Let the little children come to Him

​​‘Dear God, I forgive mum,’ he said matter-of-factly, without hesitation, and with real sincerity. A short, but most powerful prayer. I was shocked. These were not the words I was expecting from a 6 year old child, very recently removed from the only home that he had ever known. We had explained that as Christians we pray to God, but that not all people believe in God, and that they were free to choose what to believe. Not expecting him to take me up on an offer to pray, I was taught a valuable lesson. God talks to all children. Sounds like something we know instinctively, but are shocked when we encounter it.
As Christian short-term foster carers with Cornerstone, we, like all foster carers, provide a safe, warm, predictable family space to care for children who have recently been removed from traumatic and abusive home lives. This is to allow space and time (6-12 months) for the social-work team to work with the birth family to make things better and try and get the children back home if appropriate, and safe. This process is overseen by the courts and is often triggered through child neglect because parents are struggling with many issues, including alcohol and substance abuse.
The practical care of these children is the simple part. The more demanding aspect is often managing behavioural challenges; their dysregulated, wild and raw emotions and memories being stirred up at the most inconvenient times (e.g. bedtime) again, and again, and again. Prayer for endurance, patience, love and understanding for our foster carers is essential, so that we can communicate God’s real practical love in a tangible, resolute way. If pushed beyond what we can manage, child placements in families can ultimately fail, and the child is moved on again, repeating the damage, and leaving the foster carer drowning in guilt, despite trying their best.
Prayer for the foster child is a given. They are victims of adults’ mistakes and pay a high price, and need authentic, holistic healing. As we work to reverse malnutrition and promote re-wiring of neural circuits in the brain through repeated positive messaging, we trust that they will eventually believe that if they cry or call out, someone will actually come to help them. Prayer is also needed for protection for the child, both physical and spiritual, and that God will give wisdom to the arbiters of hope and justice in the child’s life. Also, that God’s will be done for them both now, and in the future, wherever they go.
Perhaps most importantly, pray for the healing and building of positive relationships that surround the foster child. Not just between birth family members, or foster child and birth parents, but even between foster parent and birth parent. Don’t underestimate the healing that can come to a foster child when he or she sees you, as their now trusted reliable foster carer, being kind to, and working with, their birth mother. It is a really powerful demonstration to the foster child of forgiveness and restoration, which Jesus was all for!
This early years ministry is for those whose hearts have been stirred by God, a knowing of the pain He has for these lost, hurting children. Psalm 68 says God ‘sets the lonely in families’ and is a ‘Father to the fatherless.’ Maybe He is even calling you to foster children?
 
Written by a foster carer. Child details have been changed for confidentiality.
​Photo by Carlos Magno on Unsplash