Now that I have held you.....

I was reading a blog this morning and I came across this quote: 

"Orphans are easier to ignore before you know their names. They are easier to ignore before you see their faces. It is easier to pretend they're not real before you hold them in your arms. But once you do, everything changes. So when you and I hear staggering numbers and statistics about the poor and needy around us and around the world, we have a choice. We can switch the channels on our mega-TVs and continue our comfortable, untroubled, ordinary, churchgoing lives as if the global poor don't exist. We can let these numbers remain cold, distant, and almost imaginary. Or we can open our eyes and our lives to the realities that surround us and begin considering the faces that are represented by these numbers."  --David Platt

The quote is so true.  Once you hold them, everything changes.  

I thought my heart was changed towards orphans before I ever stepped foot in Ethiopia.  In many regards, it had been.  But, I never knew how much my heart would be changed when I held Eden.  Even as I sit and type this 7 months later, my eyes fill will tears...I get that "lump" in my throat recalling that moment when she wouldn't let go.  And I didn't want to let go.

 Eden is why I am going back.  The orphans of Zeway are why I am going back.  Jesus is why I am going back.  A passion was ignited in my heart in Ethiopia that I didn't know was there.  I don't know...maybe I did know but I chose to ignore it.  But there is no ignoring it now.

 As we left Zeway and our team was driving to Addis, Eden was on my heart.  My sweet teammate Heather encouraged me to listen to the song "Albertine" by Brooke Fraser.  The tears just spilled out when I listened.  

"now that I have seen, I am responsible...

now that I have held you in my own arms, I cannot let go till you are...

I will tell the world, I will tell them where I've been...."