Hi,
Things have been really crazy around here! We're having amazing lectures and growing closer as a DTS. Last week were learned about telling Bible stories by memory and we learned the stories by saying them over and over again, but really investing emotions into the stories. It was so awesome. I memorized three Bible stories all because I was practicing telling them with so much enthusiasm like I was actually there watching the story happen. It was SO cool.
Wednesday of last week we had local outreach to a place called the dump and or the city of the lost people. This place was the most eye opening local outreach I've had so far. These families are living out of houses made up of trash or anything they can find. It honestly looked like a dump. While we were driving to the there I thought that I could handle it and that I would be okay, but I was wrong. When we arrived kids were jumping on the car and they were so excited for us to come. I felt so welcomed. The kids ran up to you right away and just wanted to play. We gathered as a team and split into two teams to walk around the dump, meet people and hand them water and a granola bar. Our group had two kids who followed us around the dump the whole time and just hung out with us. Lupita was the little nine year old girl who was following us. She ended up giving her bracelet to my friend Mic. Mic was so excited and so happy but she felt bad because she had nothing to give to Lupita. I realized I was wearing a friendship bracelet Mic and I had and I felt like God wanted me to give that to her. It was such a special moment. I wanted Lupita to know that we will forever be friends and that I will never forget the beautiful, sweet and loving young girl she is. It felt amazing to do that and be able to pray for the people that we were meeting at the dump. But I was also struggling with talking to strangers when we were there. It's hard for me to go up to a random stranger and try to start a conversation. I just get afraid that it'll be awkward and I won't know what to say, but I talked to a women at the dump and it went really well. I just said a little prayer before I talked to her that God will guide the conversation and he did. I learned that this women was reading the Bible and taking a nice relaxing day off work. What I realized when I was talking to her was that she's human and I don't need to be afraid of talking to strangers. I just need to love like Jesus loves. That changed my perspective on approaching strangers. I just need to love them and allow God to speak through me. The women was the last women we talked to before we has to head back to the vans to play with the kids. Right beside our vans was a building where a lot of the kids were so we went in there and colored with the kids. Lupita and I colored together and I used the little Spanish I know to get to know her. I felt such a strong connection to her. Before my team left she gave me this...
"I love you Lauren." That really played with my emotions. I just wanted to take her home with me and take care of her. I started to cry as we walked out of the building. As a team we had time to debrief and the entire time I was crying because I wanted to do more and I didn't want to leave Lupita. While were were talking, Lupita found me and gave me the biggest hug ever. She kept looking up at me to see if I was still crying and she would give me the biggest smile ever. I truly love this little girl.
I don't want you to feel sad for this city of the lost people. I want you to love them and pray for them. This isn't a city of lost people these are God's people. They're loved, important, worthy, beautiful, creative and much more. They're not lost. God has adopted them into his family. They're a city of forgiven, loved and important people. It was hard leaving, but I know my God is right there with them. Thank you God for never leaving this place.
