Hey everybody!!
In case you haven’t heard yet, we finally made it to Bolivia safe and sound!! We arrived on Friday morning and our host ministry was at the airport to receive us with the utmost generosity.
Piled in the minibus heading to El Alto, our home for the next month!
Bold Radiance is working with team Open Arms this month for Word Made Flesh, and we were surprised and excited to find out we will be staying with host families! We were split up into pairs and delivered to our homes Friday morning.
My teammate, Lizzie and me…trying to stay warm in our open air bedroom the first night! Coming from hot and humid Atlanta to below 20 degree weather at night in the Andes mountains was quite the change!! 🙂
After some rest and settling in, we were taken to orientation at our ministry site, La Casa de Esperanza which stands for House of Hope (more on that later!).
The weekend was spent resting and acclimatizing to the altitude (13,300 ft). Lizzie and I spent most of the time in our home, getting to know our family. Besides our host parents (Abram and Alicia) and Abuela (grandma), there are also four boys (Rolando – 26, Serio – 24, Alex – 13, and Oscar – 9) and one girl (Vania – 22).
We had company/extended family come for a visit one night, and Lizzie and I had a blast playing with little Antonio.
The majority of our weekend was spent playing games together around the table and I could not be happier. What a better way to experience the culture firsthand than to spend time and do life with a family!! We have played card games such as slap jack and spoons, and word games like hangman and a version of scattergories (with of course the family playing in Spanish and Lizzie and I, in English to make it fair! haha). Even Alicia has come to join ‘kids’ in the midst of our miscommunications, laughter, and overall merrymaking.
We even got to celebrate Rolando’s birthday the other night with the family, complete with cake. Each night around the table I keep thinking we could not laugh as hard or any more than we already have, but the next day proves me wrong. It reminds me of my own family!! 🙂
As we have sat around the table breaking bread together and laughing till our stomachs hurt, I have been completely overcome with thanks for the gift of family. Even though it has only been a week on the race, I feel so grateful that God has already blessed me with a piece of home. I have been finding His small gifts in different aspects everyday while being here, but none compares to the gift He has so graciously bestowed upon me of such a loving, funny and generous family to stay with this month.
Lizzie and I at the door of our home in Bolivia!
“Let all that I am praise The Lord; with my whole heart, I will praise His holy name. He fills my life with good things.” – Psalm 103:1&5
What good things has the Lord been gifting you with this week?
