Preparing for Mexico City

Hello everyone,

I'm going to be moving to Mexico City in a few months as a fourth / fifth grade teacher at a new Christian school there. The school's name is BridgeWay North American School and is a ministry of Teach Beyond.

I won't be moving until early August, but I figured now would be aa good a time as any to revive this blog for those of you who would like to be kept updated on my life in Mexico. I know God is going to do great things and I'm very excited for the future.

Please keep me in your prayers as I will be preparing to leave for Mexico City these upcoming months.

Jhon

     I know it might be confusing when I write a blog or post a picture and throw out names of the kids here at New Hope since there are so many of them, so I figure I might post a blog now and then to share specifically more about one of the kids I work with here at the children’s home. That way, you might feel like you know the kid better and if you would like to pray, you would know how to pray more specifically for the child.

 

      Jhon is in sixth grade and likes to rough play a lot whether it be wrestling or just pushing others/being pushed around. He loves massages and always asks me to give him a massage. He’s not shy with asking me to help him with his chores or anything else he needs/wants help with. He’s also not shy with making new friends with any visitors that come to the home. For instance, he was very sociable with Cassandra’s (another intern) dad when he was here for a week, and on the way back from church one night, he jumped on his back and climbed onto his shoulders and got him to carry him the whole way back to the house. Like most of the kids, he loves using my laptop; and he likes playing strategy games on my laptop with castles and armies.

     Sometimes, Jhon’s very sociable and cooperative. Other times, he can be closed off and refuse to cooperate. For instance, sometimes it’s hard to get him up in the morning, get him out of my apartment when I tell him to get out, or get him off my laptop when I tell him it’s time to do something else. But I really enjoy being with him nonetheless.

     Although he interacts a lot with me and I’ve seen him interact a lot with others at the home and at school, he often likes to be a “lone ranger.” When asked, he insisted he doesn’t have friends and often likes to walk to school or home from school by himself instead of with the other boys.

     One day, he asked me why I combed my hair the way I do, and wanted to (and did) change it to be more like his hairstyle. Then he asked me to comb his hair like I comb mine (but he didn’t end up liking it). Then he took the comb, wetted my hair, and started giving me all sorts of crazy hairstyles. He tried combing my hair like a Mohawk, comb it up in the back and sides, etc. Each new hairstyle he gave me, I told him it was bad; but he still wanted to go around the campus and show it off. So with each hairstyle, we ended up going around to everyone asking them if they liked it or not. I told Jhon that no one would like the hairstyles, but he insisted that they would; so we ended up taking votes – every time someone said they didn’t like it, I would get a point and every time someone said they did, he would get a point – I usually ended up winning (even though I’m convinced some of the adults were lying when they said they liked it).

     I have been interviewing some of the boys here at the home to help with getting information about the kids for a sponsorship program. Here are the interview answers that Jhon gave me:

1.      What is your favorite color?

Purple

2.     What do you want to be when you grow up?

Mining Engineer

3.     What is your favorite subject in school?

Math

4.     Who is your best friend?

I don’t have any

5.     What is you favorite thing to do? 

Go on the internet

6.     What is your favorite movie?

Dragon Ball Z: Goku

7.     What is your favorite food?

Pollo a la brasa (some sort of chicken)

8.     Do you have a favorite Bible verse?

Psalms 23:1-2

9.     If you could travel anywhere in the world, where would it be? 

Azangaro, (an area in Peru) because he used to live there. His other answer was that he would go to a country in Asia (when asked which country, he said it doesn’t matter which one)

10. If you had one wish, what would it be?

That his parents were alive

11.  Who is your favorite character in the Bible?

Moses, wouldn’t/couldn’t answer why (he quickly got tired of me always asking “why?” to his answers and having to explain them more.

12. Do you play an instrument? Which one and for how long and how did you learn?

No

13. If you could learn an instrument, what would it be?

Wouldn’t like to learn

14. If you could learn another language which would it be and why?

Quechua (the language of the Incas which is common here in Peru) because it’s fun and he said he would like to learn Korean too

15. If you had 1,000 soles (about $370 - $400), what would you buy?

A laptop to speak with my sister and would buy a cell phone to call my sister (He said his sister is 20 years old. He told me she lives on the streets in Lima.) and a remote control toy helicopter and a remote control toy boat and a house with the money left over. [I don’t think there would be enough money left over for a house, but he seemed to think that there would be money left over.]

