By: Sarah Green
Sarah Green was the former Saving Susan Ministry Coordinator and is currently a Parent Partner to Pov.
It was my third day at my new job with Saving Susan Ministry. I was still learning so much about this nonprofit I now worked for. As I flipped through the binder of all the children in our program I noticed they were all young except for one boy who was 17. I later asked what would happen to him if he didn’t get a sponsor, to which my boss explained the tragedy of aging out. The orphanage directors can’t afford to keep kids around so they often go find jobs in factories or in fields with no chance for better a paying job or further education. This broke my heart. I took his picture out of the binder and taped it to my desk and began to pray for him everyday.
Fast forward about 3 months - we landed in Cambodia with a team of about 12 people. There was so much emotion, energy, and stress around the whole thing I am embarrassed to admit I never even thought to seek out this boy I’d been praying for. We took all the children to lunch and about half way through my husband finds me and says you have to meet this guy I’ve been talking to. I turn around and I knew that face instantly. I of course screamed and immediately hugged him. I told my husband this was the kid I’d been praying for. Later my husband told me all about their conversations and how he knew we needed to find a way to support his goals.
Parent Partnering allowed everything we hoped for and more to happen. My husband and I are in our twenties as is Pov so we call him our brother instead of our child. We have been with Pov through Saving Susan for two years now and because he is in college we have moved into the Next Steps program. It has been surreal to watch my brothers dreams come true and to genuinely have my family grow and wrap around the globe. We first got a year to get to know him better and have him know us. Then we got to walk through high school graduation testing, applying to college, applying for a scholarship, the joys of passing his exams as well as college admission and so much more. Since becoming a member of our family he has learned English online through Liberty University, he got accepted into Medical school, his school, room, and board are all paid for through a donor in the Saving Susan community, he has received music lessons and even interned in a hospital with another Saving Susan partner. Our brother is an incredible person with God’s hand hovering close around him, the Lord would have taken care of him regardless. To see up close His rich blessing pour out on Pov though and on my family by getting to be apart of his journey - it’s been “immeasurably more” (Eph 4:20).
