Heavier things

I come home in 30 days. I can feel myself mentally and emotionally disengaging at times. I want to guard my heart. Its already going to be so hard to leave. Please pray that I won't hold myself back just because of this. Speaking of guarding my heart....Yesterday I found out that one of the girls I am mentoring is pregnant. She turns 16 on Sunday. Now she will have to step down from her ministry position and may be forced to marry the baby's father which I believe will only lead to more problems. She is really hurting right now. And then this morning one of the preteens that always hangs around the church and follows me around was verbally and physically attacked by her mother. Her mom threw a large stick at her right in front of the church and called her all sorts of names. Thankfully she missed but it was a close call. Myself and another person witnessed the whole thing. I wish I could have intervened sooner. Afterwards I just held her as she cried. It certainly is a privilege to be the hands and feet of Jesus but it is absolutely heartbreaking too. I don't know how people do this full time year after year.

Tomorrow after work I am heading to the beach with a friend. Hopefully I can spend some time debriefing and praying through all of this. There is so much to be done. Please pray that God will raise up more workers, volunteers and missionaries. Thank-you.

Comments

Julie said…
i know what you mean about almost wanting to disengage, last summer i remember how i was in brasil--where i had wanted to be--but it was like i was reluctant to invest much in new friends, whom i would leave so soon, and i just kept projecting myself into the future "when i get back to canada i will do this and that..." ...a protective mechanism?
when i was younger and soon leaving brasil for college, i remember the Lord giving me a verse about "loving one another deeply." to me that meant that i couldnt pull out emotionally, i was to "love them til the end" as Jesus loved. it often hurts to love in a fallen world.
it is neat to read as you process what God is teaching you. it is hard to watch people hurting and feel so small, and wonder what difference one person's life can make. but the Lord is working, if you're surrendering to Him!
julie
www.eohthree.blogspot.com
July 26, 2008 at 7:33 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

En Route Stories

Image
Ahoj! This is my second day in Prague. I arrived at 1 o'clock (Czech time) on Saturday afternoon. I have already had the chance to do some sight seeing and this evening I went to the local church. Sadly, the Southcity Church (which meets in an elementary school) is the only evangelical church in the Southcity side of Prague's 4th district. There is one Catholic church also but that's it. This means there are only 2 churches for 45 thousand people! Can you imagine? On the way to the service Mark Potma (missionaries I'm staying with) told me that Czechs don't even use churches for weddings and funerals! But I was going to talk about my flights. Wow! I could totally tell you guys were praying. Everything went so smoothly. I also got to have some really neat conversations with the people who sat next to me. From Chicago to London I ended up sitting between two University of Missouri students. They were also on their way to Prague for an exchange/study abroad program. Jo...
Read more

Training in the windy city

Greetings from Chicago!! I must say that the city lives up to its name. Yesterday when we toured downtown it was quite windy so I got to sport the windblown look for the evening. Chicago also has great older buildings, amazing deep dish pizza and a gorgeous sky line! I took a ton of pictures and really enjoyed being a tourist for the day. I'll post some of them when I have some more time. Training here at TEAM headquarters in Wheaton has been fairly intense. We have breakfast at 7:15 and start sessions at 8 a.m. Its a pretty non-stop day. Really relevant info for the most part though. We've learned lots of good safety travel tips, what to expect if a TEAMserve missionary gets kidnapped, how to avoid being pick pocketed, etc. I don't think I'll have to worry about the kidnapping stuff but there is a gal going to Eastern Asia so that stuff is relevant. Also learned about TEAMs history as an organization, what to be aware of as far as knowing our own expectations, the best...
Read more

Presence is Enough

Give me something to do! I whined to Iva the cook for the Compassion project. She just laughed at me and told me to go find Mariza the director. I am learning that while there is plenty to do a day at Vila Andrade is not defined by tasks. I am expected to just show up and then see how the morning develops. Yesterday this meant playing with the children, having lunch with them and then coloring and reading until 2 o clock. My afternoons are more planned out and Pastor Marcelo is doing his best to stick with our schedule. I have been told that I do not seem to have a good attitude at times and I think the lack of a pre-planned, task focused day is 90% of the problem. Now that I know that showing up and just going with the flow is the main expectation my stress and frustration levels have gone down significantly. However, being able to deal with and be game for whatever comes up is challenging. Take this morning for instance. I was super tired and barely managed to drag myself to the 8 am...
Read more