"He rescued me because He delighted in me"

I am in my fourth week here in Nicaragua now. It’s really gone by so fast. We had our 3^rd team arrive on Thursday afternoon. It is a team of only 4 people. This trip is a little different than the others because it is a vision trip. So basically they only take down a few people from their church including their missions director to scope out Nicaragua and ORPHANetwork’s role here and decide if they want to plan trips down here with us. We also had another girl join the team on Friday. She is a nutrionalist and has decided she wants to use her talents the Lord has given her for people here in Nicaragua. She is using her scale and tape measure that she brought with her to determine which kids in our orphanages and feeding centers are malnourished. She is also training the people who are with these kids the most to be able to do the same thing so that we can keep track of progress of these kids as time goes on.

A few days ago a 17 year old girl named Yamilet came to the orphanage in an ambulance and on a stretcher from the Managua hospital. I sat with Don Carlos, the director of the orphanage, as he told me her story. This child is very malnourished to the point where she can barely see anything. Her parents shipped her over to her brother in Costa Rica to the hospital there where she stayed for a little while but was then sent back to Managua when they found out she was not a Costa Rican. When they put her in the hospital in Managua, her parents abandoned the poor girl because they did not have the means to care for her. A friend from the church got a hold of Don Carlos and asked if Yamilet could stay at the orphanage for a little while since the hospital made her leave because she got to be too expensive. When I walked in and saw Yamilet in the younger girls house at the orphanage, she was laying in a bed, face down, with her bones sticking up out of her back and covered in bed sores. This has been one of the harder things for me to see in our orphanage since being here for a month. I had a chance to talk with Yamilet yesterday as I sat by her side and told her my name and that I was from the States. She laughed at me for my Spanish-American accent. She is such a sweet girl. I told her she was beautiful and held her hand for a few minutes. She smiled. My prayer for Yamilet is that she would know Psalm 18 (v. 16-19) well:

“He reached down from on high and took hold of me;

He drew me out of deep waters.

He rescued me from my powerful enemy,

From my foes, who were too strong for me.

They confronted me in the day of my disaster, but the Lord was my support.

He brought me out into a spacious place; he rescued me because he delighted in me.”

For her to know that the Lord is mighty to save and that He is her support and will rescue her from her sickness and sadness. He will draw her out of deep waters and bring her to a safe place because he DELIGHTS in her.

At last night’s Friday night devotional, it was announced that Don Carlos and Dona Velena are leaving the orphanage, Casa Bernabe. The girl who announced this to the kids was in tears and was joined by all the caretakers and other children soon after. What a testimony to this couple who had decided to give their lives to these children. They are such good people and personally, I am also going to be sad to see them go. Change for these kids is very hard, especially when they have gotten so attached to Carlos and Velena. They have been one of the better things to have happened to Casa Bernabe.

Many of you have asked what you can be praying for specifically for me while I am down here. Please be praying for healing for Yamilet and strength and energy for the women who are taking care of her. The younger girls have shown so much love to her and every time I go into the room, at least 2 of them are always by her side. Like Yamilet, these girls are not a stranger to abandonment and sadness. Praise God for amazing community and such love shown by these little girls for Yamilet since being at Casa. Please be praying for Don Carlos, Dona Velena, the staff at Casa Bernabe, and the 60 children that live there. Pray for a smooth transition and that the Lord will equip another wonderful director for Casa Bernabe. And finally, I would love prayer for myself. Yesterday was the first day I could feel myself becoming weak and tired from my last few weeks of being down here (and getting stung did not help either!). Please be praying for strength and energy so that I am able to give it my all this last week down here. Please pray that the Lord would prepare my heart to say goodbye on Thursday to these amazing children I have come to LOVE LOVE LOVE over the course of this last month.

I will post pictures of the nutritionist doing her work here in my next post.

Well, today is Saturday which means no school for the kids. I am going to go see if I can join in on a game of UNO with the younger girls. J