Awake

I am a night person.
And especially in Peru I find it a battle to get up every morning. As soon as I am conscious, I know that I have a long day ahead of me. I have a day of testing, a day of endurance. A day of comforting crying children and not knowing what is wrong. The thought of this, makes me want to roll over and drift off into oblivion.

God did not bring me here to be asleep.
He brought me here to be wide awake.

Awake in life.
Awake in spirit.

To be spiritually asleep is to be non-existent.
Without passion, without energy, no impact is made.

Jesus came to wake us up.

To merely go through the daily course of life isn't good enough.
God did not give you every day on this earth just so you could tolerate them. He gave you every day to be fully alive and awake in Him.
To be on fire with passion.
Passion in anything that you do. In teaching, in learning, in having a conversation, in cooking.

In living.

Be awake. Live and do what you do with so much energy and Life, because He died so we could have that Life.
Wake up from the sins of the world.

"wake up, o sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you" - Ephesians 5:14

Just think, if the souls of everyone were roused, how much power and impact could we have in the world?
The impact that we are called to make.

Wake up.

Love is patient

"love is patient" can be translated into my life as "Laura needs to be patient". I am happy to truthfully admit that I am not a patient human being. Always wanting what is next, wanting things to hurry up, rushing towards the next year, month, day, minute.
As all parents will agree, children test the limits of your patience. I remember asking a million times "are we there yet", I also remember Dad patiently teaching me to drive, I made the same mistakes again and again, but he would patiently go over it again with me.

In the afternoons I help first graders with their homework. Immense amounts of patience is needed for this. Sometimes my patience is tested when I translate their homework instructions to "draw the meeting of the magic words", neither them nor I have any idea what the magic words are, or how we could draw them. But my patience is most needed when I work with Orianna. She is the sweetest, but she has learning difficulties and can be distracted by the smallest things. If I do not give her my full, undivided attention, she will not get anything done. Slowly but surely we go through all her work. She constantly is erasing, saying she can't do it, getting distracted, wanting water. But, at the end she is so happy, overwhelmed with the achievement that she did it!! And the best part is that she turns to me, throws get arms around me and says "me amo Tia". Which makes the testing of my patience worth every bit.

If my patience is tested with small things like this, I can imagine that God's patience for me is huge. As I always make the same mistakes, as I get distracted and as I forget things. But He is there, quietly but surely working with me as I do the work He has called me to do. Like a parent, He will go over it with me, twice, thrice, until I learn. And if I mess up again, He will not lose His cool, but He stays patient. He understands.

For God is love.
And "love is patient" - 1 Corinthians 13:4

Jessica

Woke up Monday morning to find out I all the long term volunteers and the madres were going to be out. At the last minute they realized someone needed to look after baby Jessica all morning. At first, with no one to run to if everything turned to custard, I was thinking this:




















But, as the morning went on, it turned into this:




















She is the sweetest baby and I pray that God has an amazing plan for her as she grows up!

Come all you weary.

At the moment I am sick. With an awful cold. Yuk. All weekend I have spent almost all of my time in my room, trying to recover; armed with cough drops, hot tea and vaporub. So, this gives me a lot of time to myself.

Thinking.
Reading.

The work that all of the volunteers do here is tough. It is rewarding, but it is not easy. At the end of some days, I have zero energy left, it has all been sucked out. I get worn out: mentally with constantly trying to interpret and talk to the kids here. Physically playing with them, carrying the younger ones, soccer on a hot day is tiring. And emotionally thinking about what some of the kids have been through and giving so much love to them.

In regards to my body and my health and being sick, I feel exhausted. My body is working overtime trying to heal. This makes me remember all the times I have felt spiritually weary. This happens both at home and in Peru.

Everyone gets burnt out, and at some point, everyone feels drained. This feeling has been frequent lately. Sometimes I don't have the energy to go on, to serve anymore.

