Thanksgiving and How We Break God's Heart

First of all, my apologies for being a tad slow in bringing this latest post to life! However, I have a good reason for this, which I will now endeavor to explain. Here at Casa Bernabe there is a special celebration for El Dia de Gracias, aka Thanksgiving. Now this is not your typical American Thanksgiving by any stretch of the imagination. First of all, Guatemalans don't generally celebrate Thanksgiving for obvious reasons, but Casa Bernabe has adapted the holiday a tad. Here they use it as an opportunity to put on a big show as a thank-you to Jesus and all of the donors and sponsors who make this ministry possible. So what is my part in all this you might ask? Well, I have stepped into the role of co-choreographer of a dance including some of the older girls here, to the song "With Everything"/ "Con Todo" by Hillsong. Here are the links to both the Spanish and English versions - we are obviously using the Spanish version :) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhIPaW9v-3g & http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSCE8uLuTJY. It's a beautiful song, and it's an incredible blessing to share my love of dance with these girls, none of whom have ever had the opportunity for any dance training. The message of the song has special meaning for me right now too because it talks about how darkness trembles in the light of God and how mighty and awesome His power is. I have felt that power in my life in a tangible way this last month (yes I have now been here for a month!) in inexplicable ways, and often I don't realize it until afterwards. He has been teaching me so much. I feel that God has laid it on my heart to share a rather difficult example of this. Last week there was one day where I was taking care of all the kids by myself, and while the majority of the day went smoothly, the afternoon was pretty rough. The kids are all supposed to nap after lunchtime, but a few of them kept getting all the others worked up, which amounted to 16 angry tired children and no down time for me. After this lovely episode, one of my kids threw a huge fit when I told him I had to discipline him for behaving so badly. I had to restrain him because he was screaming and hitting me, and it was all I could do not to burst into tears. Basically, I looked him straight in the eye and told him I loved him but that actions have consequences and that he could either accept this fact and calm down or continue freaking out and make things worse. Well he chose option 1 after about 15 more minutes of screaming, but while all this was going on and I thought my heart would break I was so upset, I cried out to God "Is this what I make you feel like when I disobey?"

I wrote the following in my prayer journal the next day:

"When John* (name changed because of privacy laws here) threw that temper tantrum yesterday and I had to physically restrain him from hitting me I thought my heart would break tand that I would burst out crying in front of him. Is that what it feels like when we sin against you Lord? When I rebel and refuse to do what You know is best for me? It's probably worse, much worse, because Your discipline is perfect and You love us so much. Forgive me Father. You watched Your only Son die for an ungrateful selfish people that You might redeem us unto Yourself."

I don't think I've ever had such a clear understanding of how our sin breaks God's heart. It was an intensely humbling experience, and I'm still working through my heart/ thought process about the whole thing.

Well, I sincerely hope that this post was comprehensible and that it gives you the reader a clearer glimpse of how God is working on my heart here. His mercies are new every morning! November may prove a little trickier for me to be posting quite as often, as the house parents I work with will be on vacation and it will be myself and my Guatemalan friend Nora taking care of the house together full-time! As always, I covet your prayers, welcome your thoughts and greatly appreciate your encouragement. To God be the glory.

Reasons to Stay

If you asked me right now to come up with a list of reasons to leave Guatemala tomorrow, I could probably come up with a rather sizable list without a great deal of thought. It would most likely include the following:

1. No me gustan las cucharachas. (Translation: I don't like the cockroaches. Thankfully they're not super huge, but I kill at least 10/day. Those are just the ones I can catch.)

2. Trying to keep track of 16 hyper-active 5-9 year-olds can be a rather interesting challenge to say the least. I usually settle for keeping them from killing each other. We'll work towards bigger and better goals as we go.

3. I really miss meat. Today I got to eat a small piece of turkey and got really really excited about it. When Christmas break rolls around I plan to eat as much steak, turkey, chicken, hamburger and fish as I can get my hands on.

4. I can't watch Patriots' games here. I am in football withdrawal. (Though I don't miss living in Steelers' country. Sorry Pittsburgh fans.)

5. No hot water due to the complete lack of gas here on campus. That truck will show up one of these days.

6. I'm getting very used to feeling stupid on an at least daily (if not more frequently) basis.

7. When I woke up on Saturday morning, there was poop on the floor.

8. Sometimes I miss my family and friends from home so much I think I'm going to throw up.

And I could come up with more...but that's not the point of this post. Far from it. The reasons I have to stay far outweigh the ones I have to leave:

1. I'm learning so much: How to say new words in Spanish. How things work in a different culture. How to not act like a stupid American in that culture. How to put 16 kids to bed by myself (which I did tonight). My understanding of my own fallen nature. And how good God is to me despite that fallen nature.

