Journal, January 5-11, 2010

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I know that I just published a Journal a few days ago but you may have noticed that most of it was done by my friends Judy and Pat and had little to do with anything that took place here at home. That is why I thought I would bring you up to date on some of the things that have been going on here at home. Don't worry I will keep this one short.

On Tuesday Cesar, Marcos, were thrilled when the head nurse and the doctor that work up in the malnutrition ward gave us the green light on taking 3 of the kids from that ward out the park. Taking any of the kids that are in the malnutrition ward out of the orphanage is usually a no no but the staff there is starting to recognize how well my boys do with these kids and I think that they are starting to realize that happy kids do a lot better health wise than ones that are sad.

On Wednesday when 2 of my other boys and myself returned to the orphanage Jose headed straight for the gate thinking that he was going to get to go to the park with us again today. We immediately let him know that we had simply come to play with him but had no intentions of going to the park. He immediately let us and anyone else that was within crying distance know that if we were not intending to take him to the park he was not going to play with us. Jose may be small but his temper outweighs that of any of my kids.


On Thursday I took 10 of my kids swimming at a place near San Martin. This was sort of a going away party for Alex and Elder. Although Alex and his family have talked about moving to a small 1 room house that Alex's Grandfather has given them for quite some time now, but up tell now they have not moved out of their rented house here in Chimaltenango. Mom finally decided that the $88 per month rent that they are paying here in Chimaltenango was more than she could pay, so on Friday Alex, Gladys, Windy, Chino, Elder and their mom will be moving to this small one room house that is located in a rather remote area about an hour from here. Alex's dad left for the States over 6 years ago to find work. He keeps telling his family that he will soon be returning but I am beginning to wonder if he has perhaps started a new life in the States that does not include his family that is here in Guatemala.

On Friday we loaded up a large truck and my car with all of the belongings of Alex's family and headed off down the road. None of the kids want to move but if they move they will no longer have to pay rent so mom feels that it is something that they must do. I think that transition is going to be a rough one for the entire family. Please keep them in your prayers.

Friday was also my birthday but I did not plan on doing much in the way of celebrating, especially after spending most of the day loading and unloading furniture. When I got back home from helping Alex's family move my house slowly started filling up with kids though. Nearly each one showed up with some sort of small gift that they had either bought or made. None of the gifts could have cost over a dollar but believe you me I wouldn't sell any of them for a million. Calin even gave me a birthday cake. Let me tell you it is hard to cut up a cup cake into 12 peaces but no one complained about the size of the piece that they received. Fernando and Cesar were the last to arrive at my house but I could tell that some thing was bothering Fernando. Cesar presented me with a small gift but Fernando held back. His tears did not hold back though. He then explained that he and Cesar saved up to buy me presents and had taken their bikes to the mall and had each bought me some thing. However on their way home Fernando fell off from his Bicycle and the picture frame that he bought for me had broken. A few Kleenex and a tube of super glue later, Fernando and the picture frame were as good as new, well almost new. I convinced Fernando that not all picture frames have to have glass in them. When I asked the kids if they had eaten they said no but they did not feel that I should have to cook for them on my birthday. I then suggested that they take me out to Burger King for supper and got a few startled looks until I explained that I would foot the bill. I don't think that the Burger King staff is used to singing happy birthday to their customers but my kids some how talked them into it. I was even presented with a free hamburger and a hot fudge sundae. The manager apologized for not having birthday candles but I told him that the straws that were polkaing out of my sundae were quite original. In 63 years this has to be one of the best birthday parties that I have ever had.

When we got home some of the kids decided that they would supply the evening entertainment by putting on a talent show. Elder won top honers with his impersonation of Rambo.



I think that tomorrow I will take Elder shopping for underwear. His older brother's underwear does not seem to fit him all that well.









On Saturday I took the 7 kids that I did not have room in the car for on Thursday swimming. Unlike Thursday's group I took this group to Esquentla which is about 6000 feet lower and 20 degrees warmer than San Martin.

