Not Abandoned

   She stares at the ground slowly dragging her big toe through the dirt trying not to let her emotions show. This moment always seems the same to me. It's the same heartbreak. The same shame. The same downward glance and silence. 
   I know I have to ask the questions, but mostly I hate hearing the answers. I hate seeing their effect. I hate when families begin to talk about the abandonment of children. I hate when I see them embracing their identity as "one who is unwanted, unloved, and abandoned" I hate when I can tell that is how that see themselves.
   Veronica's grandmother is telling us how Veronica's mother walked out on her and how that's the way that Veronica came to live with her (Veronica and her grandmother pictured in front of their home- pictured above right). I wrap my arm around her shoulder and begin to pray that she encounters the lavish and unconditional love of her Father.

   Later that same day I sit on my bed looking into my sweet friend's eyes and waiting for her to speak. She twittles her thumbs and looks down to the ground. It's the exact same body language that I saw from Veronica earlier that afternoon. Still looking at the floor she whispers, "She left you know. She didn't even tell me, but she left." She was talking about her mom. Her mom abandoned her as a baby. Although she has tried, she and her mom have almost no relationship. Her mom just recently left to work in Costa Rica without telling her daughter. It was another moment of feeling unloved, of feeling rejected by her mother. And with this newest dismissal comes a wave of abandonment and rejection washing over my friend's heart.
   As I see children sitting again and again in this rejection claiming it as their identity, my heart begins to shout: "You will no longer be called Abandoned for your were chosen and adopted. No longer will you be unloved for you are now the Beloved."