Adventures WorldRace SethBarnes Sponsorship Giving

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Welcome to Confessions of a Missionary: We were in an orphanage, and I wanted to be anywhere but there.

This was the second time that this had happened in the past six months.

The first time was when I first set foot in the SCH orphanage in India. 

This time was just the same, although I was 3,000 miles away in a province somewhere outside of Manila in the Philippines.

I stood there in the doorway, watching as all my teammates cooed over and cuddled the sweetest baby orphans.

And I stood there…stuck in the doorway. I could not stop the tears that were streaming down my face. All I could do was weep. Weep. Weep.

Don’t get me wrong, I love kids as much as the next person, but it’s impossible to visit an orphanage and for it not to break your heart.

You see,

Here’s the deal,

Saying you love orphans is not an easy thing.

It’s not a nice little badge you put on your resume or profile. It’s not a shiny little gold star. Loving orphans is not all rainbows and butterflies and cotton candy.

To love orphans means something entirely different all together.

To love orphans means that your eyes are full of tears, your heart is more broken than whole, and you are often overwhelmed.

To love orphans means that once you’ve met them you will never be the same. Their faces and names will be ever present on your heart, even when you’re worlds away.

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(My sweet boy from Sarah’s Covenant Homes in India. He needs $200 to be fully sponsored. To sponsor him visit: http://schindia.com/children/jeff/ )

Loving orphans means when you finally have to leave them, even to return to your own family back home, you will feel torn in two.  Something will be missing. See, that’s what happens. They become a part of you. They become a part of your family. Your home.

It means that they will constantly be on your heart and on your mind and in your prayers. You think of them as you make decisions considering where you go next, and your heart aches for the day when you will be reunited again.

 
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(My dearest friend Katelyn and our sweet little “Soy Sauce.” He still needs $160 to be fully sponsored. Sponsor him at: http://schindia.com/children/asher)

For some, loving orphans means that they will even sacrifice to live with and care for these kids in their native country. For others, they will save and save to adopt them. And for still others, loving orphans means they will work tirelessly to help raise supporters for the kids whose faces are forever on their hearts. 

 
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(My friends Jenny and Hannah, and Nikki and Sarah who are foster moms with SCH in Ongole, India.)

It’s such a privilege to be one of the few people who get to meet these incredible kids and to see their precious faces and learn their names and hear their stories in person. It’s the biggest honor to be the one to get to hold them and tell them how this man named Jesus loved them so much that he gave up everything to come and make them a part of his family. And that his dad wants to be their dad, and he will always love them, and they will never be alone.

I didn’t stand in the doorway the entire time. 

Eventually I came in. 

 
 
I held babies. I fed them. I played with them. Still with tears in my eyes and my heart hurting. But it’s better to love and hurt than to not love at all. Sometimes you have to face that yeah, it sucks so much that these kids don’t have homes. Yeah, it sucks that they don’t have families to love them and care for them like they deserve.

But as terribly overwhelming and awful and not right and heartbreaking as that is, you are there with them, right now, in this moment, for some reason. God had you come visit these children for a purpose. Maybe you don’t know what it is, but there has to be some reason for it.

So, eventually, you have to stop standing in the doorway, enter in, and love. We are called to love, not just when it’s easy, but especially when it’s hard.

 
 
(Katelyn and I with our sweet little family of boys we cared for at SCH.)

And you have to trust too that God hasn’t forgotten them.

And that he loves them way more than you ever could.

And that as much as your heart breaks, his heart breaks even more.

And that he hasn’t abandoned them.

No matter how hopeless it might seem right now, you have to trust that God has a plan for these kids…a hope and a future.

“For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” -Jeremiah 29:11

Here’s my challenge to you: I think many of us (myself included) need to man up and if we are praying for God to provide for someone we care about or something God has put on our hearts, who’s to say that we aren’t the one who’s supposed to play a key role in that. Who’s to say we aren’t the one? 

 
Never walk away from someone who deserves help; your hand is God’s hand for that person. Don’t tell your neighbor, “Maybe some other time,” or, “Try me tomorrow,” when the money’s right there in your pocket. -Proverbs 3:27-29 (The Message)
 
(Or if you like ESV better, 
 
Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to do it. Do not say to your neighbor, “Go, and come again, tomorrow I will give it”—when you have it with you.)
 
So don’t just consider supporting these kids- do it. These ministries I’ve shared about with you are ones I’ve actually served with while on The World Race. I have worked on the field with them and seen with my own two eyes that the work they are doing is important and SO needed and absolutely transforming these kids’ lives. It is incredible to be a part of something huge that God is doing on the other side of the world. We are all family in Christ, so it’s time we really started acting like it and taking care of one another.

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Photo: Here I am with some of my beautiful new friends from the Joyville Salvation Army Children’s Home in The Philippines. These kids are not all orphans, many come from broken homes that are unable to care for them. These are some of the most joy-filled and talented kids I have ever met.