Days before heading to our 4th country, my team found out we would not in fact be heading to Honduras with the rest of our squad. We left Leon, Nicaragua on a 10 hour Tica Bus ride going first through Honduras and then to our final destination in Santa Tecla, El Salvador – to a home where dreams are fulfilled.
We are spending the month with Mi Casa Kids – a Christian orphanage with 14 kids aged 7-23. But this is not the Hollywood blockbuster “Annie”-style orphanage. This is a home. In fact- its called the hogar, which is Spanish for home.
According to the United Nations, El Salvador is now the most dangerous country in the world for children under 18. Gangs control most of the country and take kids as young as age 8. Boys are taken to collect extortion money and girls are taken for pleasure, many of whom end up pregnant by age 12. Of those who haven’t been taken, many are abused and abandoned. They are fragile children caught in the hands of violence and poverty.
But in the midst of this darkness, Mi Casa Kids is a home filled with His light. And above everything, the staff are committed to raising children who know and love The Lord.
The children who live here are given a chance to dream. They are given the opportunity to be children, when they are surrounded by a world that steals it away.
Just this past week, one of the girls left the hogar to fulfill her childhood dream of studying in The United States. In January, she will be studying English before beginning her Political Science degree in Florida. She had a dream, and now she is living that dream.
At Mi Casa, dreams are validated. The children may have been orphaned, abandoned, abused, or for some all three, but that doesn’t define them. Because their identity is in Jesus Christ. And all things are possible through Christ.
Meet Melvin, he is filled with dreams of God being in the heart of others- and playing professional Futbol!
Half of the kids living at the orphanage right now are still in need of funding for schooling. An education is fundamental for these children to break the cycle of abuse and poverty and to live out their dreams. Will you please consider donating to fund their dreams?
To donate…
-Please visit http://www.gofundme.com/iqr2ko and click “Donate Now” on that page
-Or for a tax deductible donation, please visit www.micasakids.org
-Or mail a check to the accountant’s office located in the United States (address: Mi Casa International, c/o Mike Larson CPA, 5665 Meadows Rd. #310, Lake Oswego, Oregon 97035).
All of the money raised will go toward funding their education.
“Look at the nations and watch, and be utterly amazed. For I am going to do something in your days that you would not believe, even if you were told.” Habakkuk 1:5
Please keep the hogar in your prayers. Not only financially, but also spiritually and emotionally through this holiday season. They are also looking for a church partnership. Currently they are one of the only, if not the only, orphanage in El Salvador who is not sponsored by a church.
