Because Orphans Matter

Dwight L. Moody reportedly once told this story: A little child whose father and mother had died was taken into another family. The first night she asked if she could pray, as she used to do. They said, “Oh yes.” So she knelt down, and prayed as her mother taught her; and when that was ended she added a little prayer of her own: “Oh God, make these people as kind to me as father and mother were.” Then she paused and looked up, as if expecting the answer, and added: “Of course He will.” How sweetly simple was that little one’s faith; she expected God to “do,” and, of course, she got her request.

Unfortunately, many of the orphans and abandoned children we’ve come across in our work in Moldova don’t have fond memories of a mom or a dad. What memories they do have are often dreadful, more so than I would like to put in writing. But, perhaps, when followers of Christ come on the scene, every orphan and every lonely, unloved child might pray, “Oh God, make these people as kind to me as you have been to them.”

“Father of the fatherless and protector of widows, is God in his holy habitation.”

Psalm 68:5

The Bible has a lot to say about orphans, much more than we have space to cover here, but let’s look at a few examples:

God is Our Father

Beyond the capacity of any earthly father, God is the great protector and loving Father of every child… every orphan.

One of the great tragedies of our age is how many children grow up without the presence of a father in the home. In Moldova, long the poorest nation in Europe and still among the three poorest, the problem is a rampaging epidemic. But when we can help a lonely child understand that they have a Heavenly Father who loves them, who cares for them, who holds them as precious in His sight, incredible life-altering things begin to happen in the psyche and personality of that child. No matter who else may abandon them or let them down, their Father never will!

An Essential Evidence of Our Faith

“Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.”

James 1:27

I’m no expert when it comes to New Testament Greek, but there’s no way James meant the kind of visiting we often think of. He didn’t mean for us to drop by wherever it is that an orphan or widow happens to live and say something like, “Hey, I just wanted to stop by and say hello. Have a nice day, okay!” That doesn’t sound at all right, and it doesn’t sound at all like the gospel.

The Greek word translated as “visit” (episkeptomai) is rendered in the NIV as meaning to “look after.” The definition of the word indicates a whole lot more than just paying someone a social call. Remember, we’re talking about orphans and widows here – people who are extremely vulnerable and highly likely to be in deep need.

This isn’t the full definition, but here are a couple of elements from the meaning of episkeptomai:

1. To look upon in order to help or to benefit.
2. To look after, have care for, provide for.

James brings the point home even more forcefully when he says, “If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace, be warmed and filled,’ without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” (James 2:15-17). So, visit all you want, but while you’re there, do something to help!

A Key to Blessing

“And the Levite, because he has no portion or inheritance with you, and the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, who are within your towns, shall come and eat and be filled, that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hands that you do.” (Deuteronomy 14:29). This passage is about tithing, and how to be blessed by God, and right there, as an essential part of all that, God is painstakingly specific that He wants His children to care for the widow and the orphan.

God Always Has a Plan

One of the things we always try to express to the children and young people we care for is this: Being an orphan disqualifies you from NOTHING in the eyes of God! Someone has said that there might be some accidental parents, but there are no accidental children, and that’s the truth. Can God use an orphan? You better believe it!

Way back in the day, before I moved from Scotland to the United States, I taught at a Bible college on the subject of Old Testament History. One of my favorite times as a teacher was when we’d get to the Book of Esther. It’s just such an amazing story and, even if you aren’t a Bible believer, I happen to think it’s one of the most compelling pieces of literature you’ll ever read.

We can’t go into the whole story here, but it is proof positive that God always has a plan for every life. Esther’s parents had died. I can’t begin to imagine how desperately painful it must be for a child to live through the loss of Mom and Dad, but, sadly, I’ve seen that pain in the faces of too many children. Sometimes it’s even worse. Mom and Dad are alive, but for reasons that precious little boy or girl can’t understand, they’ve been abandoned in some unfamiliar, cold, lonely place, and now they must depend on strangers to look after them. Talk about pain. Thankfully for Esther, she had an uncle, Mordecai, who stepped up and took care of the young girl.