16. How many people are in your family?

5 (Himself and 4 sisters. 1 younger and three older) three of them live here at the children’s home and 1 lives in Lima on the streets he told me.

Prayer Requests:

 

·         Jhon seems to be closed off a lot of the times although he’s been through a lot and has a lot going on inside. Please pray that he would draw close to God and personally learn that God cares about him and what he’s going/has gone through and that he can talk to God about anything. Pray that while Jhon has a “lone ranger” personality and is very independent, that when it comes to his relationship with God that he would learn that God is truly his Father and best friend and that Jhon would see Him this way.

Some Photos of Some Dances

Date: 10/9/13

     So last Sunday, the elementary school that the kids here at New Hope attend had a celebration which including all the grades dressing up and doing dances. If you'd like to see the pictures go to https://skydrive.live.com/?cid=935a7a3c68826671%20-%20cid=935A7A3C68826671&id=935A7A3C68826671%21105#cid=935A7A3C68826671&id=935A7A3C68826671%21240

 

The Performance

Date: 10/7/13
 

     This past weekend I got to go to a couple of the boys’ schools and see some performances. One of the schools I went to was Gerson’s school. On Friday after school, Gerson, who’s about 14 or 15, asked me if I wanted to go to a “fiesta” at his school where there would be dancing and cake to celebrate the school’s anniversary. I asked who else was going but he told me it was just him. (He attends Emanuel Christian School which is a different school than the other kids at the home attend.) An hour or so later he asked me again if I would go and the house tutor, Hermana Gloria, asked me if I would take him. So I agreed. I was a little apprehensive because I pictured it as a dance with all high schoolers and I didn’t know what I would do for the 4 or five hours that the event was. (It turned out it wasn’t a dance but a school performance where all the elementary and high school grades did their own dance, skit, or performance, so I didn’t have anything to worry about in the first place.)

     Anyway, we headed out. At first, I thought his school was within walking distance like the other schools the kids attend, but it turned out we had to take a bus (which was really packed – I was standing up and was pressed against the window at one point) and then we had to walk a bit to get to the school. When we got there, they were still setting up and I just sat around and waited and watched as the kids and parents came in. Of course being the only “gringo” or white person there I’d get some glances from some of the kids. A couple girls asked me what my name was and later some 5^th grade boys started asking me about myself and we talked for a bit before the ceremony started. Overall, it was a nice time; the performances were nice, some were funny, and it was cool to see how much they incorporated God into the performance including thanking God for the 9 years they’ve been a school. 

     The ceremony finished at 9PM and Gerson and I walked back to where we could catch a bus back home. While on the bus, though, something happened that really bothered me. On one of the stops, a kid about ten or eleven climbed into the bus along with some other people. I hardly noticed until he had started singing and for the first second I thought he was just singing, but then I realized he was playing a guiro and performing in hopes of getting money. I know it’s not something you would usually see in the U.S. so much, but I knew that kids selling things or performing in other countries to get money is common; so I wasn’t so much in shock but even though I knew about this and have even seen similar things before in Mexico, I was still bothered by it – probably because I know God’s given me a heart to want to help kids like that. When the boy finished his second song, he went around the bus to see if anyone would give him any money. Gerson gave him a coin – I took notice and thought it was very nice of him. At the next stop, the boy got off the bus. I kept staring out the back window to see what he would do (Climb in another bus? Walk away?), but soon he disappeared from my sight – but not from my thoughts. Once Gerson and I got off the bus and were almost at the house, I asked Gerson about the boy. I asked if there were many kids like that in Peru and if that kid was doing that to help his parents get money. I asked if the boy even had parents. Gerson shrugged and said he didn’t know.

     But then he added, “Me too.”

     “What?” I asked.

     “Me too,” he repeated.

     I asked him if he had been in that same position as the boy we were talking about. He said yes. I asked him how long he did it for and he told me he did it for 3 years. I asked him if it was difficult and he said it was. The thought of how Gerson had given the boy a coin came back to my mind and it started to make sense to me.

     There were a lot of good performances I got to see at Gerson’s school that evening. I got to record and take pictures of a lot of them. But that night, as I lay down to go to sleep, there was one performance in particular that was pressed in my thoughts more than the others – and it wasn’t any of the ones I had seen at the school.

 

 

Prayer request: That night, having on my mind that boy in the bus, I lifted him up in prayer. I know I’ll never see him again, but there are so many kids like him all around the world and many are in worse situations.

