over and over this week, my heart has broken.
i remember a couple months ago, i prayed the prayer “Jesus, break my heart for what breaks yours. i pray that during my time in Ecuador you can begin to open my eyes to the things that break your heart, and mold my heart to become soft”.
i figured this would happen maybe mid march, or maybe not until april. not the first week of february.
every day this week, my heart has hurt for a new thing.
on wednesday at ministry, there was a heaviness that filled our team as we worked at Camp Hope. we came home and the exhaustion filled the whole house. i had never been so thankful to be back at casablanca.
thursday, we met Daniel. a refugee from Venezuela. with the help of some translation, we learned that he fled from Venezuela and started a non-profit to help other refugees. he cannot contact his family. he cannot go back to his country. he shared with us that he and so many others are being hunted by the venezuelan government. and yet-he has devoted his time to helping others in his situation. families, and people of all ages who have walked THOUSANDS of miles to get to safety in Ecuador. he encouraged us to ask any question that came to our minds, because it would only help raise awareness and share the story of so many people.
our ministry with him is fixing up an old office building that will become a medical building. doctors and nurses have volunteered to devote their time to caring for the refugees who are in need of medical attention after the long journey to safety.
the Lord had broken my heart for Daniel, and the other hundreds of thousands of refugees.
again on Friday, my heart was broken. we were back at camp hope and the sadness, heaviness and darkness that i felt on wednesday was more. it wasn’t until at debrief that night when I realized that the spiritual weight was pressing on me. the sadness of the many kids who spent every day being cared for in this facility. the hurt thinking of the kids who are too old to be adopted. families who now were unable to work because they need to take care of their children 24/7.
the Lord had broken my heart for the kids, the families, and the aides at this facility.
saturday and sunday came, and I figured I was “in the clear” from the heart breaking since ministry was at home.
lol, God said “you thought.”
saturday and sunday revealed more within my heart that I was unaware existed. situations, relationships, experiences and seasons that I thought were behind me came flooding back and i’ve sat in a funk the last couple days replaying them over and over.
while facetiming with a friend today, I was sharing how I felt that there was something God was stirring in my heart and I wanted to know what it was. almost immediately after talking to him, emotions flooded my heart.
the Lord had broken my heart for myself, and I realized that there’s more I need to sort out with the Lord.
in the process of turning my heart from stone to flesh, I’ve come face to face with my own reality. i’m learning that in order to love and care for others the way they deserve, i need to learn to love and care for myself first.
Ezekiel 36:26 “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.”