But (thank goodness there is always a but)

'Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.' - Matthew 11:28

Sometimes to world tells us that we have to have it all together to be a Christian. That we have to sort everything out and be perfect to follow God.
But we don't.
Jesus didn't come to earth for the healthy, he came for the sick (Luke 5:31). A healthy man doesn't go to a doctor, because he doesn't need to. We are all sick, and all need God.
Humans are human. That means we are not perfect. No one can do it on their own. God is here for us, here to lighten our burdens, to carry them for us.
We need to admit that we are sick, that what we are carrying is too heavy for us, and we need help. By admitting this to God, He begins to heal us.

But we can only be healed if we are willing to ask for help.

He won't carry our burdens unless we want Him to.

And then, we will have rest for our souls.



On a side note:
I know this really awesome guy who introduces me to really good music. As I wrote this post I listened to this song. You should too.

P.S. extra points for spotting the Narnia reference.

The Three Musketeers

Jhon (straight hair), Alejandro (curls) and Jose-Luis (on end hair). I look after these three in the mornings. They bring so much joy, drama and cheek to my mornings! I love them to pieces. Every day we sing songs, play outside, read books, do crafts, numbers, draw in chalk and just general all around fun stuff. They rarely smile for photos, but if I'm lucky I'll catch a giggle.

Jose-Luis is naughty, but gets away with it by giving endless hugs, Jhon is the brain box and corrects my spanish. He acts like a little man and likes to do things for himself, but deep down he's such a kid, he has the most adorable laugh - I wanna bottle it! And Alejandro loves cuddles and loves reading.

Pray for these three cute and precious boys, they have so much ahead of them. I know God will do some amazing things in their lives as they grow up!

Mark 10:14

Spending so much time with forty-odd kids has made me realize the immense and unerring faith children have. Jhon, who is three, was playing in the playhouse, it's platform is nearly as tall as me. When he wanted to come down, instead of climbing down the ladder, he shouted "TIA LAURA!" (aunty Laura) and suddenly leapt into my arms. He completly and unshakeably believed that I would catch him. (I did, thank goodness) He did not waver, or make sure I was ready, nor did he ask to be helped down.

He just jumped.

This made me think that child-like faith is needed. We need to jump, to leap into God's arms. Sometimes it's hard to trust that He will be there, and every time we doubt that He will catch us. Being here, and seeing the faith the kids have, has made me realize that I need to stop erring, and I need to trust - completly and utterly that God will always ALWAYS be there, ready to catch me. Without warning, He will be there. And once he has caught me, He will hold me, comfort me, strengthen me, and help me when I am ready to walk again. Even if it takes time, He will teach me to walk again, and He will let me know that I will never walk alone.

In Mark 10:14 Jesus says "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truely I tell you, anyone who will not recieve the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it."

So have faith as trusting, undoubting, pure and loving, as children do. For even when we do not see Him, God will always be there.


"'Do not be afraid, for I am with you and I will rescue you,' declare the Lord" - Jeremiah 1:8

Rice, oreos and green tea

Here, the staple food is rice. I have rice for lunch, rice for dinner, and I'll usually have rice for breakfast. To mix things up I eat oreos and drink green tea. In all honesty the lack of range in food choices here makes me miss home so so much - especially Mum's cooking!
An average day for me consists of working with the kinder kids - who are three boys, Alejandro is three, Jhon is three and Jose-Luis is two. Yes, they are adorable and yes they are naughty. I then help organising all the books in the Biblioteca, they have so many book I want to read, but alas, they are all in spanish. Then there is lunch and tutoria, which is helping the kids with their homework.
The orphanage itself is situated just out of Trujillo, it's a desert, with sand-dunes behind it and the ocean across the road. There are seven other volunteers here, six from the US and one from Canada. For them, hot cross buns only exist in the song and packets of marshmallows consist of only white marshmallows - they must live a sad sad life deprived of hot cross buns and pink marshmallows. On the contrary, they have a zillion types of Reeses Pieces and Batman is from America. I love everyone here and get along with them really well, Ashley is my roommate. From Nebraska. It's kinda cool meeting people from all around the world and suddenly having an international spider web.

I'm sorry this post was merely facts and hugely uninspiring. But, actually, I don't really have an excuse, other than being uninspired.

Till next time
Laura