·         Please pray not just for this boy’s physical health and financial stability, but pray also for God’s will to be done in this specific boy’s life. God has such a heart for the poor, fatherless, and abandoned, and he wants us to share this same heart.

·         Please also pray for the kids around the world that are in similar situations. There are so many of them and even though it’s sad that many may never experience the many earthly blessings that many of us can experience, they can still experience just as much of the blessing of knowing and having a relationship with Jesus Christ. They may be working and performing for physical necessities, but may God reveal himself and his heart to these kids in such an intimate way.

DAILY ROUTINE HERE AT NEW HOPE

Date: 10/1/13

     So I’ve been here at New Hope Children’s Home for about a week and a half now and thought I’d write a blog entry a little about the place and the daily routines.

 

CAMPUS:  There are three main buildings:

Girl’s Building: The girl’s building has two floors. One  of the group of girls lives in the “house” or “casa” downstairs and the other lives in the “casa” upstairs. Another room downstairs is the computer room where the kids can go online and print out things for their homework. Upstairs is the main office and also the casa for the girl interns where Cassandra and Nora are currently staying. Cassandra is an intern from Michigan who has been here since May and had also come for about a month last year. She’s working with the older boys (Ninos II) with me. Nora is from Germany and besides German, speaks a lot of English and Spanish. She came to New Hope a day or two after I did and is helping with one of the girls’ groups.

 

Boy’s Building: The boy’s building has three floors. Ninos I  is the group of smaller boys and they live in the casa on the first floor. Also on the first floor is a casa where I am staying. It has a kitchen/sitting area, a bathroom, and three bedrooms – two for guests and one for David who is the founder of New Hope. I’m actually staying in his room for now because he is back in the United States for a time, and when I first came, the other two rooms were taken – one had a missionary couple from Mexico (although they actually left yesterday) and the other room has another missionary from the States named Rick who has a children’s home here in Arequipa but stays here at New Hope since his home is a girls’ home.

     The second floor is for the older boys (Ninos II). One of the casas on the second floor is the bedrooms for most of the boys. There is a common area, a bathroom, and three bedrooms (each with two bunk beds). Another casa on the second floor has the kitchen/dining room/sitting area along with a bathroom, small miscellaneous room for a few toys and two bedrooms for a few of the older boys who are out of school and are working. The top floor of the boys’ building is kind of like a suite for missionary teams.

The other building on the campus has two floors. The top floor has some old couches where the kids sometimes hang out and watch cartoons. The bottom floor of the building is the kitchen where most of the cooking takes place for all the kids.

Besides the buildings, on campus there are also two small cement courts in front of the boys’ building. One has a volley ball net in the middle and a small basket ball hoop on one side. The other court has a basket ball hoop and a soccer goal on each side. In front of the girls’ building is a small playground area for the kids.

 

DAILY SCHEDULE: So as I said before, I’m working with the older group of boys called Ninos II (there are four groups of kids altogether – two groups of girls and two of boys). There are 11 boys who are in school grades 3 through high school. There are about 3 more older boys around 20 years or so who are also part of this group who work/help out with the group.

     On the week days, I usually go upstairs to the boys’ casa between 6:15 and 6:30. Around this time, the boys are getting up, brushing their teeth, getting dressed, cleaning their rooms, closets, and making their beds. If I’m not helping making sure that some of younger boys in the group are getting ready and doing what they need to be, I’ll sometimes be in the kitchen helping prepare breakfast or the snacks that the boys take to school. For the most part, breakfast consists of a couple pieces of bread with jelly or butter along with a hot drink that I think is mainly heated milk. For snack, the kids will usually bring a piece of bread (sometimes with a slice of cheese or jelly or something with it) and a small piece of fruit.

     We eat breakfast between 6:30 and 7:00 and after breakfast the boys continue to get ready for school and do their chores. They are on a rotation of a list of daily chores which consists of sweeping and mopping (their bedrooms, kitchen, dining room, sitting room, stairs, etc.), doing the dishes, cleaning the table, etc. There are two “tutors” that help out and are in charge of the older boys. One is new and she just started working here the day before I came. She works Friday and the weekend and the other tutor Hermana Gloria works Monday through Thursday. (Hermana means “sister” in Spanish and Hermano means “brother” in Spanish. Putting Hermana or Hermano before a name is how the kids would refer to adults. Sometimes the younger kids will just call me Hermano.) If Hermana Gloria is working, she makes sure to do a song and a quick, little 5-minute devotional with all the boys after breakfast.

