Not complete!

Not Complete!
by Heather Collver

We are all born into this world with the same story: God created us and a man fertilized the seed that the mother provided and carried that creation in her womb so that we would be born into this world. That is a fact. We can't change it. There are many other ways that science has discovered in which a child can be born into this world, but God's design remains the same, it takes his master plan and two people, one female, the other male. What happens after fertilization is what makes each of us unique in our own story.

Recently many events have occurred in my circle of influence that has made me realize just how different we are from one another. Not the obvious differences, like male and female, but that each of us is truly a miracle. Baby Jamison was diagnosed with a heart defect while in his mother's womb. The doctor's encouraged her to terminate her pregnancy. He just turned 3 this summer. We experienced the birth of baby Lauren, who was born at 26 weeks gestation. She was created for a purpose and her little story began sooner than most of ours. There is something to be said about these little fighters. They know they have a purpose, before they can begin to reveal it to us or verbalize it, they are already living miracles, doing God's work in our lives.

Yesterday, our church was privileged to have the president of Compassion International come and share his story with us. We combined all our services and had one great big service out side. Wes shared with us his story and how he knew at age 10 that he was going to do great things for lost and hurting children. He knew this because he had to go through his own "hell" as a child. I encourage you to learn his story if you can. I am sure you can find his most recent book about his life on the website http://www.compassion.com/default.htm He is now 60 years old. He spoke with so much passion about children, about his calling in life, that I was compelled to ponder on my own life, how different our stories are, the fact that there are so many numbers out there that need to be turned into stories, what if the 500 children that gave their lives to Christ yesterday through Compassion ministries actually became a list of names? What if the number of orphans actually became a list of names? Would that change the way we see the situation?

This week, I am going to write about Orphans. Since our study is on Men of the Bible A-Z, I think I would cover many of them through this week's study. There just wasn't an O name that stuck out like the Orphan subject that was on my heart. The definition of an Orphan is a child deprived by death of one or both parents.

Dear Lord, I give my mouth to you this week. Use it as your tool. Give us something new this week to take away from this devotional and to actually put into action. Let us not just be hearers of the word, but to be doers. Amen.

Some thoughts:
I would love to pool together as a group (there are over 100 who subscribe to the Women of Worship devotionals) and adopt at least one child from Compassion. But what if we all made a commitment to pay one month out of every year the cost of adopting a child? We could adopt over 8 children just through this group alone. How awesome would that be? Please let me know if you would be interested in adopting a child as part of the group or on your own. You can visit http://www.compassion.com/default.htm for more info.

You have a story, and I know it is different than mine, in fact it is uniquely yours. My sister, Angela, and I both write this devotional. We are not the same. We both have our own stories, but we want to share your stories too. If you took a few minutes to write your story and share it with us, we would love to help others heal through your story.