I will never forget that tree. The trunk was wide with twisted roots. It shot up into a massive canopy providing a leafy layer between the scorching African sun and our faces.
I was sitting in the crowded van that housed 15 other teammates. We happily turned off the pot hole Mozambique roads onto a less bouncy but rocky, dusty path. Three kilometers later, there it was “The Tree.” But what caught my attention was what was standing under the tree.
There standing was 24 slightly hesitant waving hands. Each hand represented a story. Each story tore your heart but in that, a smile and a joy broke through.
I had the pleasure of teaming up with the Rudolph family and getting the chance to love on 24 orphans.
They resisted our love at first. It took them a while to warm up. They know what it is like for a team of Americans to come in and love on them, but they also know what it is like to watch them leave. With the reality still in play, I knew that I had one thing on my mind: love them.
Standing in the dust, holding an African baby close to my heart, you start to see reality. I am not talking about those commercials that we have no idea how to relate. Some tears fall and at the end we still wonder if that is true.
Well you all know me. It is true. There really are dusty grounds, no beds, no vegetables, no meat, no parents. But there was that tree. The one that God grew. And there was God. He is there in these kids just working wonders. Oh and there were the hands and feet of God as well. Us. He really used us. He used His love in us. He used the eyes He gave us to see them as He seems them. It is quite beautiful, but always heart yanking.
We were able to move the orphanage to another site (another step in the Rudolph’s vision). This move provides more land. But the walk to the well is now 3.5 miles round trip with buckets and a wheel barrel. I can easily find myself looking around wondering will these kids ever eat right. Will they ever be educated? Will they ever know the love of a mother or the love of the father?
But then I remember “The Tree.”
It was a picture of God’s provision. That tree was where the children could find the cool of the day. If God could provide a tree how much more could he provide a good diet, an education and a hope for a future? And there is something He has already provided: The love of a father.
Now that I think of it weren’t we all orphans– and when we receive that love, that gift, we are now adopted. I can’t wait to sit on the lap of Jesus with the 24 other children. I think we might be dancing around “The Tree.” Eden?
