On the chalkboard at the Blackbox International house, the counselor wrote a discussion question for the boys:
If you could have one wish, what would it be?
How would you answer? And if you asked your kids, what would they wish for?
The boys in our Dominican Republic home all gave similar answers:
“I’d go to the country to see my family.”
“I’d go for a walk with my family.”
They wished, not for video games or clothes or iTunes gift cards.
They wished for family.
They wished for home.
But for whatever reason—for a multitude of painful, private reasons—they aren’t able to be at home with their families. Instead, they’re here, in a home away from home. A home where they’re loved and safe and free from harm. A home where everything they receive—from counseling and an education to meals and the clothes on their backs—is given in the name of Jesus.
“God sets the lonely in families,” the psalmist wrote, and so we work to rescue his children and help them find healing. We lead them to the God who trades hope for despair and freedom for bondage. And with our second Dominican home nearly funded, we work to help even more boys have a family and a home.
We work to make wishes come true.