I can always tell when I’ve fallen behind on the blog…I start hearing from people wanting to know if we’re okay. We are okay…well, mostly. Right now, Jim and I both are sick. Jim rarely gets sick but he’s had a pretty high fever, headache and stomach stuff for the last few days. I’ve had the same thing off and on for the past couple of weeks. We’re both sick of being sick but we’ve come to realize that is just part of us being here. We spend a lot of time with people who don’t have the luxury of good health care or even good basic sanitation. That’s bound to translate to our own health suffering sometimes. It just happens more than we would like!
We’ve also been extremely busy since we’ve come back from the States. Stepping in to the role of being the overseers of CINAFE continues to be both time and energy consuming…extremely. It also allows us to spend a lot of time with the children. We are getting to know them more as individuals and the better we know them, the more complicated we find them to be. Abuse, abandonment, neglect…all have taken their toll on these children. The road to healing is going to be a long one for them to travel… it’s going to be a long one for us walking alongside of them.
Along with working with the children in establishing firm parameters which are held in place through healthy affection and healthy attention, we are also working with the staff and the administration. This culture seems to create a chasm between the two. That is tough in any line of work but when working with abused children, it’s something that has to be overcome. It is imperative that there be an atmosphere of working together for the good of the kids which means that both have to learn to be intentional and deliberate in moving forward.
The very nature of why these children are at CINAFE also opens the door for the enemy to set up camp there. Control and manipulation are major issues and there is definitely spiritual warfare being waged. We’re thankful we’re on the side which will ultimately win the war but I have to say, the battles are fierce and there have already been casualties along the way. There have been recent terminations of some staff members and we are now addressing some behavior issues in some of the children. This is not a job for the faint of heart, that’s for sure. I’m guessing this is where God is going to use a lot of my life experiences of being a mom and grandma…and my natural bent for digging in and holding tight.
When my girls were in high school, we had a foreign exchange student from Japan live with us for a year. I can remember when I grounded Mika for going to a party which I had expressly told her she could not attend, she told me that I was the “meanest mother in Johnson County.” It hurt my heart to hear those words but she never knew that. I responded that I had been in the running for that position and I was glad to hear that I had won it. Today, years later, Mika still calls me Mom and I still have a special place in my heart for my “third” daughter.
I can’t even count the number of times one of my own girls would say something ugly or hurtful or would do something that would scare me half to death. At one point I could have sworn that alien beings had come and invaded their sweet little bodies and had taken control of my darling girls…if I remember right, it was about the age of 14 with both of them. Thankfully, we all lived through those years. Sometimes being a good mom means having to be a tough one, also. Funny how we never think that when we’re holding our seven pound bundle of joy in our arms…
This past week, there was a team of 27 teens (plus 6 adults) who came from a private Christian school in Ohio to work with a local King’s Castle chapter. Along with the other areas they ministered, they spent some time at CINAFE, painting the outside of several of the casitas and just playing with the kids. They had an outing where the kids were included plus several activities with them. I think both groups had a great time!
We helped arrange a ministry opportunity for this team at a small school in rural El Crucero. This is the school where Freddy and Felix’s boys attend. The team did door-to-door evangelism in the community, passing out beans and rice packets and then afterwards, met back at the school where they put on about an hour long program for the students. It was a fun program with lots of Christian based singing and skits. The students absolutely loved it!
After the program, the school fed all the students and the team with food that was purchased by the team and prepared by the school. There was enough food fixed to feed 300 people! Because they were feeding so many, Jim and I had to go to a sister school in another community to borrow one of their big cooking pots for them to use that day. It was a great collaboration and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves that day. We also had some doors opened to us that day for some possible future ministry opportunities. I just love how God does stuff like that!
The update on Yamuleith is not so encouraging. She remains in the hospital and although she is better than she was the day we called the ambulance, she still suffers so much. Her foster family has said they don’t want her back as she requires too much care. She has begged not to be returned to her father and step-mother. The facility we had hoped might be able to take her has said they can’t. Our options are quickly running out. I’m afraid that the government’s social services department is going to have to get involved. This probably won’t be the best thing for Yamuleith but we no longer have a good choice to make. We are faced with the lesser of two evils at this point and the burden of what to do weighs heavily on us. This is such a serious matter of prayer for us and we would appreciate your prayers as well. We obviously need God’s wisdom and guidance on this.
Kenneth continues to do well. He’s awfully slow in recovering from the effects of the last chemo but each day, he seems to grow stronger and he is more and more upbeat. We are in constant awe of how God has worked through this little boy and his family never misses an opportunity to give God all the glory!
