A Prayer Need

Today I am asking you to pray for a brother and sister who attend our school. For privacy purposes, I have changed their names to Vincent and Brenda. Vincent is in third grade and Brenda is in fifth grade. Our school serves the most impoverished, neglected, abused, and forgotten children in the Monte Plata community – and Vincent and Brenda are heartbreaking examples of this truth. Vincent and Brenda’s father passed away two or three years ago. He was a known drug-dealer in the community here and was killed in an altercation with police. Their mother has also spent time in prison for selling drugs. Vincent was recently asked to stay home from school for a few days for fighting. Fighting is the only behavior for which we send students home from school. We know that they are often staying “home” in an environment that will not help them change their behavior. Oftentimes our students can be found wandering the streets in the afternoons and at night with nothing to do and no one to take care of them. Sadly, when Vincent returned to school, he fought within an hour of being back in his classroom, and was asked to stay home for another day. Today he returned to school and started a fight once again. Our school director called his mother and had her come to school to take him home again. She asked when he could come back and was told that he could come back again tomorrow. Just as God’s mercies are new for us every morning, our school administration believes in forgiveness and mercy and was ready to welcome him back tomorrow with open arms, despite his consistent history of misbehavior. As Vincent and his mother walked out of our school office, our school directors watched and listened in horror as she pushed her son out of the office and proceeded to punch him twice, once in the head and once in the back, while screaming at him.  We know that Vincent is not solely responsible for his behavior issues. He likely lives with this abuse daily, constantly observing a cycle of violence so hateful that most of us cannot even fathom it.

And somehow we expect him to come to school each day, sit calmly in a desk, and learn how to add, multiply, read, and write.

According to all earthly methods – we might as well give up now. There is no way that we can make a difference in his life from 8:00-12:30 Monday through Friday. It seems hopeless. It seems impossible.

And then I remember that several thousand years ago, a group of over 2 million Israelites stood on the banks of the red sea with the entire Egyptian army pursuing them and thought, “This is impossible.”

And then I remember that Nehemiah and the Jews once faced so much opposition while trying to rebuild an entire wall that they had to work with tools in one hand and weapons in the other, and they probably thought, “This is impossible.”

And then I remember that three young men were once bound and thrown into a furnace that was heated to seven times more than its usual heat, and on the way down they might have thought, “This is impossible.”

And then I remember that Jesus’ body once laid in an earthly tomb for three dark days and as the reality of His death slowly began to sink in, His friends and family must have thought, “This is impossible.”

I remember these stories because the sea parted, and the wall was finished, and those young men walked out of that furnace, and Jesus rose again. And if I serve the God who is able to do all of that, I definitely serve the God who is able to change Vincent and Brenda’s lives, as well as the life of their mother.

Please join me, and our entire school staff, in praying for this family, because through the Lord, drastic change is not impossible.