Category Archives: Living Waters Ranch Secondary School

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Rays of Hope Shining From Dark Places: Reflections From the Next Generation (Part 1)

February 19, 2017 jenniferzillycanales Leave a comment

Over the past several days I’ve spent close to a dozen hours reading our students’ ‘books’ — long handwritten reflections that they’ve carefully torn out of their school notebooks and stapled together. During the three weeks of intensive preparation that finished last Friday, every evening our students were given one or more reflection themes as homework to get them thinking and engage their hearts and minds. Reading their sincere reflections has allowed us to enter the inner world of each student, to know them better and witness close-hand the transformative work the Lord has begun in them.

Some of the reflection themes had to do with their current or future family while others were about their relationship with God, how they spent their school vacations, a situation they had to face with bravery or their personal opinion regarding whether or not cell phones are a healthy tool for teenagers to have. The writing prompts were all very open-ended, and the responses were intriguing.

Although our precious students have many grammatical errors, the heart of their message — the Truth shining forth from their small pencil-written letters and unorganized paragraphs — caught me off guard. It is for this reason that I’ve translated several excerpts from their writings to include them on this blog to encourage those around the world with the good work the Lord has begun in many young lives in Honduras. Seeing as I’ve only got about halfway through the enormous stack of reflections (each ‘book’ is 15+ pages), there will probably be another blog with additional excerpts in the upcoming days.

The following excerpts were written by Honduran youth ages 12-17 who are all currently in poverty, many of which do not live with their biological parents due to situations of abuse and neglect, and some of whom spent the first 10-12 years of their life without entering school. Some have been raised in devout Christian families while others found Christ through their relationship with us at the Living Waters Ranch.

juegos4 — Last Friday the 40+ youth in our homeschool-style discipleship program (both elementary and secondary combined) celebrated the end of the very demanding three-week process of Intensive Preparation as my husband Darwin and the rest of our faithful team planned a fun day of outdoor games for those who had persevered and not given up. Our official school year started this past week.

I believe that God is the only one who can liberate us of all evil. We humans are very difficult because we tend to resist our divine Eternal Father and don’t want to be guided by Him, and that is why there are so many problems in life. – New female student, age 15 (8^th grade)

My first week at the Living Waters Ranch high school was very special. God has been changing my life ever since I entered this new school. He has changed my whole life because now I read the Bible, which I never did before. I now pray every night. I am learning more about Jesus Christ, and God has changed my life, and I am so happy about that. Another thing that makes me happy is that God has cured me of the evil I did last year. I believe He has forgiven me. –New male student, age 14 (7^th grade)

juegos2 — Ariel and Alejandro, two teen boys who are new to our school. Alejandro (blue shirt) graduated 6th grade from a local public school without ever having learned the basics of reading, writing and math, so he has entered our school on the second-grade level. This is not uncommon, as the public school system is notorious for passing students even though they have learned nothing.

juegos13 — Miss Isis, one of our beloved local teachers who has now been with us a year and a half, enjoying a riotous participation in the field day games

I suffered a lot with my biological mom because we did not have a stable home…We were vagabonds; we did not know how to read. In order to provide food for my siblings and I, my mom prostituted herself. My dad had other women. I do not want to suffer like my mom did…That is basically what happened with my biological family, but by the grace of God my siblings and I stayed alive and together. — One of our daughters, age 12 (6th grade)

I was lost, and God, through the Christian brethren at the Living Waters Ranch, opened my eyes…He sent His son to pay for us. Thanks to God, my life has changed for the better. God loves me. God is the answer to all problems. We must repent with all our heart, and He will understand. He is my father. He is like a lifesaver; in the middle of the ocean we must cling to Him. I was so far from God – a lot of television, just wandering around without purpose, dirty language, very irresponsible. Everything bad that happened to me I blamed God. I used to say, “If God is good, why did He let this happen to me?” I was so wrong, but God – through the Christians at the Ranch – opened my eyes. – Returning male student, age 14 (8^th grade)

juegos3 — This is Genesis (red shirt), the new addition to our household, competing in a carry-the-egg-on-a-spoon competition with our daughter Jackeline.

