A Beautiful Mosaic

A quick synopsis on life: -The school year is well under way, and we are enjoying the change in routine.  It's been encouraging to see that most of the girls enjoy going to school and work hard to do well.  We are able to maintain a bit more sanity ourselves now that we have time carved into our day to accomplish the "job-like" tasks of houseparenting (paperwork, phone calls, faxes, appointments, meetings, menu planning) before we give ourselves completely to the girls upon their arrival at 3:30pm.  -We were excited to welcome a new youth to Barton this week!  She is nine years old and a bundle of joy.  We shed tears of joy (okay, I did) as we were able to watch her reunite with her sister who lives next door on campus.  They had not seen each other for over a year.  -Although daily life is a rollercoaster, we are encouraged that in some ways, we are moving forward with the girls and continuing to build t...

Heal my limbs, and joyfully, I'll run to you. This line from a beautiful song by David Crowder* Band (imagine that) helped me formulate some of the thoughts I haven't been able to put into words about the kind of work I am doing now and the helping profession in general. This lyric is the prayer I hear bleeding from the hearts of so many of the girls we work with here.  Most of our girls know about God and His love and even enjoy attending church on Sundays.  Most of them are open to spiritual topics depending on the current circumstances and their mood.  However, I would not be able to describe any of our girls right now as joyfully running into the arms of Jesus, which is the image I recieve from this lyric: joyfully, I run to you .  Hmm.   Heal my limbs .  Is the healing of our heart's "limbs" a precursor to the joy of being in the arms of God?  Perhaps.  Sure, God is big enough to enstill joy in any heart at any time,...

I've started this post a few times now, and I am either not ready to write it or I really just do not know what to say.  It has been awhile since I blogged, as Michael and I worked our first "super shift" last week, which is a weekend shift (Thursday night - Sunday night) combined with our normal weekly shift (Sunday night - Friday afternoon).  This week was definitely our most difficult week of ministry here, by which I do not mean to be negative, only honest.  Several extreme behaviors in our girls were triggered this week with the onset of the school year and the change and anxiety that comes with that.  We started our shift on the weekend, and I think we questioned on Sunday how we would ever make it to Friday after the weekend we had had.  I think despite the despair in that statement, that was a very good place for us to come to; though, it is still a place we are coming out of despite our weekend off we just had.  But today, rathe...

We're working our first weekend with the girls this weekend (which is why we've had a few week days off this week) and will be getting them ready for school on Monday!  It should be an exciting week with a totally new schedule for all of us!  Here are some of the prayers on our hearts this week: -Please pray for one of our older gilrs, the one I mentioned last time, who has been really depressed.  She's starting to really face the issues in her life, but in the process has become very demanding and difficult.  Pray that our hearts can remain soft toward her and be filled with the love she needs. -Please pray for our 17-year-old who turns 18 this month and at this point is opting to stay in care to finish high school and go to college.  It will be such an exciting year; however, our prayer is that she can remain focused and strong once her birthday comes and the temptation to puruse things from her past and embrace supposed freedom will grow ever stronger....

"When are you leaving?" The question shocked us.  Michael and I were in the office with a few of the girls just hanging out and shooting the breeze.  And out of no where.  Our 7th grader asked, "When are you leaving?" We were a few hours away from going off duty, so we answered with the hour we would be heading to our apartment for some much-needed R&R.  "No, when are you leaving Barton (Vera Lloyd)?" she asked. We looked at each other.  "We're not leaving anytime soon; we plan to be here a long time!" "What?  I thought everyone was only here for a limited amount of time." [She's been here since April and through the transition of us coming has met 5 different staff in the Barton home, as well as several "Barton sisters."  She also is in care due to abandonment and neglect.] "Nope.  We can stay as long as we want!  We just moved across the country, so I don't think we'll want to do...

I need to get out of the way.  When her heart's breaking.  And she wants to hide from what she did.  And what she said.  And how she lied.  When she's overwhelmed and its all too heavy.  And she just can't bear one more ounce.  When life's too hard.  And things aren't changing.  I need to get my feelings out of the way.  And I need to enter.  And wipe her heart's tears.  And let her know its safe and not to hide.  I need to let her know she's forgiven.  I need to ease her burden with my care.  I need to share the Truth and hope and promise. Without letting my feelings steal the show. Because its all too easy to let it hurt your feelings.  Or get angry for the wrong things they have done.  It's way too simple to let it change your mood swings.  And build and build and build until its gone.  The natural way...the one that's easy...just stands right in the way and says - move on!  It says ...

God has called me to a place where: I spend some days sitting in waiting rooms for hours so that children can recieve the medical or psychologocial care they have been without for too long. "Progress" may look like a youth yelling and screaming about the pain in her life...finally. Grocery shopping takes two Wal-Mart baskets, two hours, and well over two (sometimes three) hundred dollars.  That is for the week. I respond to alarms at 1:30am because she's afraid of the dark and is having bad dreams, but I can't just let her crawl into our bed and fall back asleep. A single ounce of pain from the life of a youth is heavier than all the pain in my life put together.  In some ways, I am younger than the girls here. I am a minority.  I don't usually like the music, I don't understand all the slang.  The way I relate is certainly new to most of the youth here. Getting to the core issue is harder than it used to be; there are so many layers. Telling them to p...

Observations from a Midwesterner Living in the Bible Belt : Bible Belt:  an informal term for an area of the Southern United States in which socially conservative evangelical Protestantism is a significant part of the culture and Christian church attendance across the denominations is extremely high.  Christians talk often of their desire for Christianity to have more of a presence in their life and acceptance in their culture.  We want this because we want comfort and if our norm is THE norm, then we will be comfortable.  I live in a town now where I can listen to David Crowder* Band while I sit and eat at Taco Bell.  K-Love is played over the speakers at other hot spots like Wal-Mart, gas stations, and clothing stores.  No one around here feels disrespected by the lyrics or the fact that it is being played in a public setting.  On a more significant scale, there is a much greater level of openness to discussing faith and God by children...