And a Little Child Shall Lead Them...

Donations for the Yard Sale

This past Friday and Saturday gave us yet more opportunities to be grateful for loving friends and generous people. After Friday's sale, which brought in around $1500, more friends and neighbors donated yard sale items and baked goods for Saturday's sale.
People who had shopped Friday came back Saturday to continue to support our efforts. One very generous woman handed us a $100 bill after coming back the second day. All in all, we were able to bring in almost $3,200 thanks to all the donors of baked goods and yard sale items and our friends down the road who planned and carried out the entire thing!

Friday's Sale

This yard sale was the idea of our young 12-year-old friend, Sidney, who met Ruslan during his first week here. After church that Sunday, she and her family came over to meet him and have some homemade ice cream. She was aware of his situation and bleak future because we had told them before their visit. Our time together that evening was full of fun with lots of children between our two families. She watched Ruslan interact with her siblings and our children and, though his wasn't able to communicate well in English, there were lots of reasons to laugh and enjoy each others' company.

12-year-old Sydney - Making a Difference

About a week later, I received a phone call from Sidney. She told me about her feelings the night she met Ruslan, that she cried when she got home, that her heart was hurting over the fact that such a bright, happy, enjoyable person could have such a difficult life to look forward to. She then determined that she needed to figure out a way to help us afford to adopt him and give him a life that was worth living. She bubbled over with ideas, one of which was this yard and bake sale. At the end of our conversation she said, "I was sad before, but now I feel better!" At such a young age, she's learning that not only can we all make a difference, but that faith without works is dead. We can pray and pray for people who are in need, but if we don't roll up our sleeves and get to work, there will be fewer blessings...for all of us.

As the days passed, she would call me with updates on how many people she had called, which details we still needed to work out and plans she had made. One day I visited her at her home and she showed me the clipboard with her bake sale sign up sheet. I took one look at all those signatures of friends and neighbors who were offering their help and I thought of all the time she had spent talking to people, all the phone calls she had made and I couldn't help but cry. It was as if all the love in the world was enveloping me through the angelic hands and hearts of all these wonderful people I am blessed to have around me.

Saturday's Sale

These wonderful friends went door to door dropping off flyers throughout the neighborhood, went to all the businesses down Main Street to request that they hang up flyers and spent countless hours contacting people and preparing for this fund raiser. Everyone can make a difference...and everyone did. We had babysitters who helped take care of the little ones so we could run the yard sale, two families offered their properties for the days of the sale, several families made food and donated items to sell, others handed us extra money to donate to our efforts and saints came to rescue us from one of the biggest thunderstorms we've ever experienced! Everyone contributed something..."And a little child [did] lead them"!