The reporter and police officer turned up unannounced at the Abundant Life Home with a six-year-old girl named Mee (not her real name). They told us a heartbreaking story.
Mee’s mother was a drug addict, and mentally ill. She had already tried to kill herself once by jumping off a tall bridge while Mee watched. She survived, but voices in her head kept telling her to kill herself and to kill her daughter. So, she took Mee to the police station, and begged them to keep her daughter safe. They brought her to us.
We welcomed Mee with open arms and heard her sad story. Life with her mother had been a daily struggle. “Mom was always crying,” Mee told us. “We only ate one meal every day, and most of the time mom was sleeping because of the drugs. I kept trying to wake her up, so she could take me to school.”
After only a few weeks at the home, Mee was transformed. She changed from being a fearful, sullen child to being full of peace and confidence. The very first time she attended church with us she went up to the open mic, gave thanks to God for bringing her to the Abundant Life Home, and asked us all to pray for her mom. One week later, Mee gave her life to Jesus, and was free from the fear of evil spirits for the first time in her life.
The story is not a tidy one, and there is no happy ending - yet. Mee’s mom still has not followed up with getting the psychiatric care she needs, and she keeps choosing to miss her appointments and not go on medication. When she finally came one day and visited her daughter, it was a tearful, gut-wrenching reunion. Mee and her mom fell to the ground together, weeping in each other’s arms. We wept along with them.
Pray for Mee and her mom. Jesus is now a part of their story, and we continue to trust him to complete the work he has begun.
Karen is the founder and director of the Abundant Life Home, an orphanage for HIV-positive children.Ricky serves as president of the Thailand Mennonite Brethren Foundation, which oversees all church-planting projects in Thailand.
