Praying for Isaac…

Today I asked my students to pray for my friends, Ben and Janet Whipple. Ben and Janet are in the process of adopting a little boy, Isaac, from Ethiopia and their court date is tomorrow. I had no idea how beautiful and overwhelming my students’ responses would be to Isaacs situation.

As I explained the difference between an orphanage like Isaac is living in and an orphanage like Bethesda where most of my students live, my children connected with Isaac in a way I did not expect. Various students began to talk about and share about the various pre-Bethesda orphanage experiences. They all knew, better than I could even picture, how they should pray for Isaac and the next few weeks for him.

I read to them each of Ben and Janet’s prayer requests and they were super excited to pray for all of them at school and at home. We prayed today as a class and I was absolutely overcome with tears as my students poured out their hearts to God in prayer on behalf of my friends, their baby, the judge who will rule on their case, and all the specifics they could think of about the court case and the orphanage. They are now all anxiously awating the decision of the court so Isaac can “get a family” and so they can see his picture! After praying, my students decided they wanted to to make cards for “Uncle Ben”, “Auntie Janet”, and “Baby Isaac.”