Here in our neighborhood there was a man who liked the easy life. He was a drunkard and liked to play cards. He was also involved in drugs. One day he began reflecting over his life, and he began to seek God. He is now a pastor; he has two children and they follow him everywhere. He is so thankful to God for the change He made in him. This story has helped me because I feel that God is doing the same thing in me. — Returning male student, age 15 (7th grade)

God gave Himself up for all of us on the cross of Calvary so that we would have life in abundance. The Bible specifically tells us about the love that God has for us and what God is capable of as He transforms men. God makes no exception of people – we are poor, rich, small and big, and He takes no note of race or language. We are all important to Him, and God acts in various ways to liberate us from the error of sin that the whole world finds itself in. Many are in gangs or are drunkards; others have different errors but God sends people that He has already liberated so that they can talk to us, to those whom God wants to save. God’s Word says that even in our mother’s womb God chose us to be saved. – New male student, age 14 (7^th grade)

juegos6 — Who knew that a potato sack race would be so much fun? Jump, boys, jump!

juegos10 — This is 13-year-old Donaris who is in 4th grade with us. He has severe behavioral problems and struggles with basic social norms. Although he presents many classroom difficulties for several of our teachers, we all thank God that he is with us and not roaming the streets, where he would very quickly fall into a life of crime and sexual perversion.

In my life I want God to make me into one of His instruments. I want to counsel other youth and speak to them of the love God has for them. I also want to help street children, those without responsible parents. I would like to guide them on the right path. One day [last year] when I was in Bible study and my mom was talking about drug addicts and street children, I felt that God touched my heart and I sensed in my heart that God wants me to be the person to help those people, to share with them the good news that God has for them. I would also like to start a mission base just like the Living Waters Ranch in order to raise children and be the mom that they never had, to be a blessing to their lives.. — One of our daughters, age 16 (8th grade)

One verse that I read in the Bible this past week that impacted me is Proverbs 11:4. It says: “When you stand before the Great Judge, your riches will not be able to save you; only doing what is just will liberate you from death.” This means that not even the richest person can buy their own life in God’s presence. It makes me think that being rich would not help me because salvation is not bought with money. — Returning male student, age 15 (7th grade)

juegos7 — Our beloved student Stanley (left), whom I’ve written about on numerous occasions, and Cristian, one of our night watchman’s sons. Cristian (red shirt, right) is 15 years old and in 5th grade with us because he entered school for the first time in his life two-and-a-half years ago when he arrived at our front gate. He was one of our first local students along with his siblings, and he has been enthusiastically completing two grades per year in our accelerated program for older students.

Nowadays all the youth stop studying in order to spend time on their cellphone. I spent three years [they were actually only two, but he always says three] in fifth grade because I was distracted with my cellphone. If I were you, I would put my cellphone away so that you don’t lose points. Plus, the teacher will take the cellphone away from you. I am very proud of myself because I no longer have a cellphone, and now I am more focused than I could have ever imagined, and I thank God for that. This is my opinion. — One of our sons, age 15 (6th grade)

To me, a problem in our neighborhood is that there is a lot of trash on the ground. We should not throw it on the ground because is takes a million years to renew itself, and that’s a long time. — One of our daughters, age 12 (6th grade)

juegos18 — Our 15-year-old son Brayan hauling one of the little 10-year-old boys in our program toward the finish line!

When I began writing the Proverbs [for homework during the Intensive Preparation], at first I did not want to copy them, but then all of a sudden I felt that I wanted to do it because I found a lot of great advice that would prove helpful in my life. I now feel that every time I sit down to write the Proverbs, God is telling me, “I am waiting for you. Sit down and write, and you will be blessed by my teachings.” Also, if one hopes to correct himself, he’s got to read Proverbs. In that way we will not join up with the foolish. – Returning male student, age 15 (5^th grade)

One day Brayan and I were in a verbal spat on the porch, so Pa Darwin came and sent us both out to the yard to pull up weeds for a good while. I have a phrase that I invented: “Sometimes hard things happen, but it’s better to shut your mouth.” — One of our daughters, age 12 (4th grade)

juegos8 — During our first few weeks of the new 2017 school year, we’ve worked hard to put into practice positive behavioral norms among our students such as teamwork, mutual encouragement and utilizing one’s energy toward the good (serving God) rather than for evil. It is a very special privilege (and a lot of fun) to organize high-energy team-building events for these kids as God continued to mold their character and tame their heart with His love.

juegos15 — Ariel, one of our big teen boys, plopped pint-sized Ever (one of our first grade students) into one of the sacks. Carrying him would definitely make the race a lot faster!

