why, on days like today, I’d do anything to have my kids back!
Earlier this afternoon, one of my good friends and biggest encouragers, Rachel Cook, left this comment on my facebook status talking about how much I missed my kids: ‘I bet the Lord has more kids planned in your future.’ As I laid there thinking about what she said, I couldn’t help but wonder… was this true?! I mean, just like Mark 1:17 when Jesus called the disciples to lay down everything and follow Him, I had done just that… with the acknowledgement that I’d still do so even if that meant I’d never step foot in the Children’s Home Ministry or have foster kids again. As I continued to ponder this, I was reminded of a prophecy given to me a couple of weeks before finding out I had been placed on S-Squad:
‘I am going to make you a Mom to the Nations’
Right then, my mind flooded with things from over these past few years: My kids, Moldova, the ‘Raise Your Voice’ thing, my work with SCTNow (Stop Child Trafficking Now), and various prophecies spoken to me by perfect stangers. These were quickly followed by thoughts of the World Race: Nations Night at training camp, Julius in Guatemala, Jimmy in Nicaragua, Joy and The Kids in The Philippines, Heartbreak Warfare for Bangla Road, the ‘Mama T’ thing in Malaysia, Comsean in Cambodia, and all the children’s homes I’ve been able to visit.
All of a sudden the pieces started connecting and coming together. God hadn’t given me a passionate heart for orphans and human trafficking for nothing… having a home would provides families alternatives to sending their kids into prostitution or being tricked into selling them into trafficking them; plus it would protect the kids that are aging out from the same evil atrocities. And why haven’t I been able to pinpoint a certain country like many of my friends and squadmates? Because God’s not just calling me to just the States, Moldova or Vietnam… I’m going global!!!
Now I certainly don’t know any of the specifics of where, when, and especially how, right now… I mean I still have 3 1/2 months of this adventure left! But I do know this: God just gave me yet another Mother’s Day Present…
I AM GOING TO BE A MOM AGAIN!!!
