I just want to share a few quick stories with you that happened this week:
1- The 8-month old baby at the children's home started scooting around (almost crawling)! Thankfully Kendra was there to take a video so I could watch it later and it made me SO happy! A lot of people in the states would think of this as a "milestone" for a baby and all I could think about was how she didn't have her parents there to watch this milestone.
2- At our feeding on Friday one of the nurses pointed to a little boy and asked me how old I thought he was. My guess was 4-5 and then I found out he is actually 8 years old. Needless to say, I was speechless.
3- Two of the boys at the children's home who are on the swim team won medals this week at their swim meet! When they happily showed them to me I felt like a proud mom (weird, right, cause I'm only 19?) and found myself bragging about how well they did! I remember when my parents would proudly display my awards on the fridge or mantel piece when I was younger, but these boys don't have parents to brag about them.
4- The other night Kendra & I walked into the children's home and saw one of the boys sitting on the couch crying. You have to understand though that this boy is the type of kid who always has his tough face on. I've seen him take a few spills playing basketball, but he always picks himself back up and acts like nothing happened (even though I'm sure he is hurting). So anyways I was very surprised to see him crying and found out he had a sore on the back of his leg that was really painful. And again I remembered when my mom used to bandage me up, put ice on my boo-boo's (even though ice was probably not necessary), and make me feel better. He had one of the caregivers there to put a band-aid on, but I couldn't help thinking he needed a mom hug. I gave him a hug, but it's just not the same.
All of these stories lead up to Friday night when I was laying in bed thinking about the week and then began crying. I have been praying for the last two months, "God, break my heart for what breaks yours," and I realized in this moment that it had happened. My heart has broken for these kids. I want to find them all homes with loving mothers and fathers to love and protect them. I want to feed them so they are no longer malnourished and can run around happily with the rest of the kids. There is so much I want to do for these kids and then I started feeling overwhelmed by all the thoughts going through my head.
Then yesterday after our team worship time Kailie shared something with me that was extremely encouraging. She said God was showing her a scene where our entire team was surrounded by a huge group of kids and at first we all thought we could handle it. Then we realized there were just too many kids and nobody knew what to do. Then I ripped my heart out and began tearing off pieces of my heart and handing it out to the kids. The crazy thing was that I never ran out of pieces of my heart to give to the kids.
Please understand, this was just something God revealed to Kailie as we were worshipping, I never physically tore my heart out of my chest. But I have realized over the last two motnhs that God has slowly been pulling my heart out of my chest and I have been pouring my heart out to these amazing kids! And now I am not afraid and I'm not overwhelmed because I KNOW God will continue to grow my heart and I will never have to stop pouring out my love for the kids! Wow! I just feel so blessed to be here right now and thankful for the lessons God is teaching me.
Here are some of the amazing kids I am blessed to spend time with everyday!
Thank you to everyone who has been praying for our team and the people we are ministering to everyday. Please continue to pray for this incredible ministry and everything God is doing through the people of the Philippines!
