For the last year and a half, she has come onto our "radar" for a month or two, then she'll disappear for three or four months, then she'll show up again.
In the first of those "seasons" she was so poor that she needed transportation for essentials:
We would give her rides to the Greymere Church of Christ clothes closet, which gives away clothes on Thursday mornings. We would give her another ride to The Family Center where she could get some toiletries and counseling and some food. They would refer her to Harvest Share where she could get more food. We would take her there.
Then, one day, the calls ceased and she disappeared for a while.
A couple of months later she called again and another season began:
This time she was pregnant, and we set up a ride to take her to A Woman's Place, where they could help her with Christian counseling. She cancelled that ride and didn't go. She carried the baby a few months and then miscarried, (that's what she told us) which was really hard on her. One day, she stopped calling and we didn't hear from her.
Time passed. The next time that she called for our services, she was looking for work:
We were excited for her. We took her to the Career Center and to other Employment Agencies. We took her to job interviews, and sure enough she got a job at a fast food restaurant. Then, every workday, we took her to work! All the drivers encouraged her to stay with it. They were trying to encourage her because it was very obvious that she was very sad and very depressed. Then, we learned that she was pregnant, again.
She began to complain about her job, then she quit, then she disappeared, again.
Well, she called again, yesterday:
We don't know, yet, how it will be this time, but her situation brings to mind why it is that I have such hope for the MUMs ministry and why it is that I still have great hopes for her . . . .
It's because we're in this for the long run!
Some of the same ladies that took her where she needed to go on that first round were still taking her where she needed to go on the last one! Some of our volunteers have driven for six years now, and I have no doubt that if they're alive and able, they'll still be driving for
six more years!
Their prayers for her now number in the multiple hundreds.
Today, would YOU lift another prayer for this young lady?
We must believe that, one day, the sheer weight of those accumulated prayers will tip the scales on her behalf!
Up to this point, an imnmovable counter-weight sits upon the scales of her life. The weight of an abused childhood, the weight of a troubled youth, the weight of rejection after rejection after rejection, has placed an awful heaviness in her life.
It may take a lot more time and a lot more prayers before those scales will finally tip in her favor, but we must pray and believe that THEY WILL TIP! And when they do, we hope to be her to help her then, too.
Let's pray that, for her, this Christmas Season will be better than last Christmas.
Let's pray that the next Christmas Season will be better than this one,
until finally,
one Christmas Season . . . . . . ,
her testimony will be
that the Christ of Christmas has come
to be the King of her healed heart!
Grant it Lord, we pray
