"PYD"-PRAY YOUR DREAM

From Susan Hillis:

We were sitting around the table chatting with kids when one of them, giggling, commented about their day, "The teachers saw a guy and girl holding hands in the hall and walked up being them, saying, 'No PDA allowed.' We hear it all the time...PDA.  Hey mom  (I guess they think I am in still living in the DarkAges!), do you know what that is -- PDA?"  (in case someone reading IS in the Dark Ages...PDA means 'public display of affection'). 

To which I replied, "I don't care very much about 'PDA' but I care A LOT about 'PYD.'

The kids sitting around the table are now quite curious, as their 'with it' mom knows a new acronym  that they have never heard before!  "Mom, what's that mean...'PYD'...we haven't heard that one yet.'

I explain, "That one means 'Pray Your Dream...'  PYD.

"Oh mom, no one knows that one," they reply.

I assure them, "Someday they will!"

Make a Wish

So here's how 'PYD' came to be.  I was returning from a trip to Russia, waiting in the long line at Passport Control in New York's La Guardia Airport.  I see a 'Make-a-Wish-Foundation' poster like this one.  And right there, jet-lagged, standing in line with my suitcases, it becomes clear.  If a man-run Foundation can make the wildest dream come true for a dying child, then God can certainly fulfill His people's wildest prayers for every child around the world who needs a family's love.  The words, 'Make a Wish' disappeared from the poster in my mind's eye, and in their place were these words, "Pray Your Dream.."  And I started then and there, "Lord, my dream is a believer in the life of every orphan.  I pray for a believer in the life of every orphan." 

Many of you reading this are part of God's answer to that prayer.  And it is spreading.  I am hearing rumblings of a new movement being birthed.  A movement called, "World Without Orphans."  So now I ask you, join me in making PYD a virally recognized acronym  among us believers.  Among those of us who have experienced, personally, the joy and freedom, the purpose and hope of the One who said to us, "I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you." (John 14:18)  And He did. And He does. And He will....PYD!!!!

LOVE COVERS

A new aspect of PYD is becoming clear for me.  Not only do we pray that the Lord will cause a believer to ENTER the life of every orphan, but we pray that we as believers will actually have grace to REMAIN in the life of the orphan.  To REMAIN on those days when their previous orphan-like hurt and at times denial, threatens to push us as away. On those days when 'hurt people, hurt people.'  When their deep hurt causes them to hurt me deeply. I am learning a new secret to this REMAINING.  And it is this: 

HIS LOVE COVERS ME                                                           The Lord's love covers me, "He will cover you with his feathers and under His wings you will find refuge." (Ps 91)   It is the love of the transfiguration [because it also transfigures, or transforms me!] when "He was still speaking [and] a bright cloud covered them, and a voice from the cloud said, 'This is My Son whom I love.  With Him I am well pleased." (Matthew 3:16-17) Jesus' gloriously radiant love still covers us, His daughters and sons who have adopted and fostered, and it says to us, "You are my beloved in whom I am well-pleased.  I've got you covered."

HIS LOVE COVERS THEM  

The Lord's love covers them..  "Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers a multitude of sins." (I Peter 4:8)  Love covers by forgiving and by helping guide them back to their real gifts and purpose and identity in the Lord and in our family.  I have seen it as a process that often takes years, but oh, the joy we experience when our chldren begin to live as the Lord's sons and daughters.  And for those who are not there yet, I pray for the grace to have the kind of love that covers a multitude of bad choices and bad attitudes.  What is amazing is the glorious result, "Blessed are those whose sins are covered." (Romans 4:7).

A Hands-On Example

For those with young kids, it would be so easy to invent a 'love covers' game.  Dump chocolate syrup on the floor then place over it a pretty thick clean towel, smile and say, 'love covers.'  "This means that we love and forgive each other's messes.  If we don't cover this brown mess and walk in it, it gets all squishy between our toes [let's try it];  but if we cover it and walk on it, we stay clean.  In the Hillis (or 'xxxx') family we are going to forgive each other's messes." 

I saw this played out beautifully several months ago when our daughter who has been in and out of jail and living on the streets came home to visit for the first time in over a year.  I watched with thankfulness as I saw her sisters and brothers hug her, then walk arm in arm around the house.  

LOVE COVERS