At church I met an old man who lives a few houses away from John, named Papi. Papi is probably in his 80s, missing quite a few of his teeth, walks with a slow steady pace and a bit of a hunch in his back. He lives alone, has no family to speak of and doesn’t have food in his house. Yesterday, Kel, Kelly K, Taylor and I made a sandwich and took some homemade donuts to him while he was sitting outside his home. One of the little boys “we” live with (other members of the squad do anyway) named Lacey, tagged along to interpret for us. We all sat outside for awhile communicating as best we knew how and watched people and cars go bye. Kel and I noticed an old woman right across the street watching us. She went over to visit with her and later called us over to pray with them. The old woman, Anutza, complained of pain in her legs and she was very worried about her daughter, Stella, who had to be taken to the hospital because of complications with a tumor in her abdomen. We prayed over her and eventually another neighbor, Ana, joined us.
Anutza
I have a special connection for Ana. Others around here say she is crazy or mentally not right. She is blind in one eye and she asked us to pray for it. I wanted so badly to see her blindness cured right here…and as we were praying I began to cry. I asked God to heal her mind instead. I felt deep down in my heart that God has her on this earth still for a purpose. People can live their whole lives and never know the love and tender mercy of Christ. And yet here I am travelling around the world sharing the gospel with those I meet. I don’t believe that I am here in this village on accident. I do believe that it’s possible for Ana to be healed and that she would know soundly, that Christ was born, crucified and resurrected for her very soul’s salvation. So that she too would know the joy and peace of what it means to have an intimate relationship with God. I was crying because I was praying in intercessory for her life, for her mind.