In my life I already have experiences and I have seen how God manifests Himself through those who obey His Word. – New male student, age 14 (7^th grade)

When I’m an adult, I want my children to be Christ-centered leaders, just like their parents. — Returning male student, age 15 (7th grade)

Me in the past, I was a cow-herder. I did not know anything; I was not a Christian until I met Darwin and Jennifer. I started to talk with them, and I became a child of God. I am now a follower of Jesus Christ. When I was little I suffered a lot. Now that I am a Christian I enjoy the love of God and I do not ignore people. When someone insults me, the only thing I do is say, “God bless you.” Now the moments of my life are better than they were before. — One of our sons, age 15 (6th grade)

juegos9 — Hurry! Change out the sack and keep it moving!

juegos16 — 16-year-old Sandra, who has returned to live with us for a short period, on the left as she and her teammate Arlen (on the right) lend a helping hand to 11-year-old Yefri in the potato sack competition.

Proverbs 8:36 was very impactful in my life because it says “Those that offend Me put their life in danger; to hate Me is to love death.” This impacted me because the teaching is that he who hates God is a lover of death and of Satan. The people in this world don’t know what they do; they go to church but keep sinning against God. We people play with God, but we do not truly think that our body has a limit, and that limit is death. But even so we rebel against the goodness of God. — Returning male student, age 15 (7th grade)

When I’m grown up, I want my wife and I to be responsible parents. I will give thanks to God for the wife He gives me. Also, with my wife I want to help needy people — those who need help raising their children. I want to have 3 biological children and 5 adopted ones, and I want to be faithful to them. I want to form them into well-educated sons and daughters, receiving them from different places. I want to be a loving husband and a loving person. I also desire for God to guide my wife and I on the path of justice; may He give us the hope of really and truly helping others in the same way that God changed me. — One of our sons, age 15 (6th grade)

juegos22 — Now it’s the teachers’ turn in the sacks! Everybody help Miss Isis out!

[In regards to the 3 weeks of intensive preparation] …I learned that if I don’t turn in my homework, I have to go to detention and I lose a lot of points…I learned that if I put forth a good effort, good things happen. – Returning male student, age 14 (8^th grade)

I want to study at the Living Waters Ranch because I want to honor my parents. I am going to learn how to be a Christian leader. The teachers treasure and love me, and I them. Thanks to the teachers, I feel extremely encouraged because they say I’m off to a good start and that I should keep up the same pace until the end. I know that we students sometimes get really foolish and don’t do our homework, but thanks to God that now the Living Waters Ranch has detention. — Returning male student, age 15 (7th grade)

juegos24 — Who’s winning? Who cares?! Everybody just start running, and grab somebody if possible!

juegos25 — Everybody work together to haul Miss Isis over the finish line! Miss Isis, don’t wet your pants!

One of my dreams is to become a gynecologist, but if I don’t do that, then I’d like to be a pediatrician in order to help needy children. Another dream that I have is to be a prophet. Each day I ask God to grant me more and more wisdom… — Returning male student, age 14 (8th grade)

In the earlier years of my life, my relationship with Satan was perfect, but my relationship with God was terrible. I did not know God’s love. The Lord called me several times, but I never responded… Now, years later, I have the knowledge of God and I know Him personally. He is marvelous and powerful. Satan is a nobody. Satan promises to offer you things that he himself doesn’t even have. Now I love God with all my heart. I accepted Christ and am 100% submitted to His will. — New male student, age 17 (8th grade)

Amen! Glory to God!

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Full House: the Daring Practice of Christ-like Hospitality

February 4, 2017 jenniferzillycanales 1 Comment

About a week ago during our family’s daily ‘Sabbath Hour’ — the whole house covered in a precious blanket of silence, our kids peacefully in their rooms while our candle’s small flame danced soundlessly along our bedroom’s dark walls after a long day — my phone suddenly rang.

It was not too late to receive a phone call — about 8:00pm or so — but when your whole household is on its feet and showering at 4:45am and all day is spent meeting the needs of dozens of very precious, needy people (of all ages), any phone call received after nightfall seems like a bad prank.

I continued brushing my teeth in the little cave-like bathroom that connects to our bedroom, standing idly in my large, baggy pajamas as Darwin reached for the phone. After a quick verbal exchange, he held the phone out to me — a gift I did not want to receive — and informed me, somewhat confused, “It’s Genesis from Choluteca.”

Choluteca is one of Honduras’ 18 regions and is located at the other geographical extreme of our small Central American country. Darwin, three of our kids and I had gone there on a mission trip with our faith community back in January 2015 and then again once more in the ensuing months. The drive to that arid, destitute part of our country takes about 10-11 hours, and the people there are steeped in a poverty that is even more harsh than that of our wounded and limping neighborhood on the northern coast. Many of the people have only corn to eat and are without electricity and running water.

