Today is a day of many thoughts flying through my head. In reflection of the past few weeks I have spent in Guatemala I have many things I could blog about but I want to start with one of my favorite and oldest stories thus far on the race…
The two days we spent in the hospital for ministry…
The hospital here in Guatemala is obviously very different from those in America. It’s part a hospital and part an orphanage! Anyways, the first day we were there we were split in to groups to go to different areas of the hospital. The group I was in was sent to the CP unit in the hospital. When we walked in there were about 18 cribs lined up in one of the many rooms in this wing of the hospital all but one of the beds were empty! As we gathered around the bed I saw the most handsome little boy staring at the ceiling while he was in a car-seat inside of his crib. As a team we decided to pray for him, to pray for healing and to pray for protection. I began the prayer and as I prayed I opened my eyes to see piercing brown eyes staring right at me. I began to weep knowing that because he had special needs his family had simply just left him here. I began to weep because I knew that he would grow to be something amazing no matter what his circumstances were and I began to weep because all I wanted to do was grab him and love him forever. In that exact moment I would have ended my race. In that moment I would have packed my bags, took him home and become a mother, if I could have.
The next two days were filled with holding that precious boy (Juan Diego). They were filled with sitting in the court yard with Paola as I sang “Jesus loves me” over and over again… as we clapped out the beat and she began to learn the sounds of the words. They were filled with praying over beds as the children slept and screamed during nap time. They were filed with playing soccer (pushing around a wheelchair to hit a ball) with some kid, I didn’t even know his name, but the way he smiled made sweating in the sun totally worth it.
Mainly my days were spent with my heart breaking not understanding how people can just leave their children.
