I thought I'd take a minute to write about something... or someone who I have thought of many times in the past several years.... and I don't even have a picture of her.
Her name is Hope. In high school I went on a mission trip with a church to North Dakota. We worked with children on an Indian reservation and helped paint houses. Hope was just one of the little girls who came to our meetings. It didn't matter who you were, Hope would jump up and latch on when she saw you coming; she never wanted to let go unless she was sure there was another person who was ready to hold her. She was probably five or six.
I enjoyed watching little Hope so much. She never said much, and would hide her face when you'd try and talk to her, but boy did she want to be loved on. On the morning our bus was going to pull out some time around 5:00 AM, there was Hope, by herself, to say good bye. Nobody had brought her. No parent had woken her up. Not many other kids were awake to say goodbye, but Hope was. It broke my heart.
How many children are out there so desperate for love that they are willing to cling to a stranger just to feel wanted?
For years I have prayed for Hope. When I got back from the trip I got a Bible for her and wrote a prayer inside for her. I recited this prayer (almost) every night for a year, and then I read from "her" Bible. I don't know if it will ever make a difference, and I'm sure I will never see her again. Of all the people who held and loved her during that trip, I'm sure she didn't remember me the next day, but I still feel a brokenness in my heart for her and for other children like her. I hope my God and my prayers have helped to save her from the life she could have had if she continued to grow up in a very lost community.
She did not come from a place where opportunity was abounding. She came from a compound-like area that was filled with hunger, theft, rape, and a false religion. She came from right in the middle of America.
There are millions of children all over this country and all over this world who need your prayers. They need your touch and your love. It doesn't matter if you pray for somebody you met once on a mission trip or just for the child you saw on the adopt-a-child infomercial. (You don't have to adopt one financially to pray for him/her). I urge you... if you ever get the opportunity to go.... step out of your comfort zone and GO. Weather it be to help the children who survived the LRA, or to help the children in your area's Boys' or Girls' town. Go. Invest. Love. And pray.