Deja-vu

I think that tomorrow I will take Elder shopping for a swimsuit. His older brother's swimsuit does not seem to fit him all that well.








On Sunday (today) we went to church and then I took the kids out for a relaxing hike.

Actually the kids
did most of the hiking.

I did most of the relaxing.

Goodnight,
Yours in Christ: Dick


























Monday, January 11, 2010

This morning Marcos and Bryon accompanied me to Hermano Pedro Orphanage. I had promised 2 groups of students from Spring Arbor University that I would take them through the orphanage, one group in the morning and another in the afternoon. Unlike many groups that visit the orphanage this group did not ask me ahead of time what they could bring the kids in the way of tangible gifts. As it turned out they ended up bringing what the kids needed the most. They brought their love, and the kids loved it.

Thanks gang!


"Happiness is not so much in having as sharing. We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give."


Goodnight,
Yours in Christ: Dick

Journal, January 8, 2010

Last week I received the following e-mail from a good friend of mine who runs a school up in Santa Maria Dejesus. Lately there have been an alarming number of kidnappings in this village so when I received the flowing e-mail I expected the worse.

Judy Kerschner wrote

AN URGENT PRAYER REQUEST!

I received notice that one of our New Life students has gone missing. Her name is Azucena Coroy and she is 10 years old. She is socially very developmentally delayed. This makes her more vulnerable. She has been missing since Wednesday Dec 30th. Her parents have involved the police, fire dept, everyone they can think of. They have even checked the morgue in Antigua. Please ask your Sunday school classes and church families to pray. Please pray for her protection and to return home safely.

WITH CHRIST'S LOVE
JUDY

A few days later I received this e-mail from Judy.


This is just a short note to say that Azucena has been found. It's a miracle of God! He had placed her in a safe situation.

This photo was used for a flier. The New Life staff had attached more than 100 (to anything & everything) in Santa Maria then Antigua when she was recognized.

As Paul Harvey would say "Stand by for the rest of the story".

Thank you for your prayers!

Judy


I could not wait to here the rest of the story but had no Idea that my friends Pat and Bill Guillermo whom I met with the following day had been a big part of it. I stood in aw as Pat shard with me "The rest of the story."

Here is the Godincidence that Pat shared.

WHAT BEING IN THE MIDDLE OF GOD'S WILL CAN ACCOMPLISH!

You know, sometimes what seems to be something less than it could or should be turns out to be exactly right. Like when you don't get to a task when you want to, or when other commitments keep you from doing other worthwhile stuff. So here is a true story that will forever keep me glad to serve a living God! How wee details and big problems can be part of such an amazing happening. We got to go to los Estados Unidos for a visit, had an outrageously wondermus time, and returned to Guatemala exhausted AND with lots of stuff our friends and family in the states gave us to give to some of our young friends. Stuff like underwear, socks, and blankets. Well, because we were so wiped out when we returned AND because we got back just in time to prepare for Christmas, we didn't get to Rosa's de Amor, a loving home run for kids who have been removed from dangerous living situations, until Dec. 31st.

Here's a foto of some of the kids with some of their new gifts. A GREAT BIG, HEARTFELT THANK YOU TO EACH OF YOU WHO DONATED ALL THE AMAZING ITEMS, BY THE WAY!! But wait; there's more. It gets even better...which is saying a LOT after we gave them such practical and necessary stuff. Hope you can see the little girl in the front row, 2nd from the left, with the white shirt. The one NOT smiling....this is Azucena..pronounced Ah-su-cena; beautiful, isn't it?). The police brought Azucena to Rosa at 3am this same day, the 31st, having found her in the streets nearby, all alone. She would or could only give her first name, that's all; not her age, where she lived, her parents' names, nothing. I tried talking with her, she was so sad; it was not possible to keep her engaged, and even the other kids couldn't get her to talk with them.

TAKE TWO....

