Name

There is a family I know... a family I've never been particularly fond of, had any deep connection with, or had any ties to. They know my mother and my sisters (her boys used to clog with Kat, her daughter dances with Olivia). They were just that family who only listened to Bach, conservative activist republicans (not that there is anything with being conservative, an activist, a republican, or listening to Bach. It's just a bad combo.).A couple of months ago I heard that this family had decided to adopt. They have three children of their own, but they were wanting to take in a few children from Liberia. I thought it was a joke. A fleeting idea they had...Until the day I came home to Winchester and heard that the family had just picked up their new family additions. Come to find out... they've adopted at least five children from Liberia. My heart hurt. I wanted to hug the mother. I wanted to thank her for bringing these beautiful children into our world... these children who dont know their real age, who have walked across countries to get to orphanages, who live in dangerous proximity to LRA. Their skin is black as coal, their accents thick, their eyes dark and exotic...I watched the oldest daughter dance in the last ballet performance. SHe danced to a song called "Cathedral". I saw her lift her eyes and I wondered how she much feel... in this world of technology and luxury and love... does she feel like she lays her head down in a cathedral every night?And then I found out that the mother and father had given each of the children a new name. I was upset at first... wondering why you would rename a teenage girl or boy... until my own mother told me why. Told me that these children from Liberia had gone to their adoptive parents and asked for new names. "Real parents name their children. We want you to name us. You are our parents now."And I thought of the verse in Revelations, where it says we will be given a new name... of Jesus renaming Saul and Simon and Abram.

Father God, real parents name their children. Name us. Give us new names, written on white stone. So that we may be yours.