How playing in the rain changed my outlook on life

I can’t believe that it’s been over a week since I left little Leesburg, GA to come on this incredible journey. It has already been a life changing week in my life. We started off in Gainesville, GA at a training camp with a bunch of college students going all over the world: Kenya, Thailand, Guatemala, and other parts of Africa. This was a great time of getting to know my teammates and getting spiritually and emotionally prepared. During training camp we had sessions and then after the session we would do an activity or have a group discussion that was based on the message. I loved being able to really dissect the message and reflect on how it impacted me, and also hear how it impacted others.

We left Friday afternoon from Atlanta and after a 14 hour flight and then another 3 hour flight we arrived in Manila Saturday night. Our living situation here is amazing; God has been so good to us. We are working with a ministry called Kids International Ministries that has so many ministries to get plugged into. Everyone on our team can really create their own schedule and choose which areas they want to work in. My schedule will look the same pretty much every week. We will take Mondays off, Tuesday and Thursday mornings I will be giving swimming lessons to toddlers, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday mornings I will be working in the nursery at the children’s home, my afternoons will be spent either playing with the older children or some afternoons I will be hanging out with Josie’s Angels helping the girls with homework and just spending time with them (you can learn more about the “Angels” here: http://server1.charityadvantageservers.com/client/Kids_International_M_ZEFFAQ/jas_home0.aspx). I will also sometimes be helping out with the feedings, which is when we take food out to poor communities and play with the kids there. I am really excited about all of the amazing things that I get to be a part of during the next three months.

The past couple of days have been spent seeing all of the different ministries and trying out different things to see where we felt lead. This morning we went over to the children’s home for the second time. I had already spent time in the nursery with the babies and toddlers and I knew that I felt called there. The nursery has 8 children varying in age from 5 months to 4 years old. They live in an area that is set up like a daycare. The main room is a playroom/kitchen and then there are 3 or 4 rooms off of that where the children sleep. It is a very cute place, but the children rarely get out of those rooms. Today we were able to take three of the children outside to play. One little girl, I will call her Chloe, latched on to me. As soon as we walked outside it started to rain a little bit. Chloe and I had so much fun spinning, dancing, and laughing in the rain. I will hold the sound of her giggle and the look of pure joy on her face in my heart forever. I started to wonder if little 2 or 3 year old Chloe had ever played in the rain before. My heart breaks for her and the other children who spend most of their days stuck inside in a room. I have a hard time dealing with the emotions that overcome me when I think about these sweet, beautiful and how difficult their lives have already been. My first thought is that I just wish that I could take every one of them home with me so that I could love them and care for them forever. But since one of my sweet teammates already told me that that is insane and not possible, I will have to make due with placing their lives in the hands of a Father who will love them, care for them, and simply adore them forever. God is already teaching me to surrender these things to Him. The things that I have seen and will see are not easy, and they certainly to do always make sense, but I take so much comfort in knowing that God is in control and that He is still good. I can’t keep these sweet babies from difficult times or change all of their situations to something that I think would be better, but I can entrust them to my Father and I can show them His love for the next three months. Something that I will take great delight in.