Guatemalan Journey: The World Race comes to Guatemala!

Yesterday, at church, as I was running around getting things ready for Sunday School, a young man new to the church came up and asked me if there was anything he could do to help. This offer stopped me dead in my tracks, since it’s the first time this has happened since I started working on the staff of Iglesia del Camino in the Children’s Ministry. I was just about finished with set up, so took some time to visit with Dan.

It turned out that he was the team leader of a group from The World Race which is beginning its trek of 11 countries in 11 months here in Guatemala. Last year we had a group from this organization working at Hermano Pedro, and they were wonderful. This was a group I had to get to know.
After church, we visited for a while. The group told me about their assignments, and we discovered that they would be serving at Hermano Pedro a couple of days a week. I told them a few things about the orphanage, and agreed to meet them there today to help them settle in. Then they stopped me dead in my tracks once again, when they asked how they should pray Sunday night in preparation for what they would experience at Hermano Pedro. This is not your “usual” mission team. . .

Today at the orphanage, I found out just how true this was. The team jumped right in and got involved with the kids, though I know this was not easy for them. As Lindsay, one of the team members, put it in her blog,

I wasn’t sure that they would understand me or even know I was there. After 20 minutes, I found Melvin…he’s the hospital “Romeo”...I began to rub his head and as when he smiled at me the first time, my heart melted. It was in that moment that everything was OK...in an instant I just understood how to love them. I just needed to give them some attention and let them know that I am “here”…exactly the way God loves us.

One memory of this group will always be burned into my mind an heart. As I approached the kids who are in the cribs nearest the nurses station (those who are most in need of constant care), I saw this “gentle giant” of a man standing over David’s crib, just gazing at him, and I knew instantly that he was praying for David. I came to know this young man, Ryan, as having one of the tenderest hearts of any I have met. He felt an immediate connection with David, who is pretty much non-responsive, and as a result does not get much attention from volunteers. But Ryan was there, and promised both David and me that he would some spend time on each of his visits to Hermano Pedro with this dear little one who seems so alone.