When you’re an older sister it’s instinct to be protective. You want to keep your siblings safe from danger, anything that is going to harm them, anything that will not affect them for the better. As I’ve grown into adulthood, taking care of my siblings and loving them has become something I take great pride in. When I discovered I loved working with children, it was almost a different kind of love than that of a sibling. It was more of a compassionate, understanding and gentle love. Staying in the childcare work-field made it really easy to transition into coming on the race and having to work with children that I loved in every country. Country after country a new group of children would find their way into my heart and embed themselves there. It wasn’t until month four when my team was transported to Cagayan De Oro, that I remembered how it felt to love a child so much that it was just as if he were a sibling to me.
In Cagayan De Oro (CDO), we worked at a ministry called Street Light Ministries. This ministry was just as the title implied; a safety zone for street children who just needed to be shown God’s light and God’s love. There were sixteen children who would come to the center we worked at everyday. A shower, lunch, and a fresh change of clothes were provided before the children were given free schooling by tutors from a local church. Following school, there would usually be a craft and some sort of snack for the children before they left for the afternoon back to the streets.You could see in each one of their faces that the small space they had to come was more than enough, and to each one of them it was a refuge. Not many of them had somewhere they belonged, and if they did they may not have been great places. All of the children tugged at my heart. All of them made a lasting impression. One of them made me want to stick around forever just so I could love him.
Among the group of sixteen children, one little boy stood out to me. I’m not quite sure why, he didn’t do anything too outstanding. For the first couple days he wouldn’t even talk to me. Now that I think about it maybe that’s why I was drawn to him, because in a strange way he reminded me of myself. Once I did get him to open up to me we became attached immediately. Every time I could help him during school time, I would. When we would go out and play with them at night I would sit by him and tickle him, and make him laugh. I would try to get him to dance with me, and chase him around. The times we got to spend together were so much fun that I didn’t realize how deeply I was starting to care about this little fifteen year old boy.
On Christmas Eve night a few of my teammates and I were walking back from the McDonald’s around the block, where we had just skyped our families and were feeling very happy and giddy! Those emotions were quickly triumphed by anger and frustration when we rounded the corner and saw three of the boys from the center, one being my best buddy, standing in an abandoned lot huffing this drug called Rugby. We had found out at the beginning of the month that the kids use, and if we found them we were to take it and keep it in the center where they couldn’t find it so that they couldn’t just dig it back out of the trash. Most of the ones that did it, had been doing it for many years of their short life. My emotions flared as I started to cry. I didn’t have a clue as to where all these emotions were coming from. I couldn’t even look at him, I just quickly walked away from the situation and prayed.
Finally I realized that the last time I felt this angry with a person was my brother.The emotions I were feeling were the exact emotions I’d feel if I were at home with my siblings and had caught one of them doing something to that extent. I loved this little boy so much, I considered him my brother. I knew there was no way I would be able to stay mad at him, so I waited until the next night at ministry when were were playing with the children to try and talk to him. I told him that doing rugby was bad, and that when I caught him doing it he had made me and Jesus very sad. He told me he was sorry, and that touched my heart. When I asked him to stay away from the drug and not to do it anymore, he agreed. Not that I fully believe that, and not being there to keep him accountable I will never know, but the point is that he knew that it would make me happy so he agreed. Well, he was right. It did make me happy. He made me happy. 
I’ve heard the expression “never frown, because you never know who could be falling in love with your smile” my whole life, but never realized how true it was until I actually fell in love with the smile of a little fifteen year old boy who I let into my heart to stay. He may not know it, but I will always love him, and I will never forget him. I can’t even look back and picture my race going any other way than meeting him at that exact time. I think about my little brother daily, and pray for him and the other children as often as I can. I didn’t know it then, but when I opened up my heart to that little boy.. I opened it up to him forever.
Too the four girls running the ministry, my hat goes off. I know first hand how hard it is to be patient with those who give you ever reason not to be. When you repeatedly ask someone not to drink, and then they show up drunk. When you ask them not to do the drugs offered to them, and they show up high. When you ask them to go to their homes and be with their families, and they run away. Add to the mix that the ages of these kids range to be about 7-17. Nonetheless, they are still great kids with ambition to learn and do better! God has big plans for Street Light Ministries. I am so blessed to have been a part of it for what little time I did.