     Between 8 and 8:30, the kids leave for school. All the kids attend Christian schools. From my understanding, the school system here in Peru has a total of 11 years of school (the primary grades are the first six years and high school is the last five). The high school is about a two or three-minute walk from the campus and the older kids walk by themselves. Cassandra, Nora, and I will usually walk with most of the younger kids to their school. It’s about a six or seven-minute walk. After coming back from dropping the kids off at school, we have our “free time” where I usually go on my laptop, do laundry or whatever else I need to get done, or – usually – take a nap. J.

     The younger kids usually return from school around 1:30 and the older kids around 2:00. When they return, they get dressed and we eat lunch. After lunch is homework time. I’ll sometimes help some of the older kids who need help with their English homework (although yesterday, Miguel, one of the older kids, tried telling me that he needed help with his English homework when in reality all he needed to do was copy some English phrases a few times each – go figure, all he wanted me to do was write it for him, hahaha. Of course, I refused.) If I’m not helping one of the kids with English homework, sometimes I’ll help one of the younger kids with their homework. Sometimes I help Arius, who’s 8 and in third grade, with his multiplication tables. Last night, I was also helping Jhon (sixth grade) with his math homework on finding the average and mode in a set of data. Whenever the kids finish their homework, they have free time. They’ll usually play outside with a soccer ball or basketball, or watch tv, or play inside in their rooms or with some of their toys.

     Dinner time varies depending on the day. Usually dinner is around six or seven. After dinner, the kids help clean up and then finish their homework (if they haven’t yet) or hang out for a couple more hours before bed time.

     On weekends, breakfast is pushed back about an hour or so later and the kids have more free time. They will also do any homework they have for the weekend and any chores. Some nights, the kids will have a movie night or play soccer.

     On Thursday nights, Sunday mornings, and Sunday nights the kids attend church. Their church is about a five minute walk from the New Hope campus. Victor, one of the 13 or 14-year olds, plays the guitar and will play at church. Many of the songs they sing at church are ones that I am familiar with from back home – just that the song is translated into Spanish. It’s pretty cool singing a song you know in English but singing it in Spanish.

     I hope this helps give you a little better idea of what daily life is like here in Peru. Also, for those of you who want to know how you can pray, here are some prayer requests I’d love prayer for:

·         My personal health – I ate something bad Wednesday night and was sick all day Thursday. Also since then, I felt like I was getting a sore throat although it quickly went away and wasn’t an issue, praise God. So just for personal health for me and the kids and the other workers here at New Hope.

·         That I’d keep my focus on God and my relationship with Him – Like in the story of Mary and Martha, it’s hard sometimes getting distracted with serving God and being so busy that you neglect just sitting at his feet. Although I’ve been able to have that time each day before God, my mind is often distracted with tons of other stuff.

·         That I’d continue to be able to understand and speak Spanish better – Although I can speak a lot, I’m nowhere near fluent and often need to ask people to repeat themselves two or three times. Sometimes I seem to understand a lot, and other times I am completely lost. It gets frustrating at times, but I know that if I keep my focus on God and seek first His kingdom, He’ll take care of the rest.

·         That the boys would continue to learn about God and be interested in memorizing His Word – God’s prompted me to start encouraging the boys to memorize Bible verses (which I’ll try to make a blog entry about that story later). We just started a few days ago and many of them seem to be interested, but the pessimist in me is saying that they will sooner or later lose interest. I just need to remember that any interest they have or will have in the future is from the Holy Spirit’s work in them – and not from me – and I don’t have to worry but just trust God to do His work in each one of the boys’ lives.

Also here is a reminder of a few links that you might be interested in.

New Hope Website: http://www.peruhope.org/

New Hope Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/NewHopePeru

Some Pictures I’ve Taken and Continually Update: https://skydrive.live.com/?cid=935a7a3c68826671#cid=935A7A3C68826671&id=935A7A3C68826671%21105

Arequipa Pictures

Okay, so a quick entry just to say I made it to Arequipa in one piece, and despite getting little sleep in my traveling, I had an eventful first day at New Hope getting to know and play with the kids. If a picture is worth a thousand words, here's a link to my skydrive which is worth about 32 thousand words or so (plus captions). I'll try to update my skydrive during my stay so people can see pictures too.

https://skydrive.live.com/?cid=935a7a3c68826671#cid=935A7A3C68826671&id=935A7A3C68826671%21105

P.S. Could someone please comment on whether or not you can see the pictures from this link as I'm kind of new to skydrive and don't know if I'm doing it right. Thanks and God bless.

