If God will do whatever He wishes,
regardless of whether we pray or not, then we do not need to pray at
all, and the Lord's instructions on praying for the kingdom and the will
are superfluous. But the truth is that God waits for a remnant to rise
up and to pray in agreement with His purpose before He does anything -
He will do nothing apart from the church. Apart from HIM, we CAN do
nothing; apart from US, He WILL do nothing -Chip Brogden
Dear ,
Yesterday we had the opportunity to share in three churches about the burden God has given us for the adult orphans. I don't think we realized how much we needed to share this burden! Somehow, without us realizing it, we had taken the responsibility for the lives of these young women into our own hands. This was never God's plan!
As we unloaded our hearts to these loving, understanding people, we realized all the more that God's plan is that the Body of Christ function in harmony to touch broken humanity. We were so blessed as these three small village churches committed to pray for us and for "our girls", as well as for God's plan for their restoration.
The task before us is mountainous. The young women God has called us to are, in human terms, irreparable. Psychology would say that there is no way to fix the damage caused by lack of physical contact at a young age. They would say that their negative behavior is too ingrained, and that the abuse that they have suffered is too severe for them to ever recover and function in any kind of normal way. Thank God that He is able to give beauty for ashes and gladness for mourning. We are not so naive as to believe that we can change these girls. But we know the One that can!
 We continue to invite girls from the homeless   shelter to come to our home for a one week "vacation". We take them sight-seeing, feed them good meals, and give them a safe and quiet place to sleep for a week. We also plant seeds of God's Word in their hearts, teach them to pray, and speak words of hope for the future. Honestly, it is quite exhausting!
But God is touching their hearts and we are developing trust with the girls that we know will be required for any longer term situations in the future.
We know we cannot do this alone. Some days we don't want to do it at all! But God is faithful, and His grace is sufficient! As you are reminded, please pray for us and for the girls God has called us to serve. We know that prayer can move mountains! Thank you for standing with us.
Going for Him,
Stephanie and Leslie
|