So that was last Thursday. We didn't get to church Sunday, but we were told that they prayed for a missing child from Santa Maria de Jesus. This girl has special needs which leave her unable to communicate well, among other things. She went missing on Thursday, Dec. 31st. Sta. Maria de Jesus is about 7 miles south of Antigua, way, way up on the side of Volcano Agua. Rosa's de Amor is on the road to Guatemala City, at least 10 miles in the other direction from Antigua. We live in San Felipe de Jesus, oh, 2 miles or so in yet another direction from Antigua. I had english class this afternoon at my house, but only 2 of the 4 girls came. When it was time to walk the girls home, we discovered that there was a funeral was walking down our street....did I tell you we live on Callejon del cementario? And yes, they were walking..that's how they do funerals here in Guatemala, even if it means walking down one of the main highways! Anyway, as we were walking down the main street of our little town, here comes my friend Amy, and she has on rubber gloves, and she looks very intense in her work. And since she lives nowhere near us, and because of the gloves, really, this is really why I asked, I asked what she was doing in our part o' town. She and a friend were hanging posters for the missing little girl from Sta Maria De Jesus. So I ask to see one, and this is what I saw.

YEP, IT'S HER!!!

Azucena, the sad little girl at Rosa's. So I get to tell Amy I know where she is AND that she is OK!


Look at some of the IFs in this.

If we didn't have any gifts to give to Rosa, we probably wouldn't have been at her house on the 31st...gives giving a whole new meaning!!!

If we had gone to Rosa's any earlier than the 31st to give the gifts, which was what I wanted to do but didn't have the energy for, then we wouldn't have met Azucena.

If the funeral procession didn't go past our casa, or if the other girls had come to class, which would have meant we would have walked them home another way, we would have missed meeting Amy on the street.

If I wasn't so nosy, remember the gloves?, then I wouldn't have seen the missing poster.

If Amy and I weren't out just doing what we heard God ask us to do, simple stuff, walking girls home and hanging posters, then we wouldn't have been given the privilege of connecting lost and found!

GIVES BEING IN THE RIGHT PLACE AT THE RIGHT TIME A NEW LEVEL OF SIGNIFICANCE!

All this adds up to what our friend Dick Rutgers calls a Godincidence vs. coincidence, and we agree with him!

Now I know you remember as you read this that we are indeed in a 3rd world country, where the police and legal machines just don't function as they do in the US. There are no Amber alerts here. And thankfully, the police DID bring Azucena to Rosas. These police operate out of Chimaltenango, which is even farther away from Antigua than all the other places aforementioned...oh how I wish I could draw a map of all this for you :) And when her parents tried to file a missing report, being New Year's Eve, I guess, the police dated it 12/2010. Mom and dad even tried to file a report in Antigua, but the offices were moving, so they were told to come back on Monday. Azucena is 10 years old! Any guesses on how long it would have taken the wheels of justice to figure this one out?

So back to Amy and the gloves, which she got to take off as she wouldn't need to glue any more posters to poles, etc. She called the parents immediately, OK, as soon as she stopped crying, and arranged to meet them in Antigua. Then she drove them to Rosa's for a reunion. She will also help them work through the legal stuff (Remember the police brought her to Rosa's) so Azucena can go home hopefully tomorrow. It may never be known exactly how she got so far away from home, but they were able to determine that she wasn't abused in any way on her dangerous journey. And out of this, the special needs school is going to be working on getting ID bracelets for many of their students.

I like this job!

Pat Guillermo


Thanks Pat and Judy for making this week's journal a breeze for me, and thank you Jesus for watching over this precious little girl.

Here is something to think about.

"The first question which the priest and the Levite asked was: 'If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?' But ... the good Samaritan reversed the question: 'If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?'"

