Reflections of Refinement: Great things are yet to come....

So this past week has been full of awesomeness.

Since, I've been here in Lima, Peru I have seen God's promises come to pass, over and over again. I'm at a lost for words at the things Jesus is doing in the people's lives' here and how THEY change me. There's such a hunger in these people's spirit to know about Jesus, and grow in their faith.

Being here in Peru I have been doing full-time ministry non-stop. As soon as we got here we hit the floor running, of course there has been rest stops here and there. The church here has really been handing Jose and I A LOT of responsibilities. I'm highly involved with the youth, and I'm diving into head on full force, and LOVING IT, there really isn't any solid leaders, so it's a privilege to raise leaders. Right now I'm responsible to raise 6 leaders, and these six leaders are gonna "replace" me when I leave in a year. I'm also one of the 3 main leaders out of the whole youth, I also preach to the youth once every 3 weeks. Which is challenging to me because the language is still a obstacle that I'm trying to master.

Being put in a position like that has really made me self examine my-self a lot more. I have done nothing to deserve this much influence and responsibilities over the youth group here. God's grace over me has really been bringing me to more brokenness; always asking my self, "who am I that God sees fit that I have this much say and pull/influence."

Either way, I have known from the beginning that Jesus has been the main one in control, and there has been nothing I can do to change HIS will. All I need to do is just be obedient and faithful to Him.

On Thursday we visited an orphanage. I wanted to take pictures but in Peru it is illegal to take pictures of minors, so I couldn't. But I got a few pictures of the building and the gate. Sorry, I really wanted to take pictures of the kids. Here goes some.

This is the out side of the orphanage. Its a whole block long.

This is the only pic i was able to take in the orphanage. This is one of the buildings where the kids sleep.

Out side of the building

So our reason for going to the orphanage was to see how this specific orphanage runs things. Every different orphanage has a different models, this one specifically does not allow kids to be adopted they basically just take care of 35 -55 kids them selves and once they reach the age of 18 they basically tell them to move out and get a job and a apartment. Also some of the kids here are there because of family issues, like father is gone, and mother is in jail, or both parents are addicts, or physical abuse (not sexual). So they take in those kids, but with the intentions of returning them back to the family once the parent or family member is stable enough to take care of them.

While there we were able to see their dormitories and where they eat, and learn basic "life-skills". The kids wash their own clothes, and grow their own fruits, and vegetables, and maintain the property themselves. Which is understandable considering this place IS THEIR HOME, and like every child in every home, they all have chores and responsibilities. Next to the dormitories was the school, we were able to go see them during their classes. We went to a class of 4 year olds, when the orphanage director opened the class room door the little kids RAN TO US. We were overwhelmed by hugs, smiling faces, and curious innocent children. It was such a blessing to just talk to these kids. They were all well mannered and loving, they all wanted to hug, and play, and ask questions. After about 10 or so minutes, we had to walk away, because we basically interrupted their class. Then they returned to class, and we continued our "tour" of the facility. So as the tour ended we continued our conversation about orphanage laws, and regulations & left with a greater understanding of the need.

Heading there and back we were able to see people living in shacks on the mountain side. It is literally a shack, made out of wood and tin.

These are houses.

---CHANGING SUBJECT----

So since we have been here at this church we noticed that there has been a few young men wearing "Skinny Jeans". So Jose talked to one of them and told him to burn their girl jeans. Next thing you know news spread and other people want to burn other stuff as well. So I was there to record the whole things, girl jeans and satanic music was burned up. Praise JESUS! These kids are changing and are zealous and excited to get rid of these things that are in their life. Here are some pics of that night.