For the last year or so our family has participated in the Safe Families program for 4KIDS of South Florida.
In this program, you’re screened, your home is evaluated, and then, if you’re approved, you take in children whose parents or parent (usually a single mom) find themselves in crisis and need for someone else to take care of their child or children for an undetermined period of time (usually for a month or less). We recently had a little boy in our house named Bill. (Okay, I made that up, his real name is Pete. Alright, that’s not it either. We’ll call him JQ, which is actually closer to his real name.) Anyway, JQ is 4, has 2 brothers and a sister, all younger than him. His father is in prison and his mother is trying to find a job and a way out of her very dangerous neighborhood. So, we took JQ for a couple of weeks in an effort to help out and were delighted to discover what a great kid he is.
JQ is quiet, polite, obedient, sleeps well, eats well (actually, we’ve discovered that all of these kids eat well – In fact, they eat like they might not see food again for a while…) takes his dishes to the kitchen, and showed almost no signs of disobedience or anything else for that matter which might shed some light into what was really happening in his little heart. Well that all changed when his brother came to visit for a day. My wife agreed to also watch his 3 year old brother for a day until another family got back into town and could come pick him up and I came home just before his brother had to leave with that family.
In fact, JQ and I stood there together as his brother was being put into the car of this other family. Needless to say, his brother didn’t want to leave JQ behind and he was quite skilful at making his wishes known. However, leave, he did, and a little while later when I was walking down the hallway in our house I heard the muffled sobs of a confused and broken heart. I quietly stepped in my son’s room and found JQ in there all alone. Not knowing what else to do, I simply got down on my knees and opened my arms up to this little guy who had seen and experienced so much in the previous few weeks (to say nothing of his 4 short years). No sooner did I hit my knees than did JQ run over to simply collapse into my arms. And so, I knelt there for a while, holding this precious little boy as he just “let it all out,” and thinking about how much I hate sin, and poverty, and crime, and brokenness, and pretty much anything else that results in moments like these. I am eternally grateful for the remedy that is Jesus and I am thankful also for the privilege of being his emissary to that child in that moment. However, moments like that also prompt me to say with the Apostle, “Even so, Come Lord Jesus.” (Rev. 22:20)
What a beautiful picture also of how we can run into our Father’s arms and sob and sob. He holds us and comforts us. He allows us to. You are not even his earthly father but you gave JQ a wonderful memory of what it is like to be held and comforted by a father figure. Changing lives one person at a time.