Orphans of God

Psalm 72: 12-14
He will rescue the poor when they cry to him; he will help the oppressed who have no one to defend them.  He feels pity for the weak and the needy, and he will rescue them.  He will redeem them from oppression and violence, for their lives are precious to him.

For three years I went on a mission trip to Nuevo Laredo, Mexico to work at an orphanage across the Texas border.  The first year I didn’t know what to expect.  The news and newspapers were talking about how dangerous it was due to drug trafficking.  Even though there was some turmoil, we decided to go.  God richly blessed our efforts, but it wasn’t without some delays and some change of plans.  We had to wait for over an hour each day to go across the line into Mexico.  It sometimes took longer, but it wasn’t going to stop us from what God had called us to do.  The long ride there to the orphanage sometimes didn’t seem to take long at all most days.  It was mostly on the way back to America each day that took forever.  

The first time we got to the orphanage it was eye opening and shocking.  Several of the buildings were run down.  The one hundred children living at the orphanage were very encouraged and so loving toward us despite their living situation.  We played games and soccer with them.  We had teams doing construction projects.  We had a group of us do VBS with them each day. The first year, the construction team remodeled their cafeteria, put in some air conditioner units and put in a fresh water system.  Each year we started on a new project.  The second year, we worked on a building so they could have a media room.  The third year, we remodeled a building and turned into an art school.  At the end of every week, we would go into the community and hand out food boxes that our church donated before we left on the trip.  We were able to hand out over 300 food boxes.  The homes in that community were pieced together by scraps of metal and whatever they could find.  Most of the people slept on dirt floors. 

We were also able to reach out to that community because we had another construction team that built a house for that community.  We tried to partner with a church in that community and it was amazing to see how God took what little we had and did so much with it.  Each year it got better and better.  The relationships we built with those children and the excitement on their faces when they saw you was priceless.  A team still goes out every year to help the orphanage and community. 

This scripture in Psalm 72, is true to the heart of God.  If you want to do something great for God it’s not how big you can grow a church.  It’s about going after the ones that nobody else will go after.  That’s the heart of God.  There’s a song called “Orphans of God.”  The chorus says, “There are no strangers, there are no outcasts, there are no orphans of God.” Remember, people might stereotype people groups and cultures, but God never will.  God’s love reaches to everyone.  It doesn’t matter how rich or poor you are.  Christ came to give us life and life more abundantly.  His love and grace is so abundant and that’s enough.  God loves the poor and needy.  He wants to use us to share His love to them.  Find ways in your community to get involved.  Ask your pastor about opportunities that you can be apart of starting today.