So, last night I left you as I was going to go play with the kids from the children’s home. I did just that, and made several friends at the same time. I was playing around with the kids when a couple of the young girls, 5 & 6 years old each grabbed one of my hands and in Spanish began to tell me “you can be my Mama.” How heart breaking. I am old enough to be their mother, and to see an adult who loves to play and spend time with them, who says she is their friend and not planning to be their mother…in the very little Spanish I know…even for a kid its just another blow. I do know they have adults around working with the home often, but as a child I would have wondered why she didn’t want me. But praise God for breaking my heart, because it is that broken heart that drives me to prayer for those girls and the rest of the children in the home.
While it is always a joy to get to serve, there are some days that my joy increases just a little bit more (or maybe a whole lot more) and one of those days was today (Thursday). The burden, passion, and desire that God has placed on my heart over the last several years has been children, teens, and young adults working with children.
We headed off this morning to go into some schools. The first school we showed up at, we originally had an appointment for, but someone from the ministry of education was there and so we were asked to come back that afternoon. A wasted trip you say? Absolutely not. Mike got the opportunity to witness to a young man who was standing outside the school, maybe in his twenties, and that young man accepted Christ as his Savior.
As a group (Midland Baptist, the interns, Mike & a few of the staff he employs) we then went to a military run school with kids ranging from kindergarten age through 16 years old. We broke up into groups of 5 and went classroom to classroom sharing the gospel. Be still my heart. My particular group got to visit 5 different classrooms ranging all ages, and saw numerous kids believe the gospel and accept Christ as their Savior in every classroom. We were in one class of kids approximately 13-14 years old and when we finished, the teacher brought us to the classroom of kids he was getting ready to take to gym. He wanted to be sure these young kids got to hear the gospel before they left their class. Amongst the 4 separate groups we visited 17 classrooms in that school. I can’t tell you exactly how these children’s lives or eternities changed. I can’t tell you for sure who did and did not accept Christ. I can tell you in our classrooms at least 80 responded that they had done so. What I can for sure tell you is that God can use anybody, and God opens doors that we could never imagine He would open.
While we were going classroom to classroom, Mark (our youth pastor) and Mike Kennedy got the chance to speak with the director of the school and his brother. Originally they weren’t going to let us in. They’ve had people visit the school before who have only taken. They’ve taken up time, resources, and even stolen all the school’s musical equipment. The director was very reserved, and very nervous about allowing anyone to come into the school, and rightly so. But as Mike began to explain that we were coming to give the Word of God and other gifts (Tootsie Rolls – they don’t have them in Peru) he cautiously allowed it. As we continued to visit Mike was able to share the gospel with the director and both he and his brother got saved.
We went to a couple other schools throughout the day, in two going classroom to classroom and in the other we had a group of about 30 – 40 kids gathered in an open space in the school where we shared the gospel, again, many of them receiving Christ as their Savior. Most of the schools we went into today were within a 20-30 minute drive from the Children’s Home, which was greatly encouraging to me, knowing that as I go back, prayerfully in February, these are kids that I might get the chance to have further ministry with.
After the schools we went to a holding tank this evening just before dinner. For those of you who don’t know, a holding tank is a temporary shelter for kids and teenagers to get them off the street and somewhere safe. Some are orphaned, some are abandoned, and some have needed removed from their homes. It’s temporary, and there are constantly new kids within the shelter, but it does provide protection.
The holding tank we went to this evening had about 17 girls between the ages of 12-16, one of which had a baby 6-9 months maybe. Mike took time to introduce us to the group, thank them for allowing us to come and letting them know we had gifts for them, and then the guys all left the room while the intern and MBC girls stayed and spent some time talking with these young ladies. Two young women amongst the 12 of us in there gave testimonies of God carrying them through abuse and hard times, and how in the midst He still loves them and is good. At the end I was given the opportunity to share the gospel with these young women, and I believe every one of them responded, understanding she was a sinner and needed the love and forgiveness of a Savior. I can’t fix their lives. I can’t fix the abuse and hurt and abandonment they have gone through, but I can introduce them to a God who gives them hope, a God who can take the bad, horrible, rotten scenarios and use them for good and His glory. I got some time to visit with Ana and Marianna afterwards, giving them John & Romans and showing them Romans 8:28 & John 3:16 – to give them something to cling to. Marianna was maybe 12 or 13 and was the young lady with the baby, and Ana was 13 and pregnant. I couldn’t say much, but did all I could to let them know God still loved them.
I know several of you are reading this, some from this trip, and some who have taken trips to NLCH in the past and you can picture what is going on, but still, it is hard to adequately describe the work that God is doing here. Continuously the gospel is going to new places and reaching new people, and Christians are getting training at sharing the gospel effectively with multiple age groups and in multiple scenarios. It’s just after midnight and I am still up because I can barely contain the joy over seeing all God has done today. I had to get it down and share it with you before I forgot a single moment.
More went on today that I haven’t focused on. Chelene Kennedy, Amy Simpson and I finished up several of the tasks that I needed taken care of in order to begin my transition in getting here on a permanent basis. A large group of us spent maybe 45 minutes singing in the dining hall (which echoes beautifully) and making the wordless book bracelets. I made friends with several of the ladies that work with the children in the home despite the language barrier, and I am beginning to get more comfortable riding through the crazy mountainous streets.
God is so good. I have loved Peru for years, and I have been excited to come, anxious to come, and praying God would get me through deputation quickly, but after today I have fallen more in love with the Peruvian people, and have a great burden for the children here than ever before. Please pray for them, but please, please, please, (with a cherry on top) pray that God will help me quickly raise the rest of the support that I need in order to be here permanently. There is so much to do, so much opportunity, and I don’t want to let a single minute go unredeemed.