The face of the little boy smiled from the photograph that we received in an email from our Nepal coordinator. We opened a few more photographs of him…one of him sitting in front of a plate of food (and enjoying it by the looks of it), one of him sitting in front of our coordinator’s computer, another of him standing in a doorway, and another of him in which he looked distraught…sad, angry even. This little boy, Rajesh*, is the first child in the New Beginnings of Nepal orphanage since a building was purchased to house the children.
Rajesh looks to be about five years old and really is a beautiful child. Our Nepal coordinator shared a few details about Rajesh in his brief email. He said that Rajesh came from the far western part of Nepal. His mother had died, and his father had left home and never returned. Orphaned, abandoned, alone, and frightened….We can only begin to imagine how this little boy must have felt, how he still must feel, and what he’s already seen in his short life. I suppose if anyone had a reason to look distraught, he did.
I listened to a song the other day and loved one of the ideas that the song conveyed….hope can be frail, but it’s hard to kill. It is our prayer to plant hope into the hearts of children like Rajesh and then to nurture that hope until it grows into something beautiful. I opened another picture of Rajesh from the email. It was a close up face shot, close enough to see the details of his sweet face – the cleft in his chin, his short brown hair with a cowlick near his hairline, the eyes that looked like pools of brown. And his smile. His smile was wide and genuine. Maybe he’s already beginning to feel the love of his new caretakers, and maybe he’s already beginning to feel the hope of a better life. God has great and mighty plans for little ones like Rajesh; may we have hope that those great and mighty plans can be realized for them, and may God bless you for helping these children to have hope and a future.
*Name has been changed.