Daring to be Restless

“Teenagers are my favorites.”   It’s one of my more recent catch-phrases, and it often takes people by surprise.   But it’s true.   I love working with teenagers.   I love being around them in the office, at church, and in the community.   Mind you, I’m not that far removed from being a teenager, and am only in my 20s, but there is something about them that captures my heart, that raises up something fierce in me to protect them, that brings a smile of joyful expectation to my face.   Don’t get me wrong – I know that teenagers can be moody, overly sensitive, and a bit defiant as they struggle to figure out who they are.   But I love their honesty.   I love how aware they are of other people and their motives, how they see sift through the pretense to discover what a person really feels towards them and thinks.   I love to see their personalities and passions begin to unfold, directing them toward the future God has designed for them. ...

“Deep in man’s heart are some fundamental questions that simply cannot be answered at the kitchen table.   Who am I?   What am I made of?   What am I destined for?   It is fear that keeps a man at home where things are neat and orderly and under his control.   But the answers to his deepest questions are not to be found on television or in the refrigerator.” – John Eldredge   “Deep in his heart, every man longs for a battle to fight, an adventure to live, and a beauty to rescue.” – John Eldredge [1] There is a stillness in the churches and homes of America, a great slumber and snore, a gray emptiness, if you will.   There is a dull whisper, like the echo of an old empty farmhouse, devoid of the bustling routine, laughter and love it was accustomed to.   Like that house whispers, “Where is my family?” the stillness in the church whispers: Where are the men of God?   Too often, their posts are vacant, inactive, or trivialized. ...

“But this people is compromised.   They’ve been plundered and robbed.   They have lost – things, liberty, place, and name.   They are all trapped in holes and tucked away in prisons.   They’ve been plundered and depleted with none to the rescue.   They’ve been stolen away with none to insist, ‘Give them back.’” -           Isaiah 42:22, Voice The last several months have taken a toll on my soul.   In my job and in my personal life, I have become deeply acquainted with injustice and have witnessed institutional level ambivalence strip children and families of hope, of their voice.   I have seen the evil of apathy and convenience … and grown weary of it.   And perhaps that’s why reading this verse – it stirs something in me.   This verse is about our generation, about our culture, about the problems the world is facing today … and the God-given call to do something about it.   ...

As long as I can remember, both my sister and I have wanted to adopt. Throughout our childhood, our favorite movies and books have always centered around adoption – adopted characters, misfit families of people who weren’t related but became “family” when they needed it most.   It’s no surprise that our favorite Bible verses have been adoption verses as well, verses like Psalm 68:5-6, where God says that He is the Father of the fatherless, who places the lonely in families. Perhaps that’s why Russia has always been on our hearts, a place of interest to us both.   I even studied Russian for a year in college, soaking up the language and dreaming of the people there.   According to some reports, there are over 700,000 orphans in Russia alone, living in more than 2,176 orphanages or on the streets – and the numbers are rising each year.   The outcomes for these children are particularly grim, most of them “aging out” of the orphanages around the age of 16 or 17 a...