La escuela de Las Rayitas de Luz (The Rays of Light School) is rapidly growing. This is the after-school school that Danelia, Kenneth’s mom, has twice a week in her living room. She started with 10 students almost a month ago and is now up to 18. An opportunity came up to rent a house which we could use for Danelia’s school and for us to use for our Saturday English class. We had been praying about it the last few weeks and we were ready to make a commitment to rent it for a year. We took the money to do so last Saturday when we found out the man had failed to meet with the family three different times. I guess it appears that maybe he’s not so sure about renting the house after all. We were all very disappointed but we also are all in agreement that we need to wait until the house and the timing are of God.
Another house did open up but that man wants to sell it and not rent it and the price was out of our budget by a long shot. So, we didn’t even entertain that thought for any length of time. We continue to pray God will open up something for us before long as Danelia’s class continues to grow in size but her small little living room doesn’t!
Our Saturday English class with the children also has experienced growth just in the two weeks we’ve had it. We were supposed to have 11 students our first week and we ended up with 18. This past Saturday, we had 21 and we were asked if two more could join. We are packed like sardines in Danelia’s as it is but neither of us can say “no” to these kids.
These are kids who want to come to school! They want to learn! They are unbelievably well-behaved and respectful. And they are learning about Jesus every time they walk through the door, whether it’s for Danelia’s school or for English class. We have already gotten prices on chairs, tables and basic supplies and so now, we are just waiting for God to open up a building for us. We are absolutely loving this and we are so excited to see what God is going to do next with this little school!
We actually attended a meeting with some of the parents last Saturday after class. Danelia called them together to introduce us to them and to discuss their participation in their children’s education. The feedback from the parents was excellent. All of the parents praised Danelia’s efforts and were very pleased with what she was doing. With tears in her eyes, one of the moms talked about how her son hated regular school and never wanted to go. She is a single mom and life is very hard for her. Bayron is a shy little boy and he has not done well in public school but he is thriving and learning with Danelia. His mom said he loved coming to our English class and she said she has seen such a change in him the last few weeks. She thanked us all and we knew her appreciation was sincere. Seeing the look of hope in her eyes about her son’s future makes teaching in the hot, crowded little “classroom” (Danelia’s living room) worthwhile for all of us.
We have recently been attending a new church called Covenant Church. It’s a small congregation and is a bit more expressive in their worship than our previous church but we have felt very comfortable there. It is a church that has both Nicaraguans and Americans in it and we like having a more balanced mix plus it also has a Thursday night Bible study which we are really excited about. They are currently going through “Forgotten God” by Francis Chan. I was given that book by James, our pastor at FBC, when we were there in March and had just started reading it when I found out that was the study they were offering! It’s a good book and we’re enjoying the study.
Well, that’s it in a nutshell. There isn’t a day that goes by that something hasn’t happened that I wish I could share with you. The problem is that rarely do I find the time, or maybe I should say, make the time, these days to sit down and do it. It seems like every day, our plans get changed due to some “emergency” that needs to be taken care of immediately or some Impromptu meeting that must be attended or some “forgotten” task that must be managed. These are needs that we are trying to meet to help others and we are ultimately, hurting ourselves in the process. We have found that we are now working literally 7 days a week…that’s too much, regardless of how “good” the work is.
We are now in the process of trying to implement a schedule that is not quite so hectic. We know this is not what God wants us to do. This kind of busyness is detrimental in so many ways. It’s not healthy for us physically (we’re both exhausted right now as well as sick), nor emotionally, nor spiritually. There will always be needs and if you make yourself available, you will always be needed. But you won’t always be in God’s will. It’s such a simple concept and yet seems so difficult to maintain.
That being said, I’m going to bed. Jim’s already there…I wanted to post some pictures but I don’t want to disturb him by getting the camera…he needs to sleep well tonight. So, I’ll post some later. Besides, it’s late, I’m tired and we have a 7:00 a.m. meeting tomorrow morning with the staff at CINAFE. It’s important that we be there. Tomorrow morning is usually the day we take Raquel, the director of CINAFE, to the market and to Pali to buy groceries and supplies for the facility…but we had to do that this morning instead because Teresa, the cook, is going to be gone tomorrow…which meant we didn’t get to have our English class there this morning.
We also will need to go buy some supplies for our English class in Tipitapa that we have each Saturday plus for the school’s Sunday’s Mother’s Day celebration there. We have been asked to attend. We have to do that tomorrow as we have English class at CINAFE on Thursday plus a meeting with Raquel following class and then there’s our time that we try to spend with the kids there each afternoon. Friday, we have to take one of the children to the dentist and then it’s Saturday and Tipitapa and….See what I mean? It’s as hectic living it as it is trying to read it! Good night all. May God bring His rest to all of us tonight!
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