In a few weeks, individuals throughout the global church will focus on something near to the Father’s heart, the orphan.  For this, I’m very thankful.

But, I’m also saddened and heartbroken.  You see. I cannot begin to wrap my mind around why the orphan is only worth one Sunday in churches worldwide.  I have a hard time understanding why the church chooses not to preach about our role and responsibility to the orphan on an ongoing basis.  Is the orphan not our problem, our responsibility, or our call?  Has scripture misled us all these years?  Was God not serious when he clearly told us what ‘pure and true religion’ was and is in James 1:27?

I have been attending church for all of my life.  During that time, I’ve heard three messages on our responsibility to the orphan.  Yes, 3, that’s it! The first was in 2008 when I stood before the congregation I served in Waco, Texas, and preached about God’s heart for the orphan. Prior to that point I had never sat in a local church and heard a message regarding the church, the orphan, and our role to serve as followers of Christ.  How ironic it is that we like to celebrate our own adoption into God’s family, but rarely do we call people to reciprocate that same love, commitment and sacrifice to be a family for someone else. 

Do you know why that is?  I don’t.  But, I tend to think it is because we don’t like messy, life changing mandates to be placed on our lives.  We like clean, simple, concise calls that only stretch us so far and guess what??  Often times, church leadership is not immune from that same desire.  After all, if they call their people to serve in that capacity, what does that mean for them?  Will God call them to do the same?  So, we avoid preaching things that might get extremely messy.   Instead we preach on the simple; the things we can control, manipulate, or quantify.

It is sad.  The church was never intended to be God’s pep rally; we were intended to be His hands, His feet, and His body.  Instead, somewhere along the way we convinced ourselves that salvation is all about our experience with God and not other’s experiencing God through us.   And when it’s about us, it is easy to forget them; the orphan, the fatherless, and the lonely.  When we are busy fitting God into our lives, it is easy to forget that He wants our lives to be all about Him.

The work of the orphan is messy.  The orphan forces us to stare directly into the brokenness of our world with all of its sin, selfishness, heartache, disease, poverty, addiction, homelessness, neglect, abuse, generational cycles, failure, and struggles.  And none of these fit very neatly into our calendars on our iPhones, or our Sunday morning ‘experiences’.   So, we avoid it.  But, we shouldn’t.

Underneath all that brokenness is God in action.  He is the God of the orphan, of you and of me.  He is the God of adoption and sonship.  He is the God who defends the fatherless and sets the lonely in families and He is the God who calls all of us to follow Him on this journey.  He never promised it wouldn’t be messy and heartbreaking, but He did promise the redemption story would be worth the ride.

On November 2nd, I’ll applaud those churches remembering the orphan and at the same time my heart will be heavy wondering, what if?  What if the church really rose up and heard God’s heart?  How could we change this world, but more importantly, how could we change the life of that one orphan in Africa, that one foster child in America, that one child abandoned, or that one teenager ‘aging out’ of the foster care system?  How could we live out our adoption and act like adopted children who have love to give, resources to pour out, and a life ready to be interrupted?  How could we join God in doing what He is already doing, loving the orphan?

Join me. Say a prayer and ask God to rise up the Church on behalf of orphans worldwide.  And, then ask God to move you and I to join Him, our Father, in this cause, a cause that is near to His heart.

3 Simple Steps to Get Involved Today:

Educate:  Connect with local groups who serve foster children, learn about the needs they have from the smallest to largest.  Connect with a family who has fostered or adopted.  Spend time understanding their heart, the process, and their needs.  Connect with organizations that serve orphans on a global scale.  Listen to their needs.  Basically, spend time becoming familiar with the orphan on a local and global scale.

Pray:  Ask God what it is He would have you to do.  Not everyone is called to foster and/or adopt a child, but we are all called to do something.  Ask and then listen.

Engage:  Whatever it is you feel He is calling you to do, do it!  If we wait around for someone else to do it, who is to say it will ever get done.  The orphan needs me and you to obey and do whatever it is God is calling us to do.   Education and prayer will only go so far without action.  Get involved and do something.

P.S. I’m a big fan of Orphan Sunday, http://www.orphansunday.org and the Christian Alliance for Orphans. I hope you will be too.