Invitation to Prayer ... TODAY
Dear Intercessors,
We will meet locally every Wednesday - TODAY - at 11:30 in the prayer closet at First Presbyterian Church of Midland, Texas. Please join us in lifting up the needs of vulnerable children in our community and around the world!
We will meet December 4, 11 and 18.
Sincerely,
Carrie McKean
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| Photo by Futures Without Violence |
December Faces of Children Digest
We moved this past month. And in the chaos of that and some big projects up here at the church, I completely forgot to send a Faces email last month. I’m sorry. But I have no doubt your hearts are in tune to how the Spirit would lead you to pray for children, and it’s good to know your prayers aren’t contingent on my emails!
With that being said, our move opened my eyes to something I thought might be a good prayer focus this month. I can explain best with a story about our move...
We didn’t move far… just across town to a nicer neighborhood with manicured lawns and pretty trees and a neighborhood pool. To be honest, though I feel foolish even admitting it, it feels like the kind of neighborhood where everyone has stable and happy ‘Leave it to Beaver’ lives. And there are kids moving in small packs throughout the neighborhood, tossing baseballs and riding bikes until someone calls them in for dinner. But we found out the night we moved in that our next door neighbors maybe don’t fit the profile. And with their favorite hang-out place located just across from our shared fence, we hear a LOT… fighting, complicated relational problems, drama, and more.
Though our meetings have been few, there have already been a lot of red flags, including questionable supervision of their 8-year-old little girl. (And I’m a fairly free-range style parent, so I don’t judge people for not practicing helicopter parenting.) But I’ve been waffling between concern for the little girl and frustration that these are the neighbors we’re stuck with, complete with visits from the police.
One night, when I was particularly annoyed and talking (read: complaining) to God about it, I felt a very strong impression in my spirit. I pictured the little girl in her room on one side of the house, readying herself for bed while the adults were on the other side of the house having a party. I couldn’t get the idea that she was lonely out of my head. Every time a new complaint bubbled to the surface, that phrase entered as well; Pay attention; She's lonely, Carrie… a teeter-totter between my human desires and God’s calling.
A few minutes later I decided to put the matter to rest for the night. I was scheduled to speak to a group called MOPs (Mothers of Preschoolers) a few days later. They’d asked me to share back in the summer. And when I said yes 7 months ago, I'd thought about something I’d written a few years back that I thought might be a good foundation for a message. But I hadn’t looked at it since then. With the speaking engagement a couple of days away, I sat down at my computer to search for what I’d written, a message I remembered as encouraging women to include other women in their lives rather than longing to be a part of social circles that always felt just out of reach.
I found what I was looking for and read through the essay with my neighbor finally out of my mind. And then I came to a section where I’d written that this sort of lifestyle wasn’t just about women befriending other women. I said it might mean striking up a conversation with an elderly man at the grocery store, or it might mean you have an 8-year-old little neighbor girl who is just really lonely and needs to be loved so she knows she matters.
I stopped in my tracks, heart pounding. I reread it to be sure it said what I thought it did. I tried to remember if I’d really just had the moment with God a few minutes earlier, where I couldn’t shake the impression that she was lonely in spite of all my complaints. I knew I had. I even questioned if I had written that line just then without thinking, but I knew I hadn’t. I checked to see when I’d last edited the document; when I’d written it… it was November of 2015, 4 years before we moved. At the time, I had a 4-year-old daughter, not an 8-year-old. Our neighbor was a boy. When I said yes to the speaking engagement and immediately thought of this message, the house I was sitting in hadn’t even been listed on the market.
Through it all, I felt God unequivocally speaking to me: Rather than choose annoyance and displeasure at my neighbor situation, I am to extend welcome and compassion and a mother’s love to this little girl. I don’t know what that means yet for me and my family; I’m already aware that I need to be careful with my own little girls, as this child is far wiser to the world than they are.
But I no longer believe her loneliness is a figment of my imagination. I believe it’s a God-whispered insight straight to my heart from the Father who fiercely loves each of His children. And I no longer believe it’s acceptable to sit with my annoyance, waiting for someone else to step in. I need to be intentional in cultivating opportunities to speak Life to this precious daughter of God. And maybe more than anything, I’m convinced yet again that God cares about each of his children knowing their worth and value far more than my comfort and ease, and He will stop at nothing to orchestrate opportunities to make His love concrete and tangible for His kids, including weaving together my circumstances of today with a message I so blithely wrote four years ago.
This Christmas Season, please pray for the lonely and the brokenhearted children. Their stories may remain invisible because they are so often hidden behind closed doors. But God sees and knows them, and maybe if we slow down enough to ask Him this season, He’ll show us as well.
Much love,
Carrie
Carrie J. McKean
Faces of Children Director
First Presbyterian Church of Midland, Texas
(432) 684-7821 x153
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