Goodnight,
Yours in Christ: Dick

Journal, January 2-4 , 2010

Saturday, January 2, 2010

Today was another good one. This morning four of my older boys and myself loaded up my car with shoes, back packs, and medicine and headed up towards Tecpan. Those of you who have been keeping up with my journals possibly remember reading about the widow and her five children that Pastor Juan, his family, some of my boys and I went up and visited last week. I mentioned that we were able to tell them that we would be building them a house in a month or two. Those of you who read my journals also know that I try not to ask for money I don't even have a magic red button that you can push to donate money to this ministry. Fact is if a person wants to help sponsor a child's schooling, medical expenses or anything else he or she has to e-mail me to find out how to do so. However last week I mentioned that none of the three children that were school age were going to school because their mother simply could not afford to send them. Guess what. Today when the boys and I visited with this family we were able to tell mom that her kids would be attending school this year. Within a day or two after publishing my journal four people offered to sponsor one child each from this family. Now I went to school back in the old days before they had the new math but if I am not mistaken that is one more sponsor than necessary. This is the first time that I know of that we have ever had to contact some one that wanted to sponsor a particular child and ask them if they would either consider sponsoring another child or consider letting us use their sponsorship money to help provide some groceries to this family on a monthly bases.

Do you want to here about another Godincidence?

The lady that is going to sponsor Samuel, the oldest of the five children did into decide to do so because she had read my journal but because she had been here several months ago and I had taken her and some other people up to the village where Samuel lives. Even though I did not remember meeting him at that time this lady had taken a picture of him and last week she just happened to send me that picture asking me if I knew who this boy was. In her e-mail she went on to say that God had laid it on her hart to put this boy into school if by any chance he did not already attend. Talk about God's timing. I had not known that she was looking for Samuel and she had not known that I had just written about him and his family a day earlier.

Today we were also able to visit other families who have children that are being sponsored, and supply them with shoes and back packs that have been donated to us. It was hard to tell other families in the area that we did not have shoes for their children but by the time we gave them out to the kids that are being sponsored there were only a few pare left. We gave the last few pare of shoes to whom ever they fit but there were still a lot of children left with out anything on there feet.




(Click on any picture to enlarge)


We got back home in time to attend Etiline's birthday party. Even though she has never seen her father and not seen her mother since she was a baby, she at least has an uncle and an aunt who take care of her. She received quite a few presents but I think that the highlight of her night was getting to come over to my house to visit with her mother over Skype. True seeing each other over a camera is not as good as being there in person but Etiline, Fernando, and their relatives had a good visit with Etiline and Fernando's mom.

Well it is getting late so I think that I will say, "Goodnight".

Yours in Christ: Dick


Sunday, January 3, 2009

Some may call it a bribe but I call it an incentive. No matter what you want to call it I am going to keep doing it because it worked. Telling my boy that I would put 2 Q (25 cents) into a kitty for each one of them that took notes on what Pastor Mike preached about this morning and later using the money to rent a soccer field seemed to work wonders. Never before have I seen a more attentive and well behaved group of teens sit through an entire church service. Actually Pastor Mike had already printed the notes in the bulletin but had left out a few words here and there that needed to be filled in. I am not sure that he had my boys in mind when he did this but after seeing how well they listened to the sermon I would not be to suppressed if next week he offered some of the older members of the church a cash incentive for filling in the blanks in the bulletin.


After church the boys and I hiked up to the cross that overlooks Antigua. I figured that if I tired them out enough they would perhaps be willing to put the soccer game on hold for a day or 2. Silly me, all it did is built up enough of an appetite that I had to feed them lunch before we went and played soccer. I actually played for the entire game but must admit that I felt more like a target than a goalie.

More food
this evening,




....and now it
......is bed time.

Goodnight,
Yours in Christ: Dick



Monday, January 4, 2009

I recently ran across the following statement.

"There are people in the world so hungry that
God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread."

That may be an exaggeration but I know what God says in the Bible about simply patting some one that is going hungry on the back and telling them that you will pray for them and then doing nothing about their physical situation.

James 2:15-17 tells us,

¹⁵Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. ¹⁶If one of you says to him, "Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed," but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? ¹⁷In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.






