Written by Lee July 13, 2008
This is a brief story written early in the minstry of how this came about. There are so many details that were arranged by the Lord that I could rewrite this later as a complete story. It would become a fairly long account just to acknowledge all the arrangements the Lord has and still making that are not humanly possible.
Spring of 2007. I’m not in the habit of having dreams that remain with me very long. I woke up and told my wife that I had a dream of the most incredible job I could possibly imagine. I told her it was working in an orphanage, surrounded by children and was absolutely the happiest I had ever been in my life. I knew it was only a dream, but she was thinking, perhaps this is what I wanted to do. Thinking realistically, she told me I had no experience with orphanages and the legal complexities were enormous. I told her this was in another country so perhaps the legal complexities would not be that bad. She said you’ve never been to another country.
I began to ask Lord in prayer about this dream and why it was so powerfully obsessive to me. The more I prayed about the dream, the more the Lord led me to pray about. I didn’t know anything about orphanages, and I didn’t know anything about other countries or have the means to ever get to one. The more I prayed about this impossible dream, the more it grew. I began to drop notes in prayer request boxes about the Lord making this possible for the sake of the children.
December 2007. One morning I was telling the Lord, my life today is all yours. I’ll go anywhere you want or do anything you want. I am totally yours and I release the responsibility to you for what you do with me, even if it is not productive. I felt the presence of the Lord very strongly with me and I knew that he was pleased with this prayer. A few hours later, my phone rang. I was asked if I would be willing to go on a mission trip to Trinidad. I did not have a job at the time, but the Lord supplied the provisions. I had not told anyone related to the mission trip about this dream about orphanages in other countries or my desire of many years to go on mission trip to another country. Financially, it was never a possibility for our family. Of course I said yes, but the timing was terrible. I had no job and money was tight. My wife had started a new job that very day, I had no job and I was desperately needed to stay here to provide whatever income or help I could with the children at home. But I knew the Lord was fulfilling this vision he had planted in me. I had no passport and only a few weeks in which to secure the passport and all the necessary shots. The Lord took care of everything.
February 2008. The purpose of the mission trip to Trinidad was to distribute free eyeglasses to the people in the name of Jesus. The leader of the team graciously told me to follow the Holy Spirit as he led me and gave me the freedom to do so. As soon as the airplane landed at the airport, I was met and spent time in the car with my companions in this ministry, a wonderful married couple who are native to Trinidad named Jon and Felina. I immediately liked them very much. I asked them if there were needs for orphanages. I later came to realize this was their passion and ministry but they did not tell me all week much about themselves, only about the needs of the children.
They told me I would be allowed to visit a children’s home, where they had been ministering to the children themselves. The plans for me to visit were frustrated, but I told Jon the Lord had other plans, for not just me, but our whole mission team to go to the children’s home. The Lord arranged it so this did happen and on our home page you’ll see a picture of the mission team at the children’s home. Amazing things happened during that visit but that is another story or several stories.
I will never understand Trinidad as those from Trinidad do, so please forgive me if I am not politically or historically correct or say anything offensive about Trinidad. My intention is only to let you know the children need help from the body of Christ and I and many more pray for that constantly. This is what I learned about the children. Abortion is illegal. The history of the island was that of slavery. The children of India and Africa were captured from their homes and taken to Trinidad to work in the British cane fields. The cane fields and slavery are gone, but the heritage is there.Today, children, who are not wanted, are used for child labor, abandoned to the streets, abused in many ways, sold, or secretly used as child sacrifices. There are only two Christian children’s homes able to accommodate perhaps 30 to 40 children at the most. Provisions are minimal and the children in the homes are needy and those not fortunate enough to be in a home are even more needy.Since my trip there, I have not found many ministries outside of Trinidad who are helping these children. We intend to minister to whatever children we can, in whatever homes they may be in, or even if they are in the streets. In the Lord’s time he will provide more Christian homes for these children and we intend to call these homes “Sanctuary”, a name given to us by the Lord in prayer. These orphanages will come to be a reality when the Lord provides the provisions for more Christian orphanages.
“The Lord will build many orphanages across Trinidad in name of Jesus Christ. From these children, the Lord will raise up a new generation of Godly and righteous leaders bringing the Lord’s blessings in abundance to all of Trinidad for generations to come.”
As I met the people of Trinidad and told some of them about this vision, they would ask me how will these orphanages come about? I remember telling some of them, ” the Lord only lets me see around one corner at a time.” Now several months have passed and the Lord brings answers and direction one step at a time. These have not been plans made by myself, Jon or Felina, but brought to us in prayer, and because of prayer. I have not sought resources nor those who are knowledgeable in the ways of orphanages, but instead the Lord has brought those people and resources to me or to Jon and Felina. It has been amazing how all this has come together.
Note Added 1-25-09 by Lee
This is to clarify what may appear to be any discrepancy from what was written at the time of July 13, 2008 as compared to what we are doing now. I still do not make the plans for the ministry. I ask the Lord, I listen, and I obey sometimes without really understanding. Later, I often see the wisdom. Nothing the Lord originally gave us has been changed or been abandoned, but clarified by him into slow and careful steps we must do to get there. These steps and provisions are given by the Lord through prayer. We only need to obey each step and we will get there because the Lord is leading. At this time, our next step is Child Evangelism. That is enough for now. The Lord will lead us from there.