Off Again Serving God On A New Adventure

Note: I use the term “mission field” to refer to a foreign country, specifically a Latin American country, where I can serve God. This is not the correct use of the term “mission field” as a mission field is any place you are currently (foreign country or not) where you can serve God and fulfill Jesus’ call of The Great Commission. I just use this term in this manner for convenience.

 

Psalm 37:4-5: Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass.

     It’s amazing to think that in a short time (just two days) I’ll be on my way again to serve God out of the country – this time to the Andes Mountains in Arequipa, Peru; and I’m very excited! I may be able to call it a “short” time now, but trust me, sometimes it seemed anything but short….

     If asked what my life verse is, I would probably have to answer Psalm 37:4. Since I was twelve – if not younger – I had a desire for missions, particularly working with kids who were orphaned or abandoned. I couldn’t wait to be done with school and be on the mission field in some Latin American country working with kids in an orphanage and/or on the streets. In the past, God has blessed me and allowed me to serve him and work with orphans and other kids in need. I went to Mexico for a summer a few years back and also to El Salvador for about six months. But ever since returning from El Salvador in October of last year, I couldn’t wait to be back on the mission field serving God and working with kids in a Latin American country once again.

     I had hoped God would call me back on the mission field soon – even as early as January 2013 – although I didn’t know where I would go. But besides that, I had a bigger problem. I had been called to appear for jury duty on January 4^th and I didn’t know if I would be selected or not. If I was selected, it was grand jury which meant that I would have to serve once a week for three months (kind of hard to serve God in another country and come back to the States each week for grand jury duty). But that’s okay, because I knew God was in control and He could easily make it so that I wasn’t chosen. Well, the day came, and at the end of it, I was the third juror picked out of twenty-three. Although I knew God was in control and it must have been His will, it was safe to say I was extremely disappointed.

     So knowing that I would definitely be in the States for at least three more months, I knew it was time to look for a job. I got an after school tutoring job as a second grade teacher which went until the end of April or middle of May. So I knew that I would be staying in the States longer than three months. And if I was to stay until April or May, I figured I’d just stay for the summer and earn some money since I knew of a job that I had done previous years as a summer camp counselor and had very much enjoyed doing it in the past.

     So that would bring me to August until I would be freed up to travel out of the country again. But the original problem still remained – I didn’t know where I would go. Throughout my time back in the States, especially in the summer as August was drawing closer, I would look online at different Christian ministries that worked with orphans and/or street kids in Latin America. From my experience in El Salvador (which seemed to be almost always hot and humid), I knew that I preferred somewhere with less heat and humidity. So that narrowed down my search to pretty much somewhere in the Andes Mountains since the high elevation makes the climate cooler despite being near the equator. Eventually, in June or July, I came across a certain website of a Christian children’s home in Arequipa, Peru called New Hope. After contacting them and praying and seeking God’s will, God seemed to be opening the door. At first, I was so used to waiting and looking for where God wanted me to go, that it seemed so surreal when all that was left was for me to say that I would go and reserve a plane flight. But I took that step of faith, made flight plans, and here it is a month later and it’s actually just a couple days before I go.

     Waiting’s hard – there’s no doubt about that. And even knowing that it’s God’s timing and it’s His will that you wait, sometimes still doesn’t seem to make it any easier. But the trials that I went through during my year of waiting to return back to the mission field were especially scary. But God is faithful, and He worked good even while I was going through the waiting process and some painful trials.

     But here I am, now a year later since I returned from El Salvador, getting ready to embark on another adventure serving God. I know it won’t always be easy and I’m not completely sure what to expect. However, God’s thoughts and plans for our future are always good (Jer. 29:11), and I’m so honored and excited to be used by God in the lives of the kids in the children’s home in Peru.

Please pray for traveling safety as I leave for Peru on Friday, that I would always keep my focus on God first and foremost, and that my Spanish would easily come back to me. Also, please pray that God continues to work in and through me and that I would always be willing to let Him use me to bless the kids and the people of Peru and to be a light of His love and kindness.

Isaiah 40:31 - But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.

PS:  Here is the link to New Hope’s webpage and their facebook link:

Website: http://www.peruhope.org/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NewHopePeru