Today Chris and I spent the day down near the coast. No it was not a day spent lying on the beach. Fact is much of our time was spent in courthouses and lawyer's offices. The end result was more satisfying than a day at the beach though. In about 4 weeks we will be having a teem of men come in to help us build a new house on the parcel of land that we purchased today. No longer will Rosa and her children have to call the ramshackle shack that they have been living in their home. As an added blessing for the first time in their lives they will have electricity, running water, a stove to cook on, and instead of 2 beds for 7 people each one will have their own bed to sleep in.

Are we going to witness to this family while we are building the house? You bet we are! And I would not doubt that as we are sharing the love of Christ with them that God will even give us the opportunity to use words.

Goodnight,
Yours in Christ: Dick

Journal, Janurary 1, 2009

I am frequently asked what I would do if I were held up at gun point here in Guatemala. Knowing that it was likely to happen to me some day I have done a lot of praying about it. I know that statistics here in Guatemala show that you are less likely to get shot if you hand over everything that the robber or robbers ask for, but they also show that even though this improves your chances of survival it is no guarantee that you will walk away in one peace. Now before any of you that are considering coming here cancel your plans and put your tickets up for bid on e-bay let me remind you that I spend a good deal of time in the back country and this is where most of these robberies and ambushes take place. Never the less even the best parts of Guatemala are far from being Disney World so if you are not prayed up and are simply thinking of coming here for a holiday there are safer places to be. I may also remind you that I have been here for 10 years now and although I have run into a few tense situations this is the first time that I have rounded a corner on a dirt road and been greeted by 3 masked men with guns. Anyway in praying abut what to do if, and in all likelihood, when that situation happened God seemed to tell me that He would give me the wisdom to know what to do when it did happen. As I sit here looking back on Tuesday's experience I realize that there was not much wisdom involved on my part. It all happened so fast that I really never had time to think about anything. I think that my approaching car startled the robbers as much as they startled me. At any rate they jumped out of the way and simply stood there looking at me as I drove by. As I looked back through my rear view mirror I saw them step back out on to the road but none of them shot at me or even aimed their guns at me. They just stood there watching me drive off down the road. I guess that I can thank the Lord that I did not have to think about what to do. I think that He had it all figured out and that it was a good thing that I did not try to use my wisdom in trying to handle what could have been a bad situation.

Sorry I didn't get any pictures of the bandits because some Guatemalans
don't like to have their pictures taken while they are working.

2 Corinthians 12:9

But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me.

Was my trip to Ronny's house worth it? You bet it was. I had promised Ronny who's physical condition prevented him from attending this year's cam that he and his little Brother Arlindo could spend a few days at my house and they have been looking forward to that for over a month now. Ronny has muscular dystrophy and it is doubtful that he will have many more opportunities to do something like this. For 2 days Ronny and Arlindo, have been having the time of their lives. Ronny is getting so week that he can scarcely sit up in his wheelchair any more and every hour or 2 someone has to get up and reposition him when he is sleeping but my kids have been helping out with this, with feeding and even toileting him so I am actually not having to do all of the work. I know that I do a lot of bragging about the kids that hang out at my place but it is hard not to brag when they are so incredible. It never ceases to amaze me how kids like Esben who's own mother will have nothing to do with him can show so much love and compassion to some one like Ronny.It is now Thursday and we just brought Ronny and Arlindo back to their home. I took a different road this time. On the way home I stopped off and visited another family. They asked me why I was taking this way home. "Didn't I know that there were sometimes thieves on this road?" I guess I could stay locked up in my house. I am sure that nothing bad ever happens to people who stay at home.

I do covet your prayers as I continue to serve here in Guatemala, but please don't send letters telling me to be careful. I have already made a new year's resolution to be more careful, careful that I continue to be exactly where I know God wants me to be.

1 Peter 4:19

So then, those who suffer according to God's will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good.

Goodnight and Happy New Year,
Yours in Christ: Dick