Part 2: Hi God! It's me, Kim.
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We received our first placement call while out of town. Most of the moms are single and many are homeless, but this mom was in a decent place. She had started a new job, secured housing, but she was overwhelmed and without reliable childcare in order to start her job. She needed someone to love on her kids, yes, but I could tell what she really needed was to be heard and seen and loved.
Without someone trying to fix her.
But in order to show you where God took us in those moments to follow, you have to come back with me to this past June when Ben and I were at our training for Safe Families. We arrived late…zip.it… to a section in the presentation called “Good Enough Parenting.”
HELLO, ANYONE?! THE FEARINGS ARE ALREADY THERE!
The truth was simple. There’s no formula for being a parent and we shouldn’t expect others to do it exactly as we do. They just need to do it “good enough” for the child to feel safe and loved. And when you strip away all the extras we add and are genuinely just left with those two notions, isn’t there a freedom that you feel? A simplicity in it all. To not be the perfect mom or the best dad but to just be good enough.
So we picked up this sweet boy the next day after the call, knowing very little about where he comes from, what he’s seen, what he’s known to be his truths and we got to just shower him with love and attention and safety. Because that’s all I had in me to give, and that was good enough.
What we had prayed about but had no idea how it would work, is how to help his mom. Turns out all she needed was love and acceptance, and I had those in me to give too because God has given me that over and over and over again. She needed a listening ear and sound advice. She needed to see that hope exists even if she doesn’t believe it yet for herself.
So he jumped into our lives and joined our family. We were Fearing Party of 6, and the kids went through a quick adjustment period and then embraced him as part of us, like he had always been in the middle of it all. And then it was time to become a party of 5 again.
Before starting the program, I had wrestled with how I would cope with the goodbyes because I knew I would become attached easily. But you see there’s a knowledge that this child is a child of God, who belongs to neither me nor his bio mom. I had an understanding that God placed him with us for a period of time to show him unconditional love but the goal was always for him to go back home. It’s never meant to be forever. So it shifted my attachment. It didn't mean I hadn't loved so deeply and vulnerably that the goodbye didn’t sting, but it meant I loved him with the knowledge that God loves him infinitely more because that child was always and will always be His. And I’m just blessed to be a part of his story.
That got me thinking…what if I loved my own kids like that? Parenting them with the knowledge that they do not belong to me but to God instead. That my role is just to love them and point them to Jesus for whatever amount of time I’m blessed to have them, because the goal is always for them to go home to Jesus in the end. How would it make my mom role look different? The harsh truth is that it would make it look different in almost every way from what I’ve been doing. To wake up every single morning and say “They are not mine, but yours. As their Creator, show me how you would parent them today because I know you love them more than I am capable of loving."
We walked into this believing we would shape and change the lives of children. I have come to realize in a brief time that what I have to give these precious lives doesn’t even come close to what they have to give me. I have seen things and come to understand things and there’s no going back now. Ever. Because once God reveals them to you, there’s new responsibility. You’ve become His hands and feet. You understand His burdened heart and it would seem like betrayal to walk away from that without dreaming of how hope can cause change. You cannot turn your eyes from one part of your city and think it won’t deeply impact every part of your city.
I’ve known these things existed but it wasn’t until now that I realize I never saw…poverty, desperation, hopelessness and the biggest beast among them is racism. You guys I can’t even skim the surface of my thoughts on this in one blog entry, but racism is alive and well as soon as you walk out your front door. The looks I’ve gotten. The questions strangers feel they can ask. Not the curious looks and glances wanting to understand more, but the harsh judgmental ones who have already created a story. One that deletes all hope and love and evokes hate.
I do not live in the world I thought I did. The one where people don’t see color and socioeconomic status. My eyes have been opened in a new way and once I can rally my thoughts and finish reading books I’ve purchased on the subject and have more heart to hearts with Black friends, then I can hopefully scratch the surface on this hard topic in my blog. But the hurt on this subject runs so deep for people that I know only my God can change hearts. But what can I do? What can we do? It weighs heavy on my heart. May I never withdraw from being made uncomfortable but instead fight for change.
When I have taken these children home, I see where they live. I SEE. I can’t just drive quickly through poverty-stricken neighborhoods and ones filled with gang violence any longer because I SEE. I KNOW. Yet, we sit in spacious homes and demand more space. We send our children to schools and expect better educations. We have jobs and yet need more money. I want these moms to know I SEE YOU and it’s not fair but HOPE IS ALIVE. My children are learning to see you too and they will grow up seeing and loving and praying over your children. We are in it with you.
You guys have showered me with humbling words of affirmation but I need you to know that I am no different than you. I don’t feel amazing, admirable, inspiring, saintly and all the other wonderful adjectives you sent me. I feel imperfect, unworthy, incapable, insufficient with a sinful nature. I feel all those things because I AM all those things…without Jesus. But God sees me as perfect in His sight, worthy of all things, capable of doing great things with a pure heart, when I do them to glorify His name.
I am not perfect. Shocking news to my ego.
I am an imperfect person trying to follow a perfect God who invites me along to join His work.
I know serving in this way isn’t meant for everyone. We were all created with unique gifts and talents, but if God is stirring your heart, then pursue it. Saying yes out of obedience is life-changing. You’ll never know what you’ve missed. And if Safe Families isn’t what He’s calling you to do, find out what it is. Don’t stop searching and asking and praying until it stirs up something inside of you that you can’t go to sleep at night without saying YES OK. I’LL DO IT! He has created you to impact the world. Yeah, little imperfect you and me -
TO.IMPACT.THE.WORLD.
GO FIND OUT WHAT IT IS!
“When confronted with the corruption of our world, Christians ought to be provoked to engage, not offended and withdrawn.” Michael Metzger