Legacy

The following is the invocation speech I gave at the recent Women's Tea put on by Hillview Acres Women's Auxiliary:

Last week the president of the university I attended passed away. In fact, his memorial service is occurring right now as I stand here speaking to all of you. When I received this news yesterday, I was overcome with emotion, but also with pride at the legacy this gentleman leaves behind him. I was also excited at the joy I understood knowing that Dr. Cook has a relationship with Jesus and was welcomed into God’s very presence upon his passing from this world to his true home.

Likewise, we at Hillview deal with issues of legacy everyday. The legacy we have chosen is a legacy of love. I describe what we do at Hillview as simply loving kids who need love. I could spend hours telling you all about what that looks like at Hillview and the philosophies that play out there, but when it comes down to it, we’re really just doing our best to love a handful of abused and neglected children in the same way that God loves us: wholly, unconditionally, and without reserve.

Our legacy of love does not affect just our personal lives for those of us who spend our days working at Hillview, but it also affects the lives of the children who are placed in our care. We all hold the opportunity to participate in this legacy. If you are here in this room today, you, too, are participating in loving those who need love. I applaud you for this.

We hold the opportunity to help the children at Hillview live out a new legacy in their lives. We hold the opportunity to extend hope to the children in our children in our care. Anyone walking on the street might look at any one of our kids and say no hope exists there, but I refuse to believe that lie. As we work to love each kid we also speak truth to them and challenge them to leave their own beautiful legacy behind them. We challenge lies in their lives like, “The world is always scary, Adults can’t be trusted, and I am not valuable and cannot be loved.”

As we build relationship with our kids, God’s legacy of love flows down through us to make a difference in the life of each child at Hillview.

Everyone in the world leaves a legacy. I thank you for choosing to make part of your legacy loving those who need love at Hillview Acres Children’s Home.