Hey
everyone. So starting Wednesday we were into our first official week of
ministry since being back. This part of the trip will be characterized with more
individual ministry on a more regular basis. We are expected to put in 25-30
hours of ministry per week at a certain place or two. So I figured I would give
a quick run down of how a normal week will look for here on out.
Monday
Mondays
have 7 hours of ministry. They start at 8am. Every Monday I will be going to
Corazon Contenta. It is an educational facility for disabled children. Today
was my first day there. It was spent hanging out with kids and teaching them
numbers and colors. This morning was spent mostly with Natily, a girl with Down
syndrome who is about 6 and then Alberto, a man with Down syndrome also. It was
so much fun. Natily sat on my lap and colored, mostly on the paper, but
occasionally on my pants, hands, face, and her shirt. Alberto and I practiced
numbers 1-20 (all in Spanish), and also worked on colors and basic
instructions. I loved watching the improvement just from the beginning of the
morning to the end. We finally mastered where 13 fits into the scheme of things!
I was at Corazon Contenta (happy heart) from 8-1 and then spent the next 2
hours running to various grocery stores to get the team food for the next
couple of days. You might be surprised how much food 15 gringos can eat!
Tuesday
This
morning starts out a little early. At 7:30am we have a bible study for women in
the community. We are also providing a day care/children’s program at this
time. That is my involvement. We hope that, since we have a child care, that
more women, especially young mothers will be able to attend out bible study.
After that I head over to Hogar de Ancianos (home for ancients…I love literal
translations). It is the local nursing home. There are about 50 residents that
live there. The appalling thing is most of these people were abandoned by their
families. Most of the residents do not need to really be in intense assisted
living. We go in and clean a little bit, but mostly spend time with the
residents. The Nursing home is a non-profit organization so staff and supplies
are short. We are just happy to volunteer. We talk with the residents, play
cards, help with lunch, and do whatever is needed. The other day we painted the
women’s finger nails. We made a friend whose name is Gustavo. He is so sweet.
We helped him with physical therapy; we just walked back and forth across the
bars with him, 50 times to be exact. The part that always makes us laugh is
when we play cards: none of the residents have glasses, so they are always
cheating, but on accident.
Wednesday
Wednesday
is another day at Hogar de Ancianos, from 9-2. After that, from 3:30-5 we have
a children’s program out in the barrio that we live in. It is the same group of
kids that came and helped us do the trash pickup. We love the friendships that
we had with these children and didn’t want to lose them. We go over and sing
songs, play games, and have a short message. This semester we are going to try
and get the kids more involved in prayer and how prayer is key in their
relationship with God. I normally come back so exhausted and disheveled, but it
is a blast.
Thursday
Thursday
is another morning at Corazon Contenta from 8-12. They split up the kids into
classes based on skill level. I am helping with the beginner class. I have come
to find out that God will be working patients with me. In the beginner class we
are still trying to cover the basics. This takes time and energy, both from me
and the students. We are in a one on one ratio, but still it is mentally
exhausting. This last Thursday, I practiced numbers with a little girl named
Melissa, (there is a picture of her) she is 8 and has Down Syndrome. We practiced the numbers 1-5 for an
hour. I believe she is making improvements. She can identify how many fingers
she needs to hold up when a number is placed in front of her. For some of these
children, this is their first time ever being in a class room setting, besides
teaching numbers and colors we are trying to teach them how to even behave in a
class room setting, what is appropriate and not appropriate. I love the work
that we are doing there, but it is defiantly stretching me.
Friday
Friday
is my day off! Kind of. A project that I am working on, that currently does not
count towards ministry hours, is a house of prayer. I have partnered with Caleb
Spitler, and we are trying to get this going. This project has 
become so
important to me, I have been pouring over books and materials. On this day we
go to meetings and pick up supplies for the house we are building. I feel so
blessed that God called me into this project. We already have four walls (you can see it in the upper right corner of the picture) and
the church Torre Fuerta to get us started. Next week we hope to open the Prayer
House to the community. We are going to try and get prayer for 10 hours a day,
but hope to get up to 24/7. God can use prayer in such amazing and powerful
ways, we want to provide the community with a place to come and just be close
to God and have a refuge from the outside mayhem of the world. This is a huge
task in itself, but we know that God is backing us on this, we cannot do it
alone. Please prayer for this ministry and we will keep you updated. (if you want to read a more details about what
we are doing you can go and read Caleb’s Blog Posts (click here), “It’s coming…” and “Fire
Starters”)
Thanks
so much for all the continued prayers and support. I am sorry that I did not
post last week, I promise to post again tomorrow!
Anita