2. My kids. For all the hell they give me some days, they're more than worth it. There's nothing like having one of them wrap their tiny arms around my leg while I'm washing dishes and looking down to see them grinning up at me. I also love the way they pray. A different nino prays before each meal, and they don't pray short prayers. They thank God for absolutely everything good that happened that day, the houseparents, Nora the other helper, myself, the food and Jesus. They don't pray to sound pious or eloquent. They just pray honestly.

3. God has called me here. While I'm still figuring out how best to be a blessing here, I have purpose and a mission to accomplish, a race to run for the Lord. I'm currently working on memorizing the following passage from Isaiah chapter 61, verses 1-4:

"The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me,

because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.

He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,

to proclaim freedom for the captives, and release from darkness the prisoners,

To proclaim the year of the Lord's favor

and the day of vengeance of our God,

To comfort all who mourn,

and to provide for those who grieve in Zion -

To bestow on them a crown of beauty

instead of ashes,

The oil of gladness

instead of mourning,

And a garment of praise

instead of a spirit of despair.

They will be called oaks of righteousness,

a planting of the Lord for the display of His splendor.

They will rebuild the ancient ruins

and restore the places long devastated;

They will renew the ruined cities

that have been devastated for generations."

Above all, the challenges here push me into the all-encompassing arms of Christ. I have felt closer to God in the last two and a half weeks than I have in a long time. And His love is so sweet, even when I feel like my heart is about to break. When my strength fails, He is all-powerful. In the midst of chaos, He gives me peace. And when I am entirely frustrated, He brings joy. It doesn't make sense. I don't deserve any of what He gives. And yet He gives anyway. I serve an awesome God. More to come.

A Day in the Life...

As of today, I have officially been here at Casa Bernabe in Guatemala for two weeks. While in the grand scheme of things this is a rather short amount of time, it certainly feels like it has been longer than that. Yes, my days here can be rather long sometimes, but I feel that this is a reflection of how different my life here is from what it was two weeks ago. In the weeks leading up to my departure from the U.S., my days were filled with job shadowing, graduate school applications and doing work in coffee shops with friends for hours upon end. I am now quite literally a world away from this aforementioned life. My day here begins at approximately 6:45, at which point I reluctantly pull myself from the warmth of my bed to get dressed and help get all 16 of our kids through the shower. After a certain amount of cajoling and the brushing and braiding of hair, we read a morning Bible story and eat breakfast. Breakfast (el desayuno) is generally one of the lighter meals of the day, often consisting of atol and cereal. I'm not sure that I'm spelling the name correctly, but atol is some variety of hot, hopefully nutritious liquid, sometimes containing rice. We eat a lot of rice. And I mean a lot. At least once a day, if not more often. But I digress. When getting up from the breakfast table, it is important to be polite and say a "Muchas Gracias" for your food, at which point everyone who does not currently have their mouth full will reply "Buen Provecho", which essentially translates to "Enjoy your meal!". This is also to be said whenever you walk into a room where someone happens to be eating. After breakfast, our mornings tend to consist of one or more of the following: Discovery Kids (in spanish of course) - Angelina Ballerina is the presiding favorite, playing with blocks and Legos, and enjoying the great outdoors either in the little play area next to our house (see pictures previously posted) or in la cancha, aka the cement basketball court at the top of the hill. Lunch (el almuerzo) is generally around 1 and is also the largest meal of the day. This tends to consist of rice, some sort of stew, and tortillas. I'm getting pretty good at just eating whatever I get, which I have to say is usually pretty good, if quite different than that to which I had been accustomed. After lunch, all the kids nap for around 2 hours. Now, I cannot tell a lie, this is almost always my favorite part of the day. After all the dishes have been washed and all the laundry folded, this is my time to spend with Jesus. A friend of mine here has been kind enough to allow me to use her coffee pot, and so it is at around 2:30 in the afternoon that I settle down outside my house with my large cup of coffee, my Bible, my prayer journal and my devotional book to spend some quality time with the Sustainer of my soul. I have come to crave this time, not only because it affords a respite from the craziness of being with 16 children, but because it is then that I truly commune with God. This time is often humbling as I study God's Word and He reveals to me truth about my own failings, but it is always refreshing. After they get up from their nap around 4ish, it's back outside again until dinner around 6, and then it's off to bed. When everything is cleaned up, I usually grab my gear and head down to my friends Sara and Edgar's house to talk, hang out with their posse of teen girls and jump on the internet. Then it's a quick shower and off to bed, hopefully before 11 so I can still cram in 8 hours of sleep. Now, keep in mind, this is only a general description, but I hope it gives you my lovely reader a slightly better picture of what my life here is like. Each day brings new challenges and joys, and I rapidly learning that it is far less overwhelming to take this experience one day at a time with Jesus than to attempt to think about the next 7 months as a whole. I still feel like a total rookie here, but I'm learning. And above all, God is good.

