Hopeful Possibility

My heart has been stirred for the poor and the needy for as long as I can remember. It might have started early when I would visit my mom schools on days off. I can remember sitting with one of her kindergartner boys (don't remember the kid's name) who was sick in the nurse's office and was going to home early. This was all going on right before Christmas. He was not feeling well, obviously, and I was sitting with him trying to comfort him before his mother got there. Trying to make small talk with the kid, I asked the kid what he wanted for Christmas. I can remember him saying all I want is some new socks without holes in them. My heart was crushed. I always believed growing up that I was a "poor" person. I was not afforded luxuries of name brands and the latest and greatest gadgets and"toys" as I felt many of the people around me were, but I never was in need or clothing, food, or most of all love. I have not really known hardships like many in our world have. My job as a teacher in Dallas and now in a more needy part of Lewisville has kept my heart stirring towards kids who need more that I could ever have imagined as a child.

My first year in Lewisville I my first two refugees. One from Burma and one from Nigeria. Now every since I have had a least one refugee from Burma. I do have a great connection with many in the Chin community at Lakeland. ( Chin is the people group from Burma that have settled in Lewisville.)

Last year I got a job offer to tutor some Chin Unaccompanied Refugee Minors (URM). URMs are refugees that have come to the United States with out their parents or other adult to take care of them. They have for whatever reason been separated from their family weather it is from death, or flight. To make a kinda long story short, I applied for the job, got offered the job, and then because of some summer opportunities that I had, I choose to decline the job. I remember thinking how interesting that would be for me to do one day.

Last Sunday when it snowed, I showed up to church early because of the weather and listened to a girl that is single and very close to my each. She had said she just finished her training to be a foster parent and had been given her first off--a 17 with a 2 year old daughter--she declined, not feeling like she was prepared for that her first time (I WOULD HAVE DONE THE SAME THING) But anyways I got home, snow and all not really able to do anything else and my brain started turning reflecting on the earlier conversation. Why couldn't I do that? The childish well is she can than why can't I? I truly believe God had that conversation happen for me to hear, and pulled that memory from last year back to my head. I spent hours looking for information on fostering URMs. I honestly really could find a way to contact some one for it here in the state of Texas. I was really frustrated, and then I thought I should email the lady that I had interviewed with and she could pass the information along to someone. I told people the next day at school my heart was stirring and I needed to find the information and set people out to pray about it. I sent emails to my brother and another friend who is a foster/adopt mom seeing if the have information. They did not, but I heard back from the lady I had emailed and that was not her program with Catholic Charities. Here is one of the funny/coincidences (sure it is) that if I had waited a week to send the email, I could not have started the process yet. But I did email and went to my first class last Saturday and and returning this week..

Pray with me through this please. I am excited and will give more details. This may help me to stay blogging for a bit.