Wednesday, January 26, 2011

The beginning of our journey...

The Lord began stirring our hearts towards the orphans about 2  years ago.  The knocking came little and slow at first, and over the duration of this time, the Lord has given us a strong burden to speak for those who cannot speak for themselves, and to walk out our mandate given to us in James 1:27 “Pure and undefiled religion is this; to care for the widow and the orphan” – something that even if we tried to, we could not ignore.  We had been praying that God would “break our hearts for what breaks His,” and He has....He has  given us an undeniable and unignorable heart and passion for the orphaned children of the world.  We want to embrace the challenge of James 1:27.  We are no longer content to just feel bad when we see a picture of an orphaned child; we have decided that God holds us responsible for the 143 million boys and girls around the world, without moms and dads.  We realize that we have been given much, and therefore, much is required of us.  Our dream is for every believer to be engaged with helping vulnerable children and we long to see thousands of children around the world cared for through this ministry, and others like it.
We have been in prayer and we have researched, and now we feel like God is moving us to step out and follow His leading into a plan, that we are excited about and humbled to carry out.  The plight of 143 million orphans in our world is staggering and overwhelming, but we are prepared to commit ourselves to doing all that we can do and to spread the awareness, to save and restore the lives of these children, one by one.
We feel led to establish and lead an Orphan Ministry, as a ministry of, but not exclusive to, Southgate Church.  It is our hope and prayer, that this ministry will develop awareness, compassion and conviction to minister to orphans, through a variety of different means.
This blog will be documenting the proces of our journey, as we follow God's leading, in the vision He has written on our hearts.....