Puzzle Pieces Fitting Together

Can I tell you how excited I am. Can I tell you what a masterful weaver God is in placing all the pieces together, even in lives that connect in no way, except at that God ordained minute!. Ok, ok, let me back up.

So I mentioned that I was interviewing different agencies to find a great fit for me to get back out into the world and do some good although I think the most good I can ever do is to raise wonderful godly future citizens btw! My search brought me to VOA- a catch all agency that does about everything. I had a great meeting with the director as she rattled off all the things I could do for them. We were going to meet this week with another person that was actually over the areas I was interested in. One of them being the work they do with parents, classes, mentoring and nurturing young moms. But then I got an email from her saying why don't I go ahead and meet with Kirsty who is over pregnancy and adoptions services. She noted that Kirsty was really short handed and could maybe use the help. I was fine with all this, afterall this was my prior work experience, but I had the feeling it would be a lot of the same that I had already done, I was looking for something new, and I was looking more along the lines of behind the scenes, strategic planning, admin, project management kinda stuff, cuz crazy as I am I love that kind of stuff and am fairly gifted at it, thanks to my event planning neurotic mother (hi mom). Anyhoo, so I obliged this director and met with Kirsti despite thinking I wanted to go another route. Little did I know that Kirsti, had been praying for this need, and well for me, for months now, and as she kept saying during our time, I must have dropped from heaven. Clearly the first obvious cool thing is that she is a Chrisitian, and she is young, and pregnant with her first, yay a new friend for me.

Ok, I'll skip to the point then show you all the behind the scenes stuff God did. So most girls these days are not choosing adoption but are choosing to parent. And she feels there is a huge gap in their services for those who decide to parent. These young women need parenting classes, mentoring, resources, encouragement and baby supplies. But Kirsti is the only worker for all of their pregnancy counseling, adoption work, training, foster work, for all of Central LA. She has passion for this need but does not have the time nor the gifts to take her ideas and make them a reality. She needs someone who is great at thinking big picture, planning, researching, teaching and one knowledgeable in parenting, uhhh, hello me! She asked her boss for part-time help but the funds weren't there so she started praying. Both she and I had chills as she spoke (and teared up) and I acknowledged over and over again that what she was describing was exactly what I was looking for. It is behind the scenes, from home, couple hours with her working, all in an area I have come to realize I am extremely passionate about.
Can I share about this passion for a moment, I know I'm going long, I promise not to blog anymore today, or even tomorow. My husband's passion in life is to help others reach their passions and it drives him crazy that I don't have any hobbies, desires, passions. But it has dawned on me in the last week and during my meeting with Kirsti today, that I have a passion for moms. If any of you close to me have had a baby, I'm sure you've gotten more advice and emails from me than you have ever wanted. I have read tons of parenting books and have filtered thru the crap and the really good stuff. I am a self-proclaimed parenting expert! whether it works or not, who knows. And as Kirsty was talking today I remembered a time back in college that a woman came and spoke to a social work class of mine about her church reaching out to young moms and holding parenting classes. I thought then, wow, I would love to do that someday. And I also spent time at a Crisis Pregnancy Center back then, and loved the work they did with the women who decided to parent. I had forgotten about all of those seeds.  Fast forward 12 years and 3 kids later, just last year as I was having to go thru this gifting/passions test at our church they asked an interesting question to probe at what I may be passionate about. "What makes you angry in this world". Well the only thing I could think of was when you're at Walmart and you see moms yelling at, hitting or berating their kids, I hurt for those children. But I also know this is the only thing these parents probably know to do. So there was that seed planted of what God may do with me someday. So all this to say, Ritchey get ready, I am passionate about children being raised in good homes and equipping those mothers who are overwhelmed, uneducated, and have been modeled very poor parenting skills. And today as I sat in her office, it all came back to me. And she sat there describing to me exactly what she needed, what her gifts were and were not, my jaw kept dropping, because what she needed was ME, in all my craziness and certain giftedness.
My family went through a rough end of our summer, some things happened that really stunk and had me question why God had led us down this long and in the end, painful path. But it was at the end of this hurtful path that He birthed in me the desire to find something new and different to do with myself, to shake off the dust and put myself out there. And here I am. Well, I hope you kept up with all that, sorry for all the details and background, but I always marvel at how God works things together, sometimes with both parties not knowing what in the world he is going to do I tell you about how Ritchey and I got together another time. But He is a sovereign God, a master planner, He takes his time ,darnnit, but He works things out. That may sound cliche' or naive to some of you, but its the TRUTH! and I'm excited to see how He'll work this out.