God’s Hand In What We Do…

God is working on me… for me to have trust, patients, and faith, among many other things. Each month Jen and I wait for our monthly support checks. We wait to see if there is going to be enough to pay all the expenses and we wait to see what we have left over to serve the Honduran people with. To tell you the truth, most of the time (actually all of the time), we don’t get enough support to serve effectively.

God tells us to rely on him and believe me we do. Sometimes, all we can do is sit back and laugh. When we are both negative in the bank and have bills to pay, God always come through and places money in our accounts. We laugh because we know that God will provide, HE always always does. Most of the time, just enough to get by… which is a God thing!

God is with us every step of the way. It’s a phrase I have heard several times in my life. I have never really applied it or thought about it until moving here. Once you step back and review what is going on around you, you see God’s awesome hand crafted artwork unfold before your eyes. God has placed lots of VERY VERY special people in our lives. They support us through “thick-n-thin.” Probably not often enough do we take the time to sit down and thank Our Lord for you and your part in all of what we do here. 

Part two… The House… All alone…

At about 12:30 this afternoon I pulled up into the house and to my surprise everything was pretty clean and orderly. The dishes had all been done, Carlos had made dinner the night before and everything was cleaned up. I was very impressed! The only thing was, there was black stuff all over the floor. I could not figure out what it was. After walking around outside and looking at what the repair man had done to our pump, I noticed ash everywhere. There have been HUGE fires here still in Honduras and there were two or three burning today on our mountain.

Please continue to be praying for the people of Honduras. Please pray for a good down pour of rain. It is so dry here, that its getting really bad. Please continue to pray for our boys. God is faithful and always come through!

Back to our boys. I asked how their night was. Carlos said that he stayed up until 5:30 am watching TV!!!  I remember doing that when my parents would leave me home alone or when I would have sleepovers. I am glad that they behaved, from what I can tell, and thank God for all the blessing he shows us daily!

 

First Time Alone… and I am worried

On Friday Gayle and Debbie flew into Honduras.  Whenever Gayle comes to the country, I love to be here to help her! Tonight (Saturday night) I spent the night out here with them in Santa Ana. Just to spend time with them and to be here if they needed something. Well, because of my staying out here and Jen having other plans, our boys were given the option to spend the night at the house by themselves or to spend the night with a “family friend,” the Garcia’s. They chose to spend the night by themselves.

Now I know how my parents felt the first time they left me home alone over night. I am worrying. I don’t know why, they are good boys (for the most part). I just worry because I love them I guess. God and I talked about it already, several times, so I know that I am just being a “worry wart.” Tomorrow, or the day after, I will let you know if we still have a house ;-) . 

I have never really sat down and written out a prayer… so tonight, here is my fist.

My prayer tonight:

God, thank you for allowing me to serve the Honduran people in so many ways. Thank you for allowing me to be involved in these boys lives. God I ask that you watch them tonight and keep them safe. Put your shield of protection around them and allow them to know that they are loved not only by us but more importantly by YOU. Allow them to see your light shine in everything they do and everything we do to better your kingdom. God I thank you for Eduardo and his caring heart Lord. Even under his rough edges, he has a soft heart and God I pray that you break him of his roughness. Show him your love and allow him to see our love as well. Show him the ways of you Lord. Thank you for Saul Lord. He is such a sweet kid and so kind and so full of love. He reminds me daily of what it must be like to have faith like a child. Please be with him Father as he is away from his mother, allow him to seek you in his times of need Lord.  Lord thank you for Carlos and his great spirit. Lord I believe he wishes to serve you full heartedly, we just need to break through the mess he still holds deep inside. God we can see that he is working through it and I thank you for that!!! I am so appreciative of all the great and wonderful things you have done and will continue to do in this young mans life!  Thank you Lord for giving him the opportunity to step up and show his brothers how to walk in the way of you Lord. God please be with Jen and myself as we are trying so hard to raise these boys. Be with us when we fall short and pick us back up. Help us dust off our pants and get right back up there doing it again. God I want to be more like you. I want to bring these boys up in the way of you so that they may better the future of your kingdom. Please be with the Lopez family as they sleep together as a family tonight. God, with tears in my eyes, I THANK YOU from the deepest parts of my heart for what you have done for that family. To see six little boys  sooooo sooooo happy to have their daddy, it just amazes me how you gave them your grace and mercy. Father thank you for all that you do for me, every day, every hour, every minute. Thank you Lord. You are a God of wonders, a God that shows us his mercy and grace daily. I pray that you forgive me when I forget all of these things Lord, when I fall on my face Lord I am glad that you will be there time after time to pick me back up. May your grace and mercy be with the people of Honduras tonight Lord. -Amen

Recap

Since the time I arrived back in Honduras on March 28th we have had groups here working! When groups are here, it is probably the most hectic, yet most beneficial time for us here in Honduras. From running around getting tin, wood, nails, supplies to seeing children in the hospital God works in a million different ways.

