Wednesday morning started off as most mornings....I was planning to work from the coffee shop while Glenn homeschooled at The House of Dreams. Just as I was about to leave, I received a phone call from one of the student's moms asking if I could bring her a piece of paperwork to the Department of Family and Child Services. Her food stamps had been cut off because she was working more hours and no longer needed unemployment but there had been some sort of snafu between DFCS and Dept of Labor and her benefits were terminated. What started off as dropping off a piece of paper resulted in a 6 hour adventure with this mom taking us back and forth between the two places no less than 4 times. For the most part, I just chauffered and stayed in the car, but when we were sent back to the Department of Labor for the third time with the SAME exact instructions..I decided to go in to keep the frazzeled mom calm. What I witnessed frustrated me to my core. I was treated completely differently and met with a desire to help me get to the bottom of the issue. The fact that the mom saw this made it even worse. I know that she was frustrated and may not have been as kind after being told the same thing over and over again, but I can't blame her. She depends on bus transportation and would have had to go back and forth on a bus to two different parts of the city and would never have gotten the answer she needed. Just before they closed they decided to finally accept the paperwork that they declined in the beginning of the day and reinstatment of benefits was promised in 48 hours. We had the opportunity to talk about how Satan likes to try and discourage us and make us feel defeated...especially when we are doing the right things and receiving the blessings of doing that. She was in a panic because her daughters birthday was the following day and she needed the food stamps to help with food for her party. I immediately put out the call for supporters to help throw her little 2 year old the best Minnie Mouse birthday party she could have to take that stress off of her shoulders. I assured her that God knew long before that moment that she would be in that position and He had already put others in the position to help. Within hours we had a cake, a grocery gift card, presents, decorations. And this was the most precious result!
The same week we spent time with another sweet girl who we treated to pizza one afternoon. While at the restaurant we asked her what her dreams were. She quickly went into a very animated discussion about wanting to go to Africa to feed the hungry children and how many she could bring them clothes.
On the way home we heard this sweet small voice in a whisper....as we listened we realized she was praying, "Dear God..please let me go to Africa to be a missionary." Bless!
There is one particular family that I have probably spent more time laboring over in prayer than others. The kids are involved in our ministry but I've had very little interaction with the parent. It seemed as though every time I would reach out to her and try to meet, she would either cancel or never come outside. Partnering with parents is the absolute best case scenario so that we can work together to set their child up for success. Recently this mom reached out to me and asked me for a workbook about Jesus. I purchased one for her and offered to meet with her and her older daughter weekly to discuss it. She agreed. I got up this morning, fully expecting her to cancel yet again but instead..for the first time ever she and her adult daughter got in my car and was very excited to meet.
We went to the local IHOP where I bought them breakfast and for an hour we talked about stress and worry and what God's Word says. I helped them come up with a Bible reading plan for this week. We prayed together and she expressed how thankful she was for what we were doing with her kids and to PLEASE keep doing it.
Y'all.....GOD IS GOOD. He is never late. He hears our prayers. He sees needs. He wants to show up and meet them in unexpected ways. He loves to see his church mobilized to carry each others burdens in whatever way that looks like at the time. And personally.....we are so thankful. Thank you for praying with us, showing up and meeting the needs we express. This is such a fun story to be a part of.
Blessings.
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