Entertaining Angels

My mind has been spinning since last night. Sean and I are officially licensed Foster-Adopt parents! There have been a few bumps along the road, but I know that it is all in God's timing. If there was enough space I'd write all the confirmations that God has given us in this process, but I will start with one.

One of the biggest affirmations to becoming a foster parent has been the idea of "entertaining strangers." We were evacuated because of the Waldo Canyon Fire in June. The Lord chose to spare our home. When we came back we knew we shouldn't sit idly by and watch those who lost their homes struggle on their own.  Samaritan's Purse came into town and they were helping with the clean-up of burned homes. So, on our date day we decided to volunteer. When we got to the orientation meeting they had mentioned a woman had traveled all the way from Indiana just to help the victims of the fire. She had even spent the night outside in the parking lot of the church just to be there to help out.
On our way to the home-sites where we would be working, I told Sean if no one had offered that gal a place to stay, and if she was on our team then I think we should offer her our spare bedroom. Sean was up for it. By God's great planning, she ended up being on our team. There were ten teams, and of course she was on ours. But, I figured someone had to have offered her a place to stay by now. There were over eighty people, so of course one person would've offered her their spare room. The hours went by and I finally got a chance to talk to her. Terrified, I told her we would love to offer her our home while she stayed and helped with the victims of the fire. She joyfully accepted. Later during the day I found out that Sean had also asked her but she rejected his offer because another gal had offered her a place to stay. Little did she know that the other gal was his wife ;-)

I know it sounds crazy to offer a complete stranger your bedroom in the basement, but she was claiming to be a Christian, and I thought it absolutely horrid that the church made her sleep in the parking lot, so we had to trust God to keep us safe. We're called to love our brothers and sisters in Christ like they ARE our brothers and sisters.

Long story short she has become one of my dearest friends. We often laugh about how we were worried for our personal safety, but we had to trust in God more, and by trusting Him He gave me one, out of a few, of the best encouraging, God-fearing, and loving sisters I could ask for.
By meeting her, God gave us that good "kick in the butt" to follow Him whole-heartedly. Jenny sold everything she had, bought a bus ticket, and traveled out to CO because she felt God calling her there. Who does that? Who's willing to give up all you know for the unknown? Those who are seeking to live in God's will, that's who.

Paul says in Hebrews 13:1-3 "Keep on loving one another as brothers and sisters. Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it. Continue to remember those in prison as if you were together with them in prison, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering."

What if you actually did what that verse said? What if you entertained a stranger, but were actually entertaining an angel? What if you cared about those who were suffering like you were actually suffering or your child or sister or brother was suffering? How would you live your life? Maybe by becoming a foster parent? Maybe by having a homeless man over for dinner? Maybe by adopting a child in need? Why not give it a try. We did and we've been able to see God move in miraculous ways.

I am so excited for the opportunity to love on some little children. You never know, we could be entertaining angels.


PS. If you want to support Jenny and her "Safe & Well Ministry," you can contact her at: Jennyrbettenhausen@gmail.com