The Fog

“He calls His own sheep by name and leads them out. When He has brought them out, He goes on ahead of them, and His sheep follow Him because they know His voice.”
‭‭John‬ ‭10:3-4

After making the decision to open an all day child care we had some big questions to answer:

• How will we keep staff and children as safe as possible from the spread of COVID?
• How will we create a schedule that allows us to serve students on their virtual days and also students on the days they go to school? 
• How will we set up our classrooms?
• Is our wifi even strong enough to support 45 students on zoom at one time? 
• How will we provide lunch?
• And lastly, how much is this going to cost and how will we afford all these huge changes that are needed? 

We hit roadblock after roadblock. There were some that were very concerned about the risk COVID-19 posed. Springfield Public Schools told us we couldn’t buy school lunches from them. Figuring out a way to have staff present with virtual kids all day and staff to pick up kids from school and still do our regular Before and After School care was overwhelming. 

Our biggest problem, however, seemed to be the financial one. We discovered it was going to cost us $2,000 to buy plexiglass dividers so that students could remain properly distanced. We realized our additional staffing costs were going to be astronomical as we went from having only three staff members plus myself to eight staff members plus myself. We didn’t yet know what our daily lunch costs would be. We decided we needed to raise the speed of the internet in the building. And all that didn’t even touch all that we knew we would have to spend on PPE, professional cleaners fees, sanitation supplies, etc. 

Every day we planned, worked, and prayed as the first day of school loomed closer. Every day we took another leap of faith, trusting that God would provide the right person, the right conversation, the right organization, to get us what we needed so that we could serve our families. 

As we kept striving forward, I had the same feeling, it was as if we were walking through a dense fog. We were deep into the unknown.

But the Shepherd kept calling, guiding us forward “Come this way, trust me, you’re on the right path.”