For the next couple of days I have planned to post just some random pictures for you to see God working here in Honduras over the last month or so :-). Make sure you check back! 

Proud day to be a Daddy... :-)

Over the last few months Carlos has been asking questions about God and religion. About a new start and a new beginning. We didn't ever want to "push the envelope" and force religion on the boys that stay with us. We do make them attend church with us and have devotionals with us, however we allow them to ask questions when they want to and just keep it all out in the open everyday. 

About a week ago Carlos gave a devotional about a class that he attended and I blogged about it so check out the older blog posts too! Tonight Carlos told that story again to the Belpre group while they were here and of course everyone cried. After he was done, he told us that he was ready for the change. He was ready to start his in life in Christ. With tear filled eyes he told us that he wanted to be baptized and was ready for change. I am SO grateful that GOD is allowing me the privilege to serve the Honduran people. So tonight at about 10:30 pm Carlos became our new brother!!! AMEN! The angles and God are REJOICING in heaven! I wonder what type of party goes on and how loud the singing must be when we receive a new brother or sister in Christ! God is furthering his kingdom and its great to watch it unfold! 

Group!!!

Playing with this little guy... gotta love cars!!!

House that the group built

The past eight days, since i have been back in the country we have had a small group here. We built one house, visited a couple of children's homes, fed at the dump and visited at the hospital. It was a lot of fun getting right back into the "swing of things!"

Boys night out... Fires

Not sure if you can tell but behind the stands there was nothing but smoke!

Today Carlos, Eduardo, Saul, Mike and I all went to a soccer game with Mark Connell. It was great to sit and watch the boys hang out with Mark and Jonathan. To have them ask their "poppi" for a coke or something to eat. It reminded me to thank God for the opportunity to be here serving the Honduran people, especially these boys.
During the game we noticed lots smoke and a helicopter flying over head carrying water over to fires off in the distance. Please continue to pray for the people of Honduras, while they struggle with the smoke and fires.

Painting!!!!

Since we moved into our home, I have wanted to paint to my room. While I was in the states my good friend Mike bought paint and tonight we started the painting process.

Tuesdays Devotional... By Carlos

On tuesday we took the group to the Jesus Statue at night for a quick devotional. After about twenty minutes of talking about Honduras, describing the history of the mountains and stuff like that they said that it was time for the devotional. We all sat down and Jen and Carlos stood there. I knew that this was going to be a tear jerker.

Carlos started to tell us about his day at school. He told us that his teacher in his Pschy class made him draw a picture of his family. He said that he drew his mom and two brothers close to each other and he was far away from the rest of his family, on the other side of the page. After he finished drawing, the teacher made the kids get up in front of the class and discribe the picture. The teacher asked why he was the only one on that side of the paper. With tears in his eyes, he said, because I knew then, right then and there, that my mom did everything that she could for us. He told us that during his class he sat down and cried. He realized that all the resentment and anger that he had towards his mother was unjust and that he knew he needed to talk to her. He told us about his life growing up and the rough times that he had. Then with big ole tears in his eyes he said I am glad that God has allowed me the opportunity to change my life. He started by thanking Jen for having faith and trust in him when almost everyone else has given up on him. He thanked me for being the father that he never had. He thanked Ashley for being his sister because his died. By the end of the night, he had EVERYONE crying like babies!
He is my son and I am proud to call to him my son. It is really great to see God working in his life. God is working here in the ministry and is really changing peoples hearts. He is showing us his grace and love in many different ways. He is showing us that this thing that we are doing, is GOING to work. I thank God that he has allowed me to meet this set of brothers and thank Him for allowing me to be a father to them. I love being called poppi, daddy, father. It brings tears to my eyes every time.

Thanking God for Godly friends...

I have a friend that I know I can count on, day or night, to help me whenever I need him, other then God himself of course. This person will drop everything he is doing, to help our ministry. He is a TRUE man of God and I pray that someday God will allow me to serve others like he does. He is open to suggestions, open to opinions, open to helping even when some of his closest friends don't. He really is the true definition of what a Christian ought to be. He opens my eyes every time I am around him, to see things differently. I pray that God never lets out friendship be altered negatively. I pray that God honors all that this man is doing for the people of this country.
Mark helps us in so many ways. He is willing to help us, raise our boys. He is willing to help change and shape and mold their lives to be more Christ like. He is willing to help them, when no one else would. Mark I thank you, and thank OUR God for you daily!!!! God has placed you in our lives and we thank him daily for you and your lovely wife. ( I once heard someone say, "Behind every good man, there is a great woman" this also applies here :) )