Pentecost8

He was thirteen years old, but could have been forty. He was dirty and smelled. He bore the scars of beatings, knifings and worse. Of course, you weren’t likely to see those wounds as the child would fight like his life was on the line if anyone came near.

The burning rage that showed on his face was an outward image of the agony that was buried deep in his psyche - his soul. The child trusted no one and no one had better trust this child of the meanest streets of the city. He couldn’t remember the last time someone had truly been kind, and furthermore, the he didn’t want to remember because being reminded of what had never been, hurt in a way that tore his soul apart.

He had spent time in more foster homes, group homes and juvenile detention centers than anyone could remember. Other kids called him "REject" behind his back. According to the social services’ file the child had been taken from a severely abusive father at age seven and had run away within a month of being placed in that first foster home.

Though he hadn’t been in one place long enough for any real testing and could count time in school in weeks rather than years, workers saw real intelligence. He learned to successfully shop lift in the presence of multiple security measures, pick the pocket of the most wary and turn multiple tricks without showing how much it hurt.

This child-adult had been on the streets most of his young life, and took great pride in the knowledge that no room, no cell, no person was any use once a decision was made to run. The file at the state agency charged with his care by the court system took up nearly half of a filing cabinet drawer. And at the rate he was going, he’d have the whole cabinet before he aged out of the system...if he lived that long.

This is what stood before Mrs. Hutchinson that bright spring morning. Mrs. Hutchinson was a special needs foster parent. She had cared for and helped some of the worst cases social services had had. And this was the child’s last chance. If Mrs. Hutchinson couldn’t handle the boy, he was a lost cause for sure.

He stood there, looking wary and defiant. He glanced around the room assessing what might be worth stealing when he took off, and calculated just how soon that would be.

Mrs. Hutchinson smiled as she looked up from the papers she had been given. "I see here that you’ve gone by several names - Robert, Jack, Mick, Jeff, Butch, Silky, M. B., among others. There doesn’t seem to be any record of the name you were given at birth though, and I was told that you don’t remember it either."

"Since you’ve had so many identities and since today is the first day of a new life for you, why don’t we think about a name that would truly celebrate the real person inside and the life that person is going to start living from this day forward.

Thus began a new creation. Over time, Mrs. Hutchinson’s love would take a boy who was an enemy of all and by her love turn him into a young man generally welcomed by all.

It wasn’t easy. It took tremendous sacrifice on Mrs. Hutchinson’s part, and she bore the scars of love for many years. But, little by little, Adam would be given back his personhood.

To accomplish this Mrs. Hutchinson told and showed the boy how much she loved him. She knew that words were insufficient and suspect. Thus, she always expressed confidence in his ability to achieve goals, celebrated his every move forward and made clear that even when she had to discipline him for unacceptable behavior, she still accepted him as a person.

Mrs. Hutchinson sensed that what the boy needed most was a sense of belonging that could only come from being adopted into a family. After much reflection, she sent her son by birth to seek the Adam’s freedom from his birth family and then began the court process that would result in the change of the boy’s status from foster child to adopted child.

Of course there were ups and downs even after the adoption. Adam would forget his special status at times and doubt his acceptance in the new family. He would occasionally take his new mother’s love for granted and hurt her by acting like she didn’t exist and in one final act of rebellion he secretly returned to his old neighborhood and got involved with a violent street gang.

When Mrs. Hutchinson found out about this she sought him out. She went into the most dangerous area of the city, searched and found her child out on a corner with his gang friends. She again proclaimed her love and desire to have him back, no matter what. Unfortunately, just as she thought she was making headway, a car filled with members of a rival gang came down the street at high speed. Shots rang out. Everyone ran for cover...everyone that is but Mrs. Hutchinson. She had stepped in front of her child and been hit by a bullet intended for the one she loved more than life itself.

As soon as the reality of what had happened became clear, Adam called an ambulance. Mrs. Hutchinson was rushed to the hospital where, after surgery, her condition was grave.

As soon as allowed, Adam came to her room and remained at her bedside. At one point, Mrs. Hutchinson regained consciousness. She saw her child by her bedside and smile a smile of love and hope.

Gasping for breath, using what little strength she could muster, Mrs. Hutchinson begged her child not to do this. She begged the child, out of love for her, to go instead to the chapel and pray, and then to make a commitment to God in her name.

This story remains unfinished. It is a story for each of us to complete. You see, this is not a story about some lost child far away. This is our story. Each of us is or has been, a lost, hurting and sometimes rebellious child, a REject . And God took us into His home, accepted us, worked(works) with us to overcome the effects of sin, adopts us through His Son into His family.

God has done everything possible to give us new life. He asks only that we remain in communication with Him, grow in relationship with Him and respond to the wonder of this love by committing our lives to him.

Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior. But now he has reconciled you by Christ's physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation-- if you continue in your faith, established and firm, not moved from the hope held out in the gospel. Col. 1:20-23