Ravenna's heart

   

     I am sitting here tonight humbled once again by the beautiful heart of my Ravenna girl. Before we even adopted her, God told me that her life would be marked by the compassion of Christ and the deep Joy of the Lord. At times I am so humbled to be her Mama as she is truly the one who is teaching me. At every meal this little girl prays for every hurting person she can think of, including whole nations. She prays with power and conviction...asks the Holy Spirit in specific ways how to help. When she accepted Christ it was in the context of a conversation  about the battle between good and evil...she more than anything wanted to give her life to serving Jesus...you know what her next question was though? "Mama...what about Satan? Isn't there some way that he can accept Jesus too?"
     I get these glimpses every once in awhile of the powerful woman of faith that she will be (that she already is honestly) and then she will twirl away as her 5 year old ballerina self to go and torment her brother.  It takes my breath away...

Yes, she can be fiesty...

And a goofball :)

      We had one of those moments this week. She received birthday money from her Aunt & Uncle. On the way home I was telling her that we could go to the fancy toy store in town and she could out something special. Once home, she really wanted her piggy bank and wanted me to open it up. I figured that she just wanted to put the check in it...she went into her room and came out a few minutes later with the contents of her piggy bank. She started making piles of change on the kitchen counter. I asked her what she was doing. She said that she was dividing her money up because she wanted to give it to Haiti, Chile, Turkey and Greece (countries hit by earthquakes recently) and to Maria's Big House of Hope in China (http://www.showhope.org/OrphanCare/MariasBigHouseofHope.aspx). I asked her how much she wanted to give and she looked up at me with her bright brown eyes and said, " All of it Mama, my birthday money too! I am going to save one dollar to go to the Dollar Store and get something special for myself."
     Then she looked at her piles of change thoughtfully and broke out into a little dance around the kitchen. Gleefully she said, "Mama, I know this isn't much but God can make it bigger just like the fish and the bread! He can make it HUGE!" and then she was off to play babies with Georgia....
    Can I just say what an honor it is to parent this little girl?