I accepted the phone hesitantly, still trying to grasp exactly who was on the other end and why on earth they would be calling after two full years of zero contact. I answered wearily only to be greeted by an extremely polite, upbeat female voice.

She began asking how our daughters were (by name) and how my husband and I had been. About five minutes into our conversation it dawned on me: this was Genesis, the young 13-year-old teen whose father was a devout believer and had so graciously received us in their home during our stay in their village. I suddenly remembered the instant connection we had had with her — especially that of the friendship our daughters Gleny and Dayana had formed with her — and how we had marveled at her maturity, faith and dogged work ethic. I remember having been very impressed by the young woman while we worked alongside of her, and I had left a letter for her inviting her to come visit us in the future if the opportunity presented itself.

With that lightbulb suddenly aglow in my mind — remembering who I was conversing with — I tip-toed over to our older girls’ bedroom (breaking the delicate Sabbath Hour with my loud phone conversation), and joyfully handed the phone over to Dayana and Gleny to greet their long lost friend and sister in Christ.

After talking at length with our girls, Genesis talked with Darwin and then again with me. Now probably 15 years old, she informed me that she was not currently studying because the educational opportunities — especially on the secondary level — in her region are extremely limited, and her family did not currently have the economic means to find other educational options for her.

Our joyful conversation came to an end and, well, we hung up the phone. Suddenly our little house fell back into that beautiful silent void as my husband and I just stared at each other from across our cozy, nearly dark bedroom. The little flame kept its rhythm as it lapped at the darkness.

Should I say it? No, right? I felt like God was urging me to speak, but it seemed in my best (selfish) interest to keep quiet. Who to obey?

After a moment or two passed, my voice suddenly came out, like a soft but very focused missile, as I felt I must speak so as not to fall into cowardice.

“I feel like God wants us to extend Genesis the invitation to come study in our school and live with us.”

Really? Now? How absurd! Had I not just that same morning ruminated over the current status of our very full household, giving thanks to God for the 8 precious little (and increasingly big) ones he’s placed with us, convinced in my heart that no one else would be added to the tribe this year?

Darwin just smiled, as I believe God has spoken the same instruction to his own heart. We talked briefly — about a minute or two — and then decided to call her back and extend the invitation. She is our sister in Christ, desires to study and grow but has had no open doors, and she suddenly calls us out of nowhere for the first time in two years. And we just happen to have an extra bed in our older girls’ room and are prepping to begin our second year with our discipleship-based high school. How could we possibly deny this was God’s doing? Were we about to cling to our own notions of control, living by sight rather than by faith?

So we called back, she answered, and we extended the invitation. It was received with immediate enthusiasm, and the phone was quickly passed to Genesis’ father and mother, with whom Darwin communicated the logistical details. Both parents were overjoyed and commented to Darwin that they had been praying for this opportunity for years. God was finally answering their plea through our obedience.

We quickly called in Dayana and Gleny, again breaking our family’s Sabbath Hour with news-sharing and late-night group praying. We told them of Genesis’ arrival, and the news was received with two big grins. Once the details were conveyed, 16-year-old Dayana eyed me and asked, “But she is going to study in the local high school, right?”

Darwin and I quickly glanced at one another, confused at her strange remark, and I answered, “Of course not! She’s going to study here. In the Living Waters Ranch. With you.”

Dayana looked uneasy and added, “But she’s going to be in ninth grade.”

My jaw just about dropped to the floor as Darwin and I suddenly locked eyes. Ninth grade? But our school only goes up to eighth grade! How had we possibly forgotten to ask her what grade she was going to be in? I suppose we had assumed she was on her way to 7th grade, which is the first year of high school in this country!

A wave of panic slammed us for about an instant before I threw my head back and laughed — of course Father God had hidden that detail from us until now so that our ‘sophisticated’ human wisdom didn’t come into play to reason our way out of obedience! Ha! It would have been all too easy to close the door knowing that we had a logical escape!

Darwin and I along with our two girls suddenly began laughing uncontrollably as we rejoiced in God’s wisdom, which is so much better than our own. Well, I guess we would be getting the books for the 9th-grade level of our homeschool program! We continued laughing. Genesis would participate in all the normal extracurricular, spiritual and academic activities we offer with our 40+ students who are 1st-8th grade, but just with slightly different books! Our Father certainly has a good sense of humor!

So the next day we shared the news of Genesis’ arrival with the rest of our clan during a family meeting, and then Darwin and our kids were off to an afternoon outing at the local river. Sandra, whose disappearance I had written about several weeks ago, would be going with them.

