Blessed Beyond Imagination

God never ceases to amaze me.  He knows the desires of our hearts, and he knows our needs.  Right now, we are feeling so joyful to be a part of the South Baton Rouge Church of Christ.  In January, the college group decided to send a container to Honduras full of things to help the people who live there.  Very few students in the college ministry have ever been to Honduras, but they labored many hours to prepare this container.  On this container, some people put a few things for our home there.  The church came together and filled the container top to bottom, and front to back.  Many people will be affected by the love of the people in BR. 

Another blessing this week comes from Parkview Baptist School.  My mother-in-law teaches there, and the JR. High president goes to our church.  They decided that the JR High students would try to raise money for school supplies for children of Honduras.  Cheryl initially hoped they would raise $800.  The kids set out to do bake sales and many other things to raise money.  They (without the help of their parents) raised over $2000.

This month we ran into a few extra expenses, and today we had an email saying that someone had decided to send us a check without having any clue of these extra expenses.  While this person did not know, God did. 

How amazing God is, and how often we forget that.

Henry

Tonight we ate dinner with Jesus, but tonight he looked like a guy named Henry.  As we were coming home from the park this afternoon, we here a guy yell out to us in English asking if we were from the states.  To make a very long story short, Henry is one half Salvadorian and one half Columbian, and he now lives in Costa Rica.  When he was 4 he moved to New York with his mom and his American step-dad.  He didn't take the steps needed to allow his US residency to continue for whatever reason.  Not doing that got him deported here to CR.  He was just asking for some money to get to where he was going to start work tomorrow.  We don't just hand out money, especially not in the  middle of the road.  The spirit moved us to invite him to walk home with us and to eat with us.  At our house, Henry showered for the first time in two weeks and ate like someone who didn't know where his next meal was going to come from (he doesn't).  We got to know Henry in the two hours he spent at our house.  He has a little girl that is 7 who he misses terribly.  Her name is faith.  Also, his mom is still in New York, but she had surgery on her back and is in the hospital.

Henry cried when we invited him for dinner.  He said people so often do not treat him like he is a real person.  He said people always come to the gate with the worst assumptions.  At dinner, we helped Haley say a prayer, then he asked if he could pray to.  In his prayer he thanked God that he was not dead and that God sent people into his life to remind him of God's love and grace for each of us.  He apologized to God for turning his back on him and vowed to walk with God again.  He said many more things in his prayer with tears streaming down his face.

Sitting here 31/2 hours after meeting Henry I am hoping that the bus fare will get him where he needs to go.  I feel in my heart that he was not just looking for money for his next fix.  As he left, he told Matt that he thought he just needed money for the bus, but he didn't know how badly he needed to sit at a table just to talk to people.  We talked about God, and we talked about life.  We talked about various Central American countries, and we talked about family. 

Before Henry left, he tried to call his mom, but couldn't get a hold of her.  A few minutes later she called and talked to me for an hour.  She was really upset.  She is in so much pain with the desire for the well-being of her son.  She cried and cried on the phone to me.

I am not writing this blog to brag about what we did, but as a reminder to not judge people as if they are less than you, but remember that each person is a creation of God and someone that he loves and we should too.  It is amazing how small acts of kindness and the love of God may be something that really changes someone's life.  Tonight, I am praying for Henry, for his daughter Faith in Boston, and his mom Cristina and his step-dad in New York.  Please join me in praying.

Great Day at Valle del Sol

Today as we headed out to Valle del Sol, we were joined by 9 other people from school.  I had a lesson planned.  I my plan for this trimester is just to go through the Gospel of Mark so that my group of kids can learn about the life of Jesus.  The first chapter of Mark is about John the Baptist, and the baptism of Jesus.  I was telling the story and sweet Emilce begins asking me lots of questions about baptism.  I told her (and the rest of the girls) what baptism meant and why we do it.  She asked me if she could be baptized.  She said that she believed in Jesus and asked if that meant she should be baptized.  I answered all of her questions, and asked her some too.  She really wants to be baptized.  This church does not have a baptistry, and we would need to go to the river.  We went to talk to her mom, and her mom was a little weary of her doing this.  I'm not sure if her mother is a Christian or not.  The mom said we would talk again next Saturday.

I am praising God tonight that he allowed me the opportunity to share with Emilce and that he has made my Spanish speaking ability good enough to do so.  But tonight, I am also requesting prayers that next week Emilce's desire to be baptized remains the same.  I'm also praying that Emilce will be a light to her family and to her community and will be able to share the good news of God with them. 

Fogata

Yesterday was a really fun day.  We found out that Olivia (a girl visiting from Ohio) was celebrating her 23rd birthday.  My dad who loves cake and ice cream asked what kind of cake she would like to have for her birthday.  She said she likes ice cream cake, so when we were in town after visiting some friends in Los Pinos, we stopped by Baskin Robins to buy the ice cream cake.  None of the kids knew that we were going to buy a cake, so that was a good surprise.  Everyone loved the cake. While the kids were eating birthday cake, my dad was starting a bond fire or fogata so the kids could roast marshmallows.  Everyone loved sharing with Haley.  She had her own piece of cake plus part of a couple other girls cakes.  Then the girls all roasted marshmellows and helped Haley eat them.  Needless to say Haley had a full belly and didn't feel so well today.  Having a fire and marshmellows is always a special treat for the kids, and I was so grateful to be a part of it.

House Church

One of the ladies wanted all of the members from church over to her house.  The 19 Casa kids, my parents, Matt, Haley, and I started for the house a few minutes after 9:00.  We had to walk a little over a mile to get to the house.  When we got to the home, the lady was there to greet each person, and her living room was ready for us to worship in it.  She had every chair she could possibly find in the room and some pieces of wood on top of cinder blocks to make benches for the kids.  Everyone who could walk the distance came for worship in this lady's house this morning.  Kelin and Karol still took the kids outside and gathered them around for Bible class while we participated in the sermon.

After the worship time, the lady got up in front of everyone and expressed how grateful she was that we were all able to come to her house.  She prepared chicken and rice for everyone and bought coke and fanta also.  I was impressed by this kind woman's hospitality.  Sometimes it is difficult to accept the loving kindness of people who have much less than me, but I know that if they offer me something, they would much rather that I accept their gift.  I learn so much from the Honduran people in terms of hospitality and of treating others like Jesus would treat people.