Christian Alliance for Orphans Summit 2016

4 states, roughly 1,200 miles, and 5 days. It has been a FULL week.  Our trip to the Christian Alliance for Orphans Summit was incredibly eye opening, inspirational and educational.  It was amazing to be surrounded by an incredible group of people who believe firmly and tangibly in answering God’s call to care for the orphans and vulnerable children of the world. God’s heart is for the weak and disadvantaged and ours need to be as well.  The CAFO conference gave us an excellent groundwork and launchpad for diving deeper into our thinking and actions on the subject of adoption and the care of orphaned and vulnerable children.  At one point, Meghan told Craig, “I’ve learned so much but I also feel like I know less now than I did before because this has been so eye opening.”  We always knew we didn't know everything there is to know on the topic but now we really know how much we have to learn. We have equipped ourselves with more resources for study over the next few months and will undoubtably will learn copious amounts more when we get to work with Helping Hands Healing Hearts in August. 

We are thankful for the safety we had on our trip, the quality time together and a chance to reconnect with old friends along the way.  We were blessed with a hotel free trip by staying with old friends from high school and college. (If you didn’t already know, Meghan is excellent at keeping in touch with people!) It was a blessing for the trip to be affordable and to be able to reconnect with good friends. Thank you to the Colgrove and Thomson families for your friendship and hospitality. 

Psalm 68:5-6a  A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in his holy dwelling. God sets the lonely in families, he leads forth the prisoners with singing

Psalm 82:3-4 Defend the cause of the weak and fatherless; maintain the rights of the poor and oppressed. Rescue the weak and needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked. 

James 1:27 Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.