Several hours after our group Bible study this morning, I grabbed our old-fashioned digital camera and headed undercover (well, not quite) to each of our intensive classes that we hold every Friday for our more mature students. Most of our teens tried to run away or hide their faces when they realized I was taking pictures, but even so I got a few shots that are worth sharing.
The following are photos taken of the following intensive 3-hour classes: Music/Orchestra (piano, violin, recorder, marimba and guitar), English as a second language, and organic agriculture/discipleship. Normally during this early afternoon time-slot there is also a group in community evangelism, but this week that class was cancelled because the local pastor who directs the group is in surgery. Thank you to all of you who support this redemptive work and/or pray for God’s continued guidance and protection over us.
This is Ariel, one of our older local teen boys who comes from a very chaotic, undisciplined home life learning to play the marimba.These are two of our daughters whom we are in the process of adopting. Musical training – paired with ongoing relational Christian discipleship – is one of our techniques to redeem broken teens and heal them through healthy, dynamic activities for God’s glory.Paola (left), one of our new foster daughters who moved in with us about six months ago, with a local teen as they learn to play the recorder.The builders are making great progress on the dining room annex! (For the last couple weeks our community kitchen with its fridge, stove, pantry, etc has been moved to our front porch! Thank goodness we’ve got a big porch!)
The classes imparted at the Living Waters Ranch are not confined to normal classroom walls: we oftentimes teach outdoors, go on prayer walks with our students, and interact with the beautiful Honduran habitat around our buildings as part of the youth’s integral learning experience.This is Miss Ligia’s English as a second language class. Everyone got the giggles and tried to hide their faces when I entered with the camera!Nobody wanted to show their face!When I got close to her with the camera, she got the giggles! What a beautiful smile!Now back outside with the beginners’ recorder class on the porch!This is our new Christian psychologist who is multi-talented! In addition to helping greatly in the integral psychological/spiritual healing of our youth in Christ, she has also been instrumental teaching in the classroom, leading a group of teen girls in twice-weekly prayer time and freely sharing her God-given talents through various outlets.One of our local Honduran missionaries has a great passion to pair organic agriculture with small-group Christian discipleship, so several of these agriculture/discipleship classes are given throughout the week to the 60 youth in our program who desire to participate. In these photos our 16-year-old foster son Brayan is working with a local teen to dig a 12-foot-deep hole to receive the waste from the pig pen we are building. These activities cultivate work ethic, perseverance and strength of character in our teens in addition to a deepened love of God’s Word.
They’ve been working on this pit for weeks — one rock at a time!Two of our local teachers/missionaries work alongside of our students to cultivate the land organically as they learn more about their Creator and how to care for His creation.This is the little plot our kids have been working so hard on. They’ve planted plantains and banana trees here.
After my escapade out in the pasture, I passed back through our front gate and found one of our musicians hard at work in his song notebook.My last stop: a posed photo with three of our beloved recorder players (our foster daughter Jackeline, far left, and two local teens who have been in our program full-time over two years). Lookin’ good!Who knew that teenagers could be this cute?This is our foster daughter Jackeline. She is a talented mathematician, an avid cow-farmer and a great big sister to special-needs Josue. The Lord has done great things to transform her since she first moved in with us over three years ago, and we love her dearly.
Nobody else was willing to participate in an impromptu photo shoot, so I headed back across our front lawn to our cinderblock home to finish up my admin duties for the day! God bless you!
A friend of ours who serves as a missionary to Honduras felt the Lord lead him to help us construct an addition on the back of our dining room/kitchen in order to accommodate the increased number of people we are serving this year. The dining room (where we hold our group Bible studies/worship times in addition to being our lunchroom and multi-purpose classroom) will be doubled in size, and a classroom will be added on as well. This is the first time we’ve made any real structural changes/additions onto the property since the leadership of the Living Waters Ranch was granted us in 2012, and we are very thankful to our missionary friend for financially covering this cost and directing the construction workers in the process.
Our existing dining room/kitchen (yellow building) with the annex being built out back
Josselyn and Gabriela Return to Their Biological Family
Two of our foster daughters (ages 13 and 11) who moved in with us in July 2015 as they escaped situations of abuse and neglect were recently moved out of our home and under the protection of a loving, stable Christian aunt. After performing the legal investigation to see if the home and family members would prove safe for the girls, they were officially moved in with their aunt in mid-January. Unlike the rest of our foster kids, these two always longed to return to their biological family, so this move was considered a triumph. The girls’ aunt has been raising their little brother since birth, and she had always hoped to receive the girls as well (which we did not know until several months ago when we were in contact with her for the first time). We continue to pray for the girls and are in phone contact with them from time to time. We currently have 8 foster kids/teens in our family ages 9-17, and we do not anticipate receiving more in the foreseeable future as we’re trying to establish ‘normal’ with those whom we have after having gone through many emotionally taxing adjustments over the past several months with the arrival of our two new teen girls (15-year-old Carolina and 14-year-old Paola) in October 2017 and now the departure of Josselyn and Gaby not two months ago.
