The Church Reclaiming the Care of Orphans...

Embrace is a community of like minded families, individuals, and churches passionate about the needs and care of orphans and waiting children in America.

Matthew 6:26

Trails to the Frontier - posted by Michael Monroe of Tapestry

Bruce and Denise Kenrick, together with Cindy Coffman, lead Embrace, the foster care and adoption ministry at Rhea’s Mill Baptist Church in McKinney, Texas. Embrace is a member of the DFW Alliance, and Bruce recently shared these thoughts about their ministry’s journey to the present and their latest initiative to help churches become more involved in the lives of orphans and waiting children.

Nearly three years ago, our church was one of over 300,000 Christian churches in America that had no intentional ministry to orphans or waiting children. When we came to our small Baptist church to be on staff, my wife and I were already foster parents. Yet our church remained mostly uninvolved in this area. Honestly, even my wife and I were not aware of the potential that was staring us in the face each week.

It wasn’t until a mom of one of the students in our church was driving down the road listening to the “Cry of the Orphan” radio broadcast that the potential (and the calling) began to become evident. She had no experience or background in foster care or adoption. She hadn’t visited an orphanage overseas … yet God seemingly pulled her over to the side of the road and called her to launch a ministry that would help the church reclaim the care of orphans and waiting children.

She asked us to help her start the ministry, and while we had experience in foster care and student ministry, we were lost when it came to organizing an orphan care ministry from scratch. Fortunately, one of the pioneer orphan care ministries in the United States, Tapestry at Irving Bible Church, was located just thirty minutes down the road, and they were willing to meet with us, share their ideas and resources and give us direction as we developed the vision for what our ministry would become. It was through their mentoring, as well as our connection to resources from organizations such as Hope for Orphans, that God led us to craft the vision and mission for our ministry, Embrace.

After struggling for nearly two years to solidify any real programming that would make a lasting impact on the foster, orphan care and adoption community, we dreamed up an initiative that would duplicate what Tapestry had done for us. We believe that it is God’s purpose that the local church lead by example in caring for orphans and waiting children. After all, if the church walks away from this privilege and opportunity, these children will ultimately gain little benefit from what the world has to offer. So in our third year of ministry, we are launching Sketching Floor in order to call more churches to the frontier of orphan care ministry and equip them to do it well.

Thus far, many churches of all sizes and from various denominations have embraced the idea of inviting God to use their local congregation to love and serve these precious children. Just as Tapestry didn’t ask us to mimic their programs or approach, yet freely offered every resource they had, we plan to pray with church lay leaders and staff members asking God to help them chart the direction the He would have them go.

Orphan care ministry can be a difficult area to wrap our arms around. With more than 140 million orphans spanning the globe, the needs are vast – but so too are the possibilities. If we ask every church to do every thing in the area of orphan ministry, the task would truly be insurmountable … but God has equipped His Church to meet these needs for the sake of these children and praise of His glory. So we are grateful for those that have blazed a trail for us to follow, and we look forward to walking with others down this path as the frontier expands before us.

Sketching Floor is a gathering of church teams crafting relevant, effective ministries to care for orphans and waiting children. Led by experienced local church ministry leaders, it is designed to help churches organize their orphan ministry’s vision, sharpen their efforts and begin making an impact. Churches need not travel the journey of creating and growing an orphan ministry alone – Sketching Floor is available so they don’t have to.

To learn more about Sketching Floor or to find out how your church can participate in Sketching Floor, visit http://www.sketchingfloor.org/."

It should not be lost that this is a 250 person church with a vibrant and innovative orphan ministry that is now actively seeking to help other churches (sometimes 10 or 20 times their size) develop, launch and sustain healthy orphan ministry.  Really cool!

Who says hot-dogs aren't good for you?

Check out this simple lesson God taught Bruce, and teaches each of us, using hot dogs.

Embrace, a church foster-adoption ministry, held an event at the Frank Buck Zoo where a few hundred kids and parents came to enjoy their time as a family. The zoo was kind enough to cover the entrance fee for every child that came, and we made the most of our time as families fed giraffes and walked throughout the park. Afterwards, we provided a very simple hot dog lunch. We prepared hot dogs along with a bag of chips, a cookie and a drink. We had prepared enough hot dogs for each person that registered for the event to have one each.

What a wonderful thing you all have done, and the wonderful friendly attitudes of all of your volunteers just made my children shine with happiness. My oldest came to me after his second trip to the hot dog table and whispered, “That man keeps telling me to take the whole tub of hot dogs and to eat as much as I can, no one has ever let me eat all I wanted before.” What was just fun for that man, was a life changing moment for my child. He came from an environment of neglect and not having food for days at a time [which] was something he was used to.

Now for the first time, I think he is beginning to see that his life has changed thanks to the love and kindness of God’s people, and that his plate runs over with the bounty of the Lord.

written by Bruce Kendrick and excerpted from One Each blog posting at DFW Alliance