On weekend
my daughter wanted us to go to park. The day was not very warm; from time to
time it was raining . We were under umbrella, when it was raining. We took nuts
with us. Nastya saw pigeons and decided
to feed them. Very soon other inhabitant of the
park realized that we were feeding birds and flew to us.
Pigeons, tit , magpie, jay came for the feast . But not every bird participated and could
take the blessings. Nastya wanted to
feed them from the hand. And seams like every bird had their own experience of
encounter with people. Only one pigeon trusted us to take the nuts from hand.
Some were brave enough to come close and when some nuts were lost by trusting
pigeon they quickly picked up them. Tit set above on the branches of the tree
and in order to take a nut had to dive
to our hand, grab our finger for quick second. It was such a joy and pleasure
while a little bird trusted us even on a second and stayed on my hand. But still only two trusted us.
All other turned back at last moment almost reaching the goal, but could not
overcome fear. Magpie was at a distance.
She could see everything that was going on. But didn’t come close enough even
to pick up dropped nuts . She had no chance. Jay was even further and up. All had equal chances to be fed. But past
experience kept most of the birds from blessings at that day. We had nothing to
do with their past experience, we had pure motives and didn’t had any intention to hurt them. But they projected their experience on us.
I was
thinking about us. Do we trust God to eat from His hand or we stay so far as
jay.
We had
encounter with one of our clients, Vika. She grew up in an orphanage. She had a room in an apartment with the
people who hated her and tried to poison her.
She lost the room because of lack wisdom, sold to change the place of
living and couldn’t buy another one for the same price. When she became pregnant she didn’t even
recognized it as pregnancy. She shared
with an older woman her concern about a growing belly. The older woman
looked at her and asked her, whether she
was pregnant. She laughed. She gave
birth a baby boy in a barn. Neighbors heard the baby cry and called police and
ambulance. It took her a month before
she got the baby out of a hospital and got shelter in Maternity home. After 6 month she got child benefit and decided to rent apartment, but without success. She came to us ready to
give up, to give baby to an orphanage.
For the first time I saw how severe distrust could operate against a
person. She was difficult to help. All
we offered didn’t fit her ideas . She lived in a barn and didn’t want to move
in another part of the city. She wanted
room in the same part of the city as she had a room. It looked like she had
invisible tie to that place, like she was chained to it. While we were talking
she would stay at distance, she didn’t want to be hugged, she didn’t trust the
love, she couldn’t understand why I was visiting her, bringing her food, she
didn’t want to open her barn out of fear I could take her baby. She was pushing the help and people out, trying to be independent and
ready to give up out of the lack of
support.
That is not
the end of the story. Could you join us in prayer for her and Peter, her baby son.
When I hold him in hand he was disturbed , like he was felling his
mother ready to give up on him. After awhile, he became interested in my coat
touching new fiber. All my soul wanted just
to take him home and love him. But it was her baby and her life. I could
come along side, if she let it. She
doesn’t trust anybody.
To survive
she did cleaning for people, leaving the baby alone. The baby got used to it.
She came back from cleaning. Somebody called police while she was away. The
baby was taking from her.
When
what she feared the most happened she came to our office. This time she was
ready for help. She said, you told you
can help, can you. We started a way with her, a way where she need learn to
trust and obey. We found a room to rent, we helped to move her belongings. This
time she listened about love of Jesus. I said to her: Look, not many people
will invite you to live in their home, even you pay.