The next morning, the news of Genesis’ pending arrival still very fresh on our hearts, our eldest daughter Dayana began chit-chatting with me in our large, open-air kitchen as we were serving breakfast. I asked her how the river outing had gone the day before with her dad and siblings, and she began telling me all the grand tales of adventure and fun. So-and-so climbed up to the top of a large boulder-sized rock to jump off, the other one scraped their knee, and several local classmates who study at the Living Waters Ranch had come along to join in the ruckus.

As our conversation was coming to a close, she glanced over at me and added casually, “Yeah, and Sandra told me she’ll be moving back in with us in a few days.”

Jaw to the floor. (I suppose that happens to me quite frequently.) My mouth gaping wide open, I began sputtering, “Wh– what? S-s-? Sandra’s moving back in? She told you this?” I couldn’t get my footing! Father God, throw me a bone!

My mind began rapidly searching itself for connections, trying to make sense of this breaking news. I knew that Darwin had sat down with Sandra and her mom a few weeks ago to talk cold-turkey about Sandra’s poor decision-making and current vulnerability in our corrupt rural neighborhood, extending the invitation for her to come stay with us on a short-term basis as a way of deepening her spiritual roots, having more direct contact and counsel with us and eliminating all contact with rogue neighbors, but Sandra’s seemed disinterred in Darwin’s proposal at the time and, as far as I could tell, had turned it down completely.

Dayana continued, not too thrown off by my bewildered expression (I suppose she sees it quite frequently), “Yeah, she feels that the temptations in the neighborhood are very strong right now, and she wants to take you and Dad up on your offer to be more protected during this time.”

My initial reaction was that of offense, for I felt wronged that Sandra had communicated more fully with our daughter than with me, but then, throwing my ego with all of its limitless demands to one side, I just sat back and allowed myself to laugh again, knowing that God’s plans are always better than our own. Not 8 kids — nor even 9 with the unexpected arrival of Genesis! — but rather 10. Ten! If our house wasn’t full already, it was about to be with 12 inhabitants, including my husband and I.

Over the following days my husband and I confirmed the details with Sandra and her mom, sitting down to pray and seek God’s will together as we came to the decision that Sandra would be staying with us for two months. Due to her mom’s work schedule, Sandra had been home alone frequently, which led to her easily falling into temptation due to the lack of adult supervision and support. Sandra’s mom, a devout Christian, wanted what was best for Sandra but was unable to provide the firm boundaries and disciplinary structure Sandra desperately needed, so we would be coming alongside their family once more to serve as a sort of spiritual and emotional life support for her during this time of great vulnerability.

And so we are at peace. Sandra moved back in two days ago, and thus far the process of recovering innocence — of remembering Father God’s love and submitting herself to His perfect will — is moving along quite joyfully. She’s back in her old room with our teen daughters, and we tuck her into bed each night. She returned to our discipleship-based high school after having struggled with wanting to drop out, and during her first week of classes she’s performed as one of the best students.

As for Genesis, she is on her way today. Darwin is scheduled to pick her and her mom up from the bus station this evening. We rejoice in the Lord at all times, and give thanks to Him for stretching us into these uncertain realms of hospitality to the least likely. Please pray with and for us during these times of transition and growth, and let us give thanks to God for granting us the privilege of being used by Him.

Amen! Glory to God!

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First Report of the New School Year: the Positive Reinforcement of Play

January 28, 2017 jenniferzillycanales Leave a comment

Yesterday evening at dusk our old Toyota truck pulled to a slow stop along a narrow strip of gravel road in our neighborhood as one of our students who had been riding in the truckbed prepared to jump off. This was his stop.

I reached over to touch Darwin’s arm, motioning for him to wait, and said, “I’d like to get out and say hi to Stanley’s mom. I’ll be right back.” I then paused and laughed to myself, murmuring under my breath, “This definitely isn’t the first time I’ve visited this house.”

Jackeline, our 13-year-old daughter who was sitting inside the cab with us, piped up and said, “Yeah, you’ve come to visit Stanley and his cousin Sindy quite a few times, right, Ma?”

I laughed even harder and admitted, “No, never Sindy. Just Stanley.”

Sindy and Stanley, who both live at this address, had been students in our seventh-grade program last year. While Sindy had shone brightly as a very high-acheiving and easily-managed student, her cousin Stanley had proved to be a roller coaster of volatile emotions and foolish choices. He seemed prone to making bad decisions and had wanted to drop out of school several times. He had even told Darwin that his life dream was to join a gang, and he had participated in a robbery at our home in 2015.

And so I glanced over at Jackeline, