I Know What You Are Thinking

By Ruth

I think I know what you might be thinking right now.  The same thing we thought.  We are having some pretty serious thoughts based on very little information.

That conversation on the boat had been so quick.  Sometimes I even wondered if I heard it right.   And maybe this boy was joking when he made this comment.  Maybe those who heard it misunderstood him.  Maybe there was more to the story.  Maybe, maybe, maybe….

But our hearts were so there, so broken  - both of us – for this boy.   Can you imagine?  You have no parents.  Your extended family cannot take care of you.  You are brought to an orphanage.  You are taken care of, your basic needs are met.   But the truth is, each day you are one day closer to being on your own, and one day farther from the hope of belonging to a family.  The orphanage can’t keep you forever.   So what hope do you have?  Where can you go?  What can you do?  Who do you have?  And sadly, many kids end up “on the streets” begging their way through life.  And being taking advantage of.   And enduring things we can’t even comprehend.

How were our hearts so not at this point one day, and so there the next?  There was only one explanation for where our hearts were at.  God was doing something in both of us with the story of this orphan boy.

We also had some moments of looking at each other and thinking– “this is just so unreal!”

We, of course, could come up with a list a mile long of very real and practical reasons it would be difficult to do this.   The timing of this from our perspective was next to impossible.   It is such a common catch-phrase – “God’s timing is always perfect”.  But often it does not make sense or seem practical to us.  As was the case here.

And there was another possibility.  Maybe it wasn’t about this particular story.  Maybe God was just working on our thought processes to prepare us for a different direction He would be bringing us.