Happy iFast58 Wednesday!  If you’re new to caring about orphans, like I was a few short months ago, visit www.ifast58.org and pray for this week’s batch of prayer requests from organizations fighting for orphans.  It’s a great way to grow.  When God broke my heart a few months ago, I didn’t know where to point my newfound caring-osity, but through iFast58, I’ve discovered other people and organizations with whom I can join and make an actual difference in the lives of the innocent victims of this world.

Okay, so one of the organizations that I’ve learned a bit about is Abba Fund.  Today, this fabulous org is on my heart.  When Alex and I felt the call to adopt (the emotional equivalent of being slammed into by an 18-wheeler), we were able to start right away.  God blessed us with the ability to start writing checks.  So we did.  A check here, a check there.  Someone needs our credit card.  Four or five someones need a stack of money orders.  Adoption isn’t cheap.  It makes me chuckle a bit at the people who made comments during our jag with in vitro, “In vitro’s expensive.  Why don’t you just adopt?”  Just adopt, eh?  There’s nothing just about it.

We “just” wrote another couple of big checks this week, and today, when Abba Fund popped up in the iFast58 prayer list, I had to petition God, to shout for those whose wallets are keeping them from their children.  Abba Fund provides help for those called to adoption who need financial assistance.  Imagine if you felt God calling you to your child but lacked the means to bring him or her home.  Adoption is an exhausting world filled with the unknown…and that’s without the unknown of where the next payment is going to come from. 

If you don’t feel God calling you to adopt, that’s okay.  He doesn’t call everyone.  But he does call us all to care for orphans.  Maybe that means that you help make someone else’s adoption possible by giving a donation to Abba Fund.  There is enough money in the world to place every adoptable orphan in a home.  It doesn’t have to be your home, but maybe you can help fill someone else’s.  Visit www.AbbaFund.org.

(From Tom Davis’ blog.  Click the link below to read more.)

Dear Friends,

I’m excited to let you know that a generous ministry partner has awarded HopeChest a $20,000 grant to stop sex trafficking in Russia and challenged us to match it by midnight, December 31.

Since that’s just 2 days away, I need your help (and voice) to help meet this challenge.

I sent an e-mail out earlier today to our supporters, and posted on my blog at http://www.cthomasdavis.com/.

Hi, Baby Dale.  I’ve started referring to you as “Slash,” because I keep saying girl-slash-boy, him-slash-her, when I talk about you.  It’s kind of a cool name.  We called Elliott “Beedee,” so wow, the two of you could easily be in a cartoon on Nickelodeon.  “Beedee and Slash.”  For sure.  Anyway, just thinking about you.  I always do, but I tend to blog to you when it’s late at night and the pain of not being with you overwhelms me to the point where I have to do the next best thing to rubbing my belly and talking to you in a rocking chair.  I wonder if you’re kicking and squirming right now.  If you’re anything like your brother, you are.  Your brother loves to jump, jump, jump, and I’m pretty sure he started in the womb.  I hope that by this time next year we’ll all be together.  God knows, but little one, all I can do is pray and wait.  I never thought about it until this Christmas, but Jesus was an orphan.  God loves adoption so much that He had His only Son adopted by Joseph.  I don’t even know if you’re a boy or girl, but God knows every hair on your head.  It makes my waiting easier, knowing that He knows you, He loves you more than even I do.  If you were in my tummy, I probably would’ve seen your 20-week ultrasound by now – 10 fingers, 10 toes, perfect profile, and you would’ve upgraded from “Slash” to a real name.  Luckily, “Slash” is really cool, so you can just keep it for a little while longer.

Kisses and hugs, sending oodles of love to you,

Mommy

Do you ever just come across a few lines in Scripture that surround you, seep into the cracks in your heart and fill in the holes in your brain?  I’ve read these words time after time, but today, stumbling upon them unexpectedly, they just sunk into my soul.

“So do not fear, for I am with you;
       do not be dismayed, for I am your God.
       I will strengthen you and help you;
       I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.”  Isaiah 41:10

This is taken from Tom Davis’ blog:

As you read this letter there are over 2 million children forced into prostitution and sex slavery.  This can be prevented and we can do something about it. These girls need our help and there isn’t time to waste.  Right now, pimps and prostitution rings are targeting our precious, young girls. They wait for them to leave the protection of the orphanage, and then offer them a “job.”  Many of the girls simply disappear: never heard from again by their friends.  But sometimes you glimpse this horror.

To read more of this post and learn what you can do to help end sex trafficking before it starts, visit http://tomdavis.typepad.com/tom_daviss_blog/2009/12/urgent-stop-sex-trafficking-now.html.