Faithful God

I am thankful that God is in control and loves us more than we could love each other. Honestly, if I didn't have that knowledge, I would be constantly in a state every time I didn't hear from one of two we're discipling. Funny how when you walk with someone so closely through all their ups and downs, help them get up and go on and cheer with them when they take steps of victory, they get into your heart somehow. And the first time you don't hear from them, especially since they've just come off the streets, your heart hits the floor and you start to pray like crazy for God's protection over them and everything else. That's when you know they're not just people you're teaching the Word to. That's when you know they've become people you care and love so much that you're willing to hit the streets to look for them should they not return home. That's when you know you would do anything to help them get back up and keep fighting, even fend off a bear. That's when you know they've gotten into your heart. 


I remember the first time JP left home after he had gotten off the streets. Luchin and I went to look for him and Luchin even disguised himself should JP try to run and hide from us. I remember once when we saw him on the streets at night and we followed him and how my heart just took a nosedive to the ground wondering if he had returned to old habits. Through it all, we've prayed hard for him, kept telling him how proud we are of him, reminded him of and highlighted every tiny accomplishment in the face of great temptations and a few stumbles, told him we love him and we never think badly of him, and generally been a thorn at his side. And through it all, I would have been a complete basket case had not my so amazing God kept reminding me that He loves JP more than Luchin and I ever could. That has sustained us and helped us release him into the Lord. We pray constantly for him knowing that God will work all things out for good for JP as he asks the Lord every day to help him overcome. We are seeing how this young man is starting to think in a different way. Starting to learn responsibility, integrity and patience. We are seeing how he really wants to change his life around and struggles against temptation. We see how he perseveres and fights against his emotions to do what is right. We are very proud of him. But we know that even as we are proud of him, his heavenly Father is prouder still. 


EM is also making us so proud of her. She has struggled with erroneous thoughts and beliefs, but with the Word of God, she is learning to overcome. I wasn't able to contact her at all all last week and wondered what had happened. She has a new job that she had said yes to when she saw it as an opportunity to get off the streets and I knew we couldn't meet as often as we had before but not hearing from her scared me. But she called and we got to meet and listening to her just made me want to cry. She said she almost quit her new job twice because it called for regular hours and it was kinda boring as she works as a domestic help. But then she talked to her sister who encouraged her to stay and she got a hold of the Word because she knew that she had to overcome her feelings as this job is a blessing from God and she needed His reassurance and strength to stay. I was so proud of her when she said that. It showed that she was now not just acting by impulse and emotions. She is also learning new things as her employer teaches her and instead of saying, "I can't", she keeps declaring Phillipians 4:13 over and over while she learns. At the end of our meeting, she told me her hours and how much she earns which are excellent. Aside from that, her employer is going to add her on a medical insurance plan. No one does that for domestic help here! God is so blessing EM's socks off!


God is so good and faithful. I have also started to go to the Women's Prison to minister to a small group of foreign women and it is a joy to be with them as they are truly a fun group. It is a huge blessing for me to be able to minister the Word in English after such a long while. 


We appreciate your prayers more than you know. So, thank you from the bottom of our hearts. May the Lord guard and keep you, may He shine His face upon you. 

5 Traits

The 5 traits of highly successful people, paraphrased from the Washington Post:

1. Stray away from the norm. It takes a major cognitive shift to understand that the way things are, and have been, can be challenged.

2.Perservere, be passionately committed even when you can't see the light at the end of the tunnel. Accept that you won't see any return on it for years.

3. Take the initiative to problem solve.

4. Take risks to create value.

5. Be disciplined.



I believe this can be applied to anything in our lives. The worst thing that can happen is if we sit on our butts and do nothing because our reasoning for it is that it's never been done in such and such a way before. God gave each one of us creativity and ideas and if we walk in His Spirit, we will get insights on how God wants us to do things. If we read the Bible, we will see that God is hugely creative in how He problem solves. We need to realize that we don't need to conform but rather, we need to transform ways of thinking. And to persevere to walk by faith and not by sight. Taking the initiative to do something when we see a need and not wait for someone else to do it and actually stepping out to do it. Above all, disciplining ourselves in the Lord, in our daily lives so that we not only talk the talk but we walk the walk as well.

...But the GREATEST of these is Love.

The deeper we get into this ministry, the more we realize one thing; that people desperately need to be loved, especially by their parents. Over and over again, those whom we are counseling tell us how much they long to hear words or see an act that show them that their parents love them. And some of them are crying out for attention with their actions, even if it's negative attention, just to get a reaction from their parents even though they are now adults. The horribly sad thing is, they get no reaction and their despair and pain propel them deeper into the vice that they're in.


Fathers, you have no idea how much you impact your children; whether it is by your absence or your presence. Your absence, whether  literal or in the form of apathy, kills the tender hearts of your children. Being a father is not just about donating sperm and then ignoring the offspring thereof with the excuse, " I have no time for you because I have to work to provide for you". Your children need you to love them, to protect them, to teach them values and morals, to hear you say that you love them and are proud of them, that they are priceless and to see you live out the actions of your words to them. Look around you, look into the faces of your children and see the emptiness and waning hope in their eyes waiting, waiting for you to just tell them that you love them and to spend time with them. Raising children isn't just about providing for their material needs. They need you emotionally and spiritually. Your children are not puppies that can be thrown out on the streets with the expectation that they can raise themselves, teach themselves morals and values and survive without being watered and fertilized by your love. 


Mothers, so many of you have been so hurt by the men in your life but please, please don't bring that hurt and pain into your children's lives by ignoring them and passing on what you had received to them. Show them love, protect them from those who would abuse them and please, please treasure, value and respect yourselves so that your children will learn to do that as well. Don't believe the lie that you are not able to live without a man in your life and seek only  to link yourself at whatever cost to any man that you believe you can get and thereby place your children's lives at risk. Respect and value yourselves so that your children will learn to value and respect themselves. Spend time with them, learn to talk and listen to them so that they will tell you their fears and hopes. Fan into flame their dreams so that they can see that they have a hope and a future. 


Build a home on the solid rock of Christ and walk in the role that God has given you; to be responsible guardians of your children so that they will  know love, security and companionship within the home and not feel the need to look for it in the streets, with those who would seek to harm them. In your hands you hold the future. Guard and treasure it well. 


You influence your children more than you think you do. 


"Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord." - Ephesians 6:4