So what have I been doing? Well we’ve done all sorts of ministry things this first month. We’ve gone to the nursing home, done manual labor around the YWAM base, ministered to women in an all women prison, and then we spent 5 days camping in the mountains running a VBS for the Ngabe children. That was by far the hardest thing we’ve done so far.
We spent 5 days without running water, without electricity, and sleeping in tents set up on the mud. It only took 5 days for me to reach my breaking point. And as lovable as the children were, it was hard to see the bright side of things. It rained every day. I mean it rained from noon till some point after I was asleep every single day. It was freezing. I was cold, hungry, and dreaming of being anywhere except on this mountaintop. We had 3 hours of planned ministry each day and that was it. The other 21 hours were spent in this one-room building that YWAM built up there.
It didn’t seem like my team and I were making a difference. We taught the kids some songs (in English so they probably didn’t even understand them), gave them crafts to do, and played with them. But that didn’t “fix anything.” It didn’t rid them of their parasites, or give them clean water to drink. Because of the language barrier, I wasn’t even sure they were getting the Jesus part of it. I couldn’t see how it was giving them a better life.
But on the last day, after I’d reached my breaking point and had given up on finding joy in this dreadful place, the kids asked to sing. Not just any songs. They wanted to sing the songs we taught them. It almost broke my heart. They knew them! They might not be understanding, but they were absorbing and enjoying our time with us. Later that night, some of my team walked the children back to their houses (in the dark, rain, and mud no less). When they dropped of one of the pairs of brothers, they saw the crafts we had given them proudly hung up around the hut. In a shack with no floor, probably no door, and probably no beds, there were the crafts displayed for their family to see.
If that’s not enough to break your heart, you should’ve been there when one of the kids excitedly told us how he couldn’t wait to come play with us tomorrow and Brad had to explain that we weren’t coming back. That we were leaving tomorrow. That conversation involved a lot of hugs and tears.
So maybe I’ll never know the long term effects of our short visit with these precious people. But I know that in those 5 short days, they felt loved. Maybe in a way they’ve never felt loved before. And I hope it gave them a glimpse into the love Jesus has for them.
And through all of it, God taught me to open my heart. These kids poured their laughter, love, and hugs into us for 5 days, not knowing how long we’d be there, and not even being able to communicate with us very well. But it didn’t keep them from diving in deep and opening their hearts. And I thought, maybe that’s the way I’m supposed to love people. And maybe if I had spent a little more time loving on the kids, and less time thinking about how much that mountain… well, sucked, then my whole experience could’ve been more. It could’ve meant more. I could’ve done more.
I’m not perfect, I make mistakes. And this is a mistake I’m glad I made in month one of the race, because I don’t want to spend another day, let alone a week, of this journey making that mistake again.