This was little Gabriela (Gaby) shortly after moving in with us in 2015. A biological family member had shaved her head and she was deeply malnourished and emotionally broken after having been the recipient of her step-father’s sexual abuse. Of the 11 kids we’ve fostered, she has perhaps had the most behavioral problems and daily challenges.Living under our care over two years, Gaby overcame some of her developmental and emotional delays although there was still much work to be done. She defied all odds and even learned to read and write, something we initially thought would not be within her mental reach. Darwin and I were prepared to be her lifelong caretakers and had even offered to adopt her and Josselyn, so now the fact that they are no longer with us is somewhat of an emotional shock to our system. We hope all the best for them in their new home and that their loving aunt can meet Gaby’s many needs.Josselyn, just like her younger sister Gaby, came to us with her hair extremely short, malnourished, and never having gone to school. She came to confess faith in Christ while in our home, was baptized, and in our accelerated homeschool program was able to catch up academically by doing two grades in one year. This year she is in sixth grade and studying at a local school close to her aunt’s home. She has more intellectual capacity than her younger sister but always lacked a certain degree of common sense and faithfulness, so our greatest prayer for her in this new season of her life is that God may grant her the wisdom and the faith to put into practice the many things we tried to teach her.This is a photo we took of Josselyn a few months ago (after having been under our care over two years). She’s grown so much!
New Teacher/Missionary Added to Team
Due to our increased number of students this year (60 in 2018; 35 last year), we saw the necessity of acquiring another local teacher/missionary to serve alongside of us in the classroom, in discipleship activities, and administratively in the office in order to alleviate the burden the rest of us were feeling with the larger number of youth being served. A sister in Christ whom we’ve known several years through a mentor of ours recently graduated college and was on a job hunt (which in Honduras can be increasingly difficult due to the scarcity of jobs available), and we snagged her before anyone else could! She has a passion for Christ and has a long history of working with children and youth, so she has been a great fit in these first few weeks on the job. Our team is now composed of 8 full-time and 6 part-time Honduran workers/missionaries including my husband and me.
Some of our foster teens and local students helping shovel gravel during a day of organized maintenance/construction activitiesTwo of our girls doing their homework by candlelight in our living room. Our kids make fun of me because I’m very old-fashioned!
Thank you for your prayers and support! God bless you.
A couple days ago after our discipleship-based community homeschool classes had let out at 3:00pm and our local students had returned to their homes in our rural neighborhood, I crossed our quiet front yard and caught sight of our 14-year-old foster daughter reading a Christian novel while perched on top of our large play structure that is normally swarmed with kids during recess time. It warmed my heart to see her so still and at peace while reading for pleasure (she used to hate reading, and we’ve been intentionally working on this not only with her but with all of our kids), and the sight of her way up there overlooking the beautiful pastures inspired me to go grab our little digital camera and take a few undercover photos of her…
When I got up close for one of my shots of her, my cover was broken and she started laughing when she saw me!Our 15-year-old foster daughter Carolina — who moved in with us about six months ago — watched from close by and laughed while enjoying our spontaneous photo-taking antics.Soon enough both Carolina and another foster daughter of ours, 14-year-old Paola, joined in the fun and started swinging on the monkey bars below Jackeline’s reading spot. (Great focus, Jackeline! She just kept on reading as if they weren’t there!)The jungle gym is not only for little kids, but also for teens! Our kids are very playful……And so are their parents! Now it’s my turn! (At this point Jackeline’s taking photos from her perch!)
This is a photo Jackeline took of our cows’ barn in the distance and the mountains behind our property.Our 16-year-old son Brayan, whom we are in the process of legally adopting, has greatly grown in his maturity/initiative in these last few weeks with the help of a local tutor. He finished his homework early (which used to never happen), so he went out front to enjoy a couple hours playing with the soccer ball! Good boy!
One last shot of Jackeline on her reading perch at dusk…beautiful!
Hidden Treasures: Seeking the Kingdom of God in Honduras 