There are some questions I don’t have answers for. There are questions about the God I believe in, the God I love, I can’t answer. The sad thing is I didn’t expect this all to hit now. Not in Central America. See in Africa…Thailand…Cambodia…India… we expect to see things that break our hearts. We expect to see injustice. And I just didn’t think Honduras would be the place I question whether or not I wanted to keep following this God. See I came face to face with a God I didn’t really want to love. A God I didn’t really like. It wasn’t anything that happened to me, like any injustice, it’s what has happened to others that cuts us the most.
Thursday we started our work at Heart of Christ. During our weeks here our work has been split between teaching at a bi-lingual private Christian school, manual labor at the property where we are living and Heart of Christ. Heart of Christ is a ministry run by Gracie and her husband Lee. They have welcomed into their home girls who have been the victim of rape and incest. These girls are all in between the ages of 12 and 15. She also has living with her 2 girls with sever cerebral palsy, 3 toddler boys who have been abandoned by their mothers and a young deaf lady who aged out of the state run orphanage. Loss is palpable in that house. But so is joy. Our job was to spend time with the mothers and play/watch their babies. And this is the place that in this Race I have felt most comfortable. Other than manual labor that is. I’ve never been awesome with babies, I’m always afraid of breaking them. But something I’m realizing is that it’s not that I’ve ever been bad with babies it’s been that I’ve been surrounded with people who are better at them. When we walked into Gracie’s I decided that I wanted to really enjoy this ministry and I wanted to shine. Right away I picked up a kid. And fell in love. Soon there was one to two moms that knew they could pass their baby off to me and I’d be glad to take them. It was a beautiful 3 days. It was a hard 3 days. It was a long 3 days.
IT shouldn’t be a surprise where my broken heart came from. I stared into the eyes of a 12 year old that had been lured into a sexual relationship at the age of 10, gotten pregnant at the age of 11 and gave birth at 12. I heard stories of rape, incest, murder… and yet I was still supposed to go back home praising God. Somehow that couldn’t compute in my brain. You can imagine why. See I’ve always believed in a God who is in control. “Everything happens for a reason.” So how do I justify a God who lets children get raped? I know the answer. Because of sin. We did this. Because of our terrible choices we have allowed these things to happen. But then that brings the question, why would God not still stop this from happening? Because of free will. But the question still comes up. He is the God who can do anything, including stopping this injustice. Then there is the thought, because He gave us free will He can’t step in. There are things God can’t do. He can’t lie, it goes against his nature. He can’t steal, the worlds are His. So maybe He can’t step in. Which begs the question, do I want to believe in a God who can’t step in when atrocities are being committed? Then there is, He can step in but He choices when He steps in. So is He a fickle God who lets some girls be raped and some not? Can I follow that kind of God?
These were the questions floating around in my head for a few days. I still don’t have answers. And if I think about it for too long or too hard I still get angry. Somehow it falls back to a Father’s love. Which was portrayed by Tony best. He loves the boys that he brings in to live with him and his wife. But they are still street kids and they still mess up a lot. And when Tony gives them chances and they defy that and chose their own bad things he has to send them back home. He wants them with him, he loves them, but he has to. He has to be true to his word. Otherwise they’ll never learn. Somehow that fits in with the Father’s love.
