Belize 2011-Day 6

Thursday, August 4, 2011

My devotion this morning said to write in my journal about some of the changes I’ve experienced and some of the changes I need to experience. So here goes:

As far as changes to my perspective, I can’t help but see how selfish I am! I am constantly fighting my selfish desires this week. I think God is showing me who I really am, deep down, if I don’t let Him change me. Well I’m done with that! I’m asking Him to do a work on my heart and to help me change to be more like Him. I want my heart to be a heart that is completely devoted to and completely in love with Him.

Just sitting here looking out the window, I am in awe of God’s creation! I can see the palm trees and the mountains in the background – it is breathtaking. I absolutely love it here! I took a picture of it, but it doesn’t do it justice.

God's creation is SO amazing!

Today is our last day at Bella Vista! It makes me a little sad. L Praying for opportunities to share God’s love today!

Later ~

This morning was wonderful – and sad at the same time. We started out by walking to a few people’s houses to pray for them (all three were battling an illness of some sort). When I’m in Belize, it’s so easy to just go and pray for them and expect God to heal them – it’s easy to have faith here. But back home if somebody is sick, we depend on doctors and medicine instead of relying on God. I know we have to do our part, and since we have the technology we should make use of it, but it feels like something is missing. Maybe it’s just the total dependence on God for what we need. Jeff had me pray for one of the ladies. That was nerve racking – the whole team (as well as several Belizeans) was standing there listening!

Alisia was there when we started walking around, and I looked for Amilia but I didn’t see her. So me and one of the other girls on the team walked with Alisia until we got over to the soccer field where a lot of the other kids were. Amilia was there and she spotted me right away and came right over to me. She stuck right by my side for most of the day. When it was time to leave she gave me like 3 hugs and we did our high – five handshake I taught her the other day. I told her I would pray for her and asked her if she would pray for me too, and she said she would.

After we left and got out of Bella Vista, I became kind of overwhelmed with emotion. I was kind of sad that we were coming to Jaguar Reef. I felt like if we couldn’t be in Bella Vista loving on those kids, then I just wanted to be at home. Anytime I saw people walking on the side of the road, it made me wish we could turn around and go back to Bella Vista – it made me miss the people of the village – even the ones I don’t know. My heart was (and still is) aching for the people – especially those precious kids!

Lester is one that I don’t think I mentioned the other day. He’s about 13 or so. He likes to pick at me because of my Spanish. Last night after the movie we had a conversation where we just went back and forth between Spanish and English. Usually making fun of my Spanish, no matter which language we were speaking in. J

Lester

I personally love this pic of him :)

Kevin has turned out to be a huge surprise this week! I didn’t find this out until this afternoon, and it made me practically stop dead in my tracks! Kevin is a boy that the trip from last month met. He’s 15 years old and he was the leader of a gang of boys in the village. This week he’s been following our group around, visiting with some of our team members, and sometimes getting involved in the activities with us. He has done a completely turnaround from last month! He was watching (and really getting into) the movie last night, and today he had a heart-to-heart talk with one of the adults on our team. We are praising God for the changes there! I will continue to be praying for him, that he will see God’s love through the things he saw this week and will continue to see it through Pastor Marcos and the church members there. If you think of it, please be praying for Kevin! He is a very influential person in that community and if he comes to Christ, he will bring several others with him!!

Kevin with our youth pastor, Tim

The lodge here is amazing! I’m glad we’re only here for one day, but I plan to enjoy it! This is probably going to be the most restful day for the rest of this whole year!