This Sunday, our church celebrated a new mission that we have started called, Forever Families. This ministry celebrates and supports the care of orphans through sponsorship, fostering, adopting, and any other way to care for those children who have no one else. We had many local programs come to let us know of their organizations, as well as, international programs. I gathered information on all the programs to look through later with my husband. We already sponsor a little boy in Uganda, but I felt the pull to see if there was something more we could do. My husband was home with our daughter because she woke up with fever that morning, so it was just my 10 year old son and me. I had a ministry coordinators meeting right after church, and my son was happy so stay b/c he got to partake in the lunch that was offered. I handed him the packet on one of the programs there, The Zoe mission. He has been looking for something to give his money in his "Give Jar" to, and I thought he might look through and pick the $10 rabbits or something small like that.
Well as we sat through our hour long meeting, I noticed he was reading the entire book, cover to cover. When the meeting was over, he told me he would like to donate his "Give" money to this organization. What he followed up with is what caught me off guard. He told me that he wanted to take the book to his class tomorrow and challenge the other kiddos to give as well, and to see what they could collect by Friday. He told me he would ask his teacher if he could talk to the class if they had some extra time. Let me just say that my first instinct was to hold back my tears. This kid gets it, and I couldn't love him more!! I wanted to wrap him up in my arms and tell him just how awesome he truly is. My second instinct was hesitation. We go to public school, so I wasn't sure how he would be received or if he would even be allowed to talk about it. I wanted to tell him maybe we should search for other ways for him to raise money, but I checked myself, took a breath, and told him I thought it was a great idea. I did warn him that he may not be able to speak about it at school, and we would also need to figure out a way to collect the money, and he replied that he knew that, but he wanted to try anyways.
Oh how a 10 year old boy can humble me. How could I stand in his way? He knows that it may not be received, but he wants to try anyways. He believes in helping others, and he really doesn't understand why anyone else wouldn't want to. Why should I have hesitation? I believe that as grown-ups that the "social norms" tell us it is not polite to talk about our faith, our passions for helping others even when it's not the popular thing to do, going against the grain of society, that we shut down when we are given that chance. We are afraid of breaking the rules, offending someone, or just being looked at as weird.
I pray to have that fearless childlike faith that my son displayed for me yesterday. I want to feel the pull of the Holy Spirit and follow it boldly despite knowing that I may face some obstacles and possibly be rejected. How do we lose that along that way? How do we get it back? That is something I will have to reflect on this week.
I don't know what the outcome has been today. I emailed his teacher last night just giving her a heads up, as well as, giving her the link to the mission, so she could see what it is. I haven't heard back yet, so I am pretty much sitting on pins and needles until he gets home. I know, I know. I am still learning to "Let Go and Let God." One thing I do know is that he will not let this be a set back, if it doesn't work out. Based on how pumped up he was last night and this morning, he will find a way to raise money for this organization. Another thing I know is that I am blessed to be able to watch and learn from my child on how to have faith and let nothing get in the way.
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