In a series of events that only God could orchestrate, Esther found herself in a position to save the entire Jewish race. I don’t exaggerate – if one powerful and evil man, Haman, had had his way, every Jew in every province of the Persian Empire would have been executed. That empire stretched from India in the east to Greece in the west, and around the Mediterranean through Israel, Egypt and beyond into the continent of Africa. Basically, every Jew alive in the world was to be exterminated. “Letters were sent by couriers to all the king’s provinces with instruction to destroy, to kill, and to annihilate all Jews, young and old, women and children, in one day, the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar, and to plunder their goods.” (Esther 3:13).

The ESV Study Bible in its introduction to the Book of Esther states it perfectly: “If Haman had succeeded, the Jewish people as a whole would have been destroyed, and the story of God’s saving work in and through Abraham’s descendants would have come to an end. There would have been no fulfillment in Christ, and therefore no gospel and no Christian church. Nothing less than that was at stake.”

And John said this: “But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.”

John 1:12

God, of course, had different plans, and Esther was given the opportunity to intervene on behalf of her people. But it was a risky proposition. She had to put her own life at risk just to speak to the King about it. Her Uncle Mordecai made sure she knew how vital it was for her to carry out the role for which God had so strategically placed her: “For if you keep silent at this time, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another place, but you and your father’s house will perish. And who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this?” (Esther 4:14).

I get chills every time I read that verse. Who knows what plan God has for you, who knows what part He has for you to play in His Kingdom, especially at such a time as this? Does it matter if you’re an orphan? Not a bit – God has a plan for you!

Abba Father

Just in case you might need a reminder, if you are a believer and follower of Christ today, you have been adopted. We were estranged from our Father, orphans if you will, but He pursued us at immense cost, never resting till we were made His children. Romans 8:14-17 says, “For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’ The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.”

We all have an adoption story. Mine found me wandering aimlessly one Sunday night down the main street of my hometown back in Scotland. At sixteen, life was already feeling empty. I saw what was happening to everyone around me and it wasn’t good. Six of us prowled down the street that night, with no future, no hope, nothing but trouble on our minds and in our hearts. I was headed for an eternity where I would never know the love of my Father… a spiritual orphan if ever there was one.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a man stop in his tracks on the other side of the street. He got my attention in a hurry, because he looked right at us, and when he started walking again, I’ve rarely seen anyone move with such intensity and determination. He crossed the street, not at the crosswalk, but diagonally, coming straight for us. He was obviously looking to “take us on,” but, as we would find out, not in the way we thought. He told us people called him Locky. He witnessed fearlessly, and I have never forgotten his words or his courage. His audacious love for Jesus was imprinted on my spirit, and reminds me still why we must carry the Gospel to those who are lost today, as I was.

I asked Jesus to be my Lord and Savior soon after. I was adopted by my Heavenly Father, but only after Locky, one of His children, was obedient. After a while, I left town, and although I came back many times to visit my folks, somehow, I never saw Locky again. Then, on one of those visits home, I went along to my old church on another Sunday night some thirty-five years later. There was Locky. All I could do was thank him from the bottom of my heart for what he did that night. I introduced him to my wife, Yvonne, and told him how we were in full-time ministry in America, and that my three children were all in church and serving God. Tears flowed down his face and mine, as we thanked God together for the blessings that came from his act of obedience.

Orphans Matter

I guess it goes back to that little girl’s prayer that people would be kind to her. We have been shown immense kindness by our Heavenly Father, and He wants us in turn to show kindness to the helpless and the vulnerable and the hurting. And as important as it is that we feed, clothe and shelter them, there is one kindness greater than all the rest that we can bring into their lives. In Moldova, we’ve rescued kids and young people for many years now. We’ve made sure they have nutritious food, warm clothing, and a safe place to call home, and we’ve provided them a way to complete their education so they can get the kinds of jobs that break the cycle of poverty and vulnerability. But for all that, there’s much more to offer them. With their grateful, happy faces fresh in my memory from a recent trip, with the sounds of their prayers as they sought God still with me, as I fellowshipped with them around the dinner table and watched them just living life in the homes our generous donors have provided, I know that an eternal change is happening in many of their lives. By sharing the love of God and living it out in front of them, we have the privilege of helping them realize that their Heavenly Father loves them, that He will always be there for them, and that they can be adopted into the Family of God for all eternity. In other words, even in a country like Moldova, where to be an orphan carries enormous stigma, where they have a million different reasons to sink into despair, and where everyone in their lives may have let them down, God never will, because in His eyes, orphans matter.

The orphans we help can change the world.