Little angel an answer to Meiring family’s prayers
To make sure little Gabriel wouldn't survive, she took a brick and continuously hit her stomach in order to kill him.
MBOMBELA – Jacques and Claire Meiring are well-known and much-loved residents of the city. Jacques has even been called a superhero as operational manager of Bossies Community Justice, having apprehended many criminals.
However, the latest addition to their family is stealing the limelight and hearts. It is the 10-month-old Gabriel, a beautiful brown-eyed boy who was named after an angel, a special messenger of God.
However, Gabriel’s short life has been no fairy tale and it was in the arms of Claire and Jacques where this boy’s eyes became alive for the very first time.
Gabriel nearly lost his life in his mother’s womb when she (22) tried to terminate her pregnancy on seven and a half months by drinking muti. To make sure little Gabriel wouldn’t survive, she took a brick and continuously hit her stomach in order to kill him.
“I sobbed,” Claire recalls. “I just held him tight in my arms when they told us the devastating story.
After drinking the muti, Gabriel’s mom ended up in hospital and he was born prematurely. He was placed in an incubator for a month and his mother left the hospital. She never returned.
He was placed in an orphanage and it was there that Claire and Jacques met the boy with the deathlike stare in his eyes.
According to Claire, Gabriel just sat there, staring at the window. “He had no name, no identity and his eyes were dead.”
Never in their life would they imagine that the very same eyes would light a thousand stars and touch a million souls a few weeks later. “Jacques asked if he could hold him and there was an immediate connection – a connection no words could explain. I went home and prayed.
I said to God, ‘Lord, if in any way possible the connection we experienced was from You, then we will adopt him’,” Claire explains. At that stage she and Jacques had considered adoption for the past four years.
Jacques and Claire went back to the orphanage and informed the staff that they would like to adopt. “We told them that it didn’t necessarily have to be him, although he was our preference.” A few days later the miracle boy was welcomed with open arms to the Meiring household and even at the receiving end of some love bites from Bossie, Jacques’ four-legged colleague in the battle against crime.
Jacques and Claire today believe having Gabriel under their roof is without a doubt a blessing from above. And what is even more amazing is the fact that Jacques received word about him from people who were not even aware of what was going on. “A woman called and said she saw a third one. This was an amazing confirmation for me and knowing that God said He trusts you with what he has entrusted you with, is such a blessing,” Jacques explained.
Today Gabriel is topping the popularity charts in Mbombela and is capturing hearts wherever he goes. And although the difference in race, which was a slight concern for Claire at first, she and Jacques are happier today and more confident than ever.
“We expected negativity and during the four years of considering adoption, I continuously asked myself, what would happen if we got a black baby, would it do more harm than good? But when we experienced what we experienced that day and the connection we felt, we asked ourselves, how is it possible to say it will do more harm?
“What is important to us is to give a child an opportunity he never would have had, no matter the colour of his skin. We will never withhold him from his culture and we don’t want to change who he is. At the end of the day it is about how he is raised and how he is empowered.”
And with Jacques speaking Zulu and a granny who speaks five different African languages, this little hero can expect a bright future.
And as Claire writes on Facebook, “I’ve done nothing to deserve having you as a part of our lives. I lay next to you in awe of how amazing our God is, how perfect He made you. How could He have chosen me for this task? I know with certainty it’s not by experience or qualification, not by accident or by chance, not by persuasion or by demand, but all I hear is the still soft voice of the Holy Spirit saying: You are just somebody wanting to be a mother and Gabriel is just somebody wanting to be a child.
To have the privilege of being a parent doesn’t mean that your child must come from your womb. After all, you are the seed of Abraham and so is he. You are connected by the DNA of Christ, the blood of Jesus, and that’s what makes real family. It is a bond by His blood which is stronger than any bond of human DNA.”
