A Missed Call

As a little girl, I was absolutely convinced that I was a Princess. Although I was not a child with a birth line that could be traced back to the Scottish aristocracy, I was a real Princess none the less. I knew it.

I was lucky enough, you see, to have a Daddy who smiled wide and told me I was his Princess. He was born in a castle he told me (and that was actually true, my Nana and my great Aunt confirmed it). That made my Daddy the real  genuine article as a king, he told me, and I, his daughter, was therefore an actual Princess, not a make-believe one. The reasoning was tight and I was convinced. 

Knowing this, it wasn't a huge stretch for me to accept that I was my heavenly father's Princess too. And it's not a huge stretch to see that the sick and orphaned children of the world were also his, either.

Last week, I told you about a sickly HIV positive baby. By earthly standards, she is the lowest of the low. An orphan, carrying a communicable disease. Something that is believed to be shameful. But you see, there is a strange inversion on this earth, because the least of these will be the greatest in the Kingdom of heaven, and in eternity. Her sickness and her social status will have no relevance there and they in no way diminish her worth in God's sight.  She is his daughter. She is his Princess.

After two weeks of intense, hard work, trying and failing to re-nourish this little girl, her diarrhoea worsened and she refused even to drink. She was tube fed for two days, and during that time, we took the opportunity to re-nourish her aggressively. In those two days, she gained over a pound in weight and she re-gained her appetite. The diarhoea stopped. Our baby needed protein to heal her gut. She is now drinking protein shakes, with medical peanut butter and fruit blended in. She is standing in her crib, she is re-gaining her energy and mentally, she is very alert and she is playful. We engage in lots of silly games to coax a few extra spoons  of food into this baby. Sometimes she'll initiate the games, teasing me with an imaginary spoon and then erupting in a fit of laughter when I pretend to cry. The baby is a joy and a delight. The loose skin folds under her arms are filling out. Her skin has healed. She is cute, and I look forward to the day when the right family, the one God has chosen for her, take her into their hearts and their home and call her their Princess. She is already his. I don't see a sick orphan when I look at her, I see a child of God.

Do you have children? Were you cherished by a family who loved you? If so, it you should have some concept of the depth of the Father's love for his forgotten children in Haiti, and all over the world.

I've got a baby in the NICU. Her name is Malozie. She came to us a month ago. At the age of 7 weeks, she had some tough odds stacked against her; born to a mentally ill mother and a deaf father, she was in the swollen stage of malnutrition. Malozie was lucky enough to arrive at GLA just in time, before this devastating form of malnutrition damaged her organs too badly. I wish you could see her now, plump and smiling. She is a gorgeous, thriving baby, with long curled eye-lashes and baby soft skin and silky hair. You'd never know from just from looking at her now, that a month ago, her body was riddled with infections. She looks like a healthy baby. Maybe like yours.

Supposing she was your child. Supposing some disaster befell you and continents separated you from her and you got a call that she was was hungry and sick and without care. I know in that situation, you would call your most faithful friends and family, all over the world, You would say, 'I can't get to her, I need someone to go and be with her. I need someone to help financially with her care.'

Well, that is the call the Father puts out to us. 'Defend the poor and fatherless; Do justice to the afflicted and needy,' (Psalm 82:3). Notice that God is telling you, not asking you, and know that that the command comes from a place of deep love, and sorrow. He is saying go to them, they are mine. Over and over, we miss that Call

It's not my place to tell you what to do. Will you give? Pray? Go? That's for you to work out. I am praying that God will ignite a passion in you, in the church and among it's people, for these children. 

I can't upload  photographs this week to ingite that passion. Maybe that isn't a bad thing. 'Hear' what am saying. Close your eyes and 'feel' your way to what you are supposed to do, and then do it with your whole heart.