My heart is heavy for Leo tonight, and for all of the orphans
who have been participating in this “America vacation” over the last few weeks.
He will head back to China in just a few short days. Back to an orphanage. To a society where he is considered “bad luck”
because he is an orphan. To a place where, in two short years, he leaves what
little care he has in the orphanage to be let loose in the society that has no
place for him… at the age of 14. The prospects for him are terrible.
So far no family has stepped forward to make him their own.
I hope that the publicity that he has received through this hosting program
will put his story out there enough for someone to connect to his face and his
story and bring him into a family of his own. That is one of the main points of
this program, to be sure. Though Leo himself has no idea of it, his host family
has been advocating for him and trying to get a better idea of his medical needs
(a special diet low in protein for his PKU), abilities, and personality so that
any interested family can know as much as possible about him.
But Leo himself has no idea of any of this. He has just been
told that he is on a vacation in America. And now he is leaving the family that
is hosting him to go back to the orphanage. What must be going on in his heart?
What would it be like to be a part of a family for a few weeks and then sent
away? What would it be like to see the extravagance of the American lifestyle
and then be sent back to the scarcity of the orphanage? What is his perception
of this whole experience? Was it just a fun, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity? Is
he confused, thinking that he is being rejected because he didn’t measure up
somehow?
What must it be like
to see the incredible wealth, enormous houses (compared to China), and wide
open space in America, the seemingly endless resources, and to be sent away
because there was no room for you? Maybe he doesn’t think of it that way at
all, but I can’t help but think that way. To whom much is given…
I hope that this short time with a family has given his
heart a glimpse of real love that will leave him soft to messages of real love
in the future. I hope that it is preparing him for a family of his own… soon!
Before he “ages out” of the system in two years and is ineligible for adoption.
Before he grows hard and despairing. Before the only “family” that is available
to him is the drug trade that preys on these orphans with their need and desire
to belong. Ultimately, I hope it prepares him to be adopted into the family of
God.
Yes, my heart is heavy tonight. But it is also hopeful. He IS loved and
wanted. Who, though, will be the messenger of this hope, the demonstration of
this love… to him?