So for now, goodnight! If anyone has a particular question they would like me to answer here, by all means send it to me and I will do my best to answer it promptly :)

A glimpse of where I live!

My kids playing Sunday afternoon futbol!

Our house - Casa Samuel.

The view from our front door - our land here is beautiful :)

Two of my ninos and I!

The Reality of God's Love

So this is hard. Really really hard. Not because what I'm doing is super super physically taxing, but because it is very emotionally and spiritually difficult. God is actively stripping me of everything that I put my trust in apart from Him. My comfort zone is officially gone. My incredible friends are not here to talk to, I have no team of parents to help me analyze important decisions, I can't control what I have to eat, I don't get solid hugs, and I cried to a perfect stranger the other day. Which was a tad embarrassing to say the least. And yet in the midst of this when I was crying out to God today for the 100th time, "what on earth am I doing here? I want to quit", He reminded me that the most of the kids here have never had these things to miss. I am spoiled. Unbelievably spoiled. I have felt more love in my twenty-one (almost twenty-two) years than most people feel in a lifetime. And I made a commitment to be here, whatever shape that may take. God is actively using this experience to shape me into the person He wants me to be. I may not always like the process, but is it necessary? Absolutely. I'm currently doing a Beth Moore study in my quiet time called "Breaking Free" - it's about having true freedom in Christ and looks at the pitfalls that many Christians fall into that prevent us from truly experiencing God's best for us. In the chapter I was reading today, the author was examining the lives of the kings of Israel after David in order to demonstrate pitfalls such as pride, idolatry and apathy. Needless to say, it was convicting. She also pointed out that we often shy away from asking God to truly humble us because we are afraid of what this might actually entail. Or we do ask, are presented with something difficult, and then try to turn around and say "Hey God, this isn't what I signed on for!". I have honestly said this to the King of the Universe. Seriously?! The reality of God's love, as this blog post is entitled, is that He disciplines children. If you're like me, or like the kids I work with, you're not too big on getting disciplined. Does that change the fact that we need it? Umm, NO. And the reality of God's love is that He also comforts His children, and provides exactly what we need. Not necessarily what we want. But He gives us what we truly need. So I can say confidently, "Hallelujah, there is Someone calling the shots who is much much wiser than I am!"

My kids will be up from their nap soon, so I will leave you here for now, but I welcome your comments and covet your prayers. To God be the glory.

First Pictures!

All the kids with Veronica our House Mom in our living room.

One of my girls and I! She's a total sweetheart who is getting adopted in a few weeks!

Mi Casa :)

First view of Guatemala from the airplane!

I'm here!!!

So I made it here! Without a hitch I might add :) I had absolutely no trouble getting through the airport here, and found my ride Luis without a problem: he conveniently had a sign that said "Emeli Rexrode" hahaha. So after running a few other errands in Guatemala City, we drove to Casa Bernabe, which is only about a half-hour outside the city, depending on traffic of course! It's really neat set-up: they have a main building and then houses where all the kids live depending on their ages/ genders with a set of house parents and helpers. I would be considered a helper, and I am currently living in Casa Samuel with boys and girls ages 5-9. There's about 18 of them that live in the house, and they are a beautiful crazy handful. My house mom's name is Veronica, and she is super super welcoming and kind. She also only speaks Spanish, so I'm definitely going to be working hard on my language skillls! Normally we eat all our meals together in the house, but today was a national holiday: El Dia de Los Ninos, so the kitchen made a special breakfast and lunch for everyone to eat together in the big meeting room where we normally have church. My kids normally nap for a couple of hours in the afternoon which is how I have managed to squeeze in this blog post today! I promise to upload the pictures I've taken so far as soon as possible. In the meantime, here are my major prayer requests:

1. Language dominance: my Spanish is pretty good, but they talk really fast! So please pray that I would get this down as quickly as possible so I can really understand what I'm supposed to being doing haha
2. Building relationships with my kids. Many of these kids come from really bad situations or have lived here at the orphanage their whole lives, and I have an incredible opportunity to be blessing to them, so please pray that I will figure out how best to do that.
3. Getting used to a new schedule: early to bed, early to rise is pretty much the system here. As those of you who have lived with me know, I am usually on the opposite end of the spectrum! But here I will probably be getting up around 4:30/5 and going to bed around 8:30/9 hahaha.
4. Finding time to spend with Jesus everyday. He is my light and my strength, especially so now that I'm here.

Right now, this whole experience is still pretty surreal; I spent so much time planning and thinking about this before it happened, so to actually be here living something I've dreamed about for so long is mind-blowing. I'm scared and excited, but as I was reading in the book of John today, God reminded me that He is the vine and we are the branches. If we abide in Him we will bear much fruit. So I will abide in Him. Because frankly, I don't have a choice to do otherwise. And I kind of like it this way. Soli Deo Gloria.

The Final Sprint to the Starting Line

As I write this, I am glorying in the fact that I have survived the GREs and can now make a huge check mark on my to-do list. Now, checking things off on a list might seem a rather mundane thing to find joy in, but it's true what they say about the little things. Plus knocking out this test (a huge source of stress for the last few months) is absolutely a blessing. I kind of feel the need to give one of those cheesy acceptance speeches people give when they accept an award: first of all, I need to thank my mom, whose tireless patience and encouragement was invaluable to me when we were studying math together. And by studying math together I mean her helping me with math and keeping me from getting frustrated about how much I don't care about fast two cars are driving towards one another... Second big thank-you goes to all of my friends who have been super encouraging, especially everyone who prayed for me today and helped me keep my head on straight!

Some of my favorite quotes from encouraging wall posts: "If you and the GRE were in a cage match, you would win HANDS DOWN!" - Hannah L.

"don't worry, if you can't get into grad school, you can live with the little roommate in my basement" - Sarah M.

"Perspective: It's too late to worry. It's never too late to be awesome" - Jordan M.

Final thank-you goes to my Heavenly Father. Not really a thank-you so much as a huge praise for what He's been teaching me even in just the last 24 hours. I was trying to calm my mind before I went to sleep last night so I grabbed my Bible after I crawled into bed. I opened to I Corinthians chapter 15 and was struck by Paul's straightforwardness in the passage. But v.54 really struck a cord with me. ⁵⁴When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: "Death has been swallowed up in victory." Over the course of my college career I have lost a number of people who meant a great deal to me. And yet, despite all that pain, the countless hours of asking God "why?" we have victory in Christ. In Christ we live with hope that death is not the end of life but merely a momentary sleep in light of eternity. Hallelujah.

Switching gears, here's my official update on all things Guatemala!

I'm leaving September 30th, so please pray that my flight and everything goes well. That's in exactly 15 days and I need to get all my grad school applications done before I leave, so that's my last big stress factor. But above all, God is good to me, and I will trust that He is faithful to complete the work that he has begun in me.

Only the Beginning...

I'm so excited to begin chronicling this journey here in this blog. As much as I love talking to people, there is an undeniable beauty in the written word that has always fascinated me. I don't claim to be a brilliant writer, but it is my hope and prayer that as you read this you may be able to catch a glimpse of how great God's love is and how real a force it has been in my life in leading me up to this point. It's been incredible to see how God has been providing for me so far and I can't wait to see where He'll bring me on this adventure. Since the very beginning when I started the process of looking for a organization to do missions abroad after graduation, a lot of people have asked me why I want to do this. Why travel to a country where you know no one, with an unfamiliar culture, and stay there for 8 months?! So here's the answer, the real answer: LOVE. In sending His Son Jesus to die on the cross for my sins and for the sins of the world, God demonstrated His love for us in its most tangible form. I have been given love in greater abundance than I could ever have dreamed possible, and to keep this love to myself would be both selfish and a denial of God's purpose for my life. I'm currently slated to head down to Guatemala in September, and it is my prayer that God will give me the courage to love Him and these children beyond my own strength. There is no greater love than that which the Father has for His children. More to come. In the meantime, Soli Deo Gloria.