thank you, Jesus!

I had meant to blog earlier about a situation at the childcare center where I work and I was going to title the post "Rip my heart out."

On Monday morning one of the most precious girls in our program, I'll call her Lauren, did not show up and we got a call from the housing program where her mom lives saying that her mother never came home the night before and they were MIA. I was so caught off guard and devastated. Little Lauren and her mother and little brother were recently homeless before they moved into an Open Door housing Program and I was fearing the worst, hence the title "Rip my heart out."

So I had been praying that God would give this mother the courage to do the right thing i.e. not pull her kid out of school in the middle of the semester and drag her through a life of homelessness. And yesterday to my delight as I was walking into the school to pick kids up, I heard her sweet little voice yelling, "Mr. Gary, Ms. Molly!!" and I turned around as she ran to me and I swept her into my arms! It was glorious! I had thought that I might never see her again and she is really the most "full of love" kid in our program... Her spirits seemed to be as high as usual and there were no signs of trauma or instability.

Thank you, God, for taking care of little Lauren, thank you for her faith and for her joy - may the joy of the Lord be her strength in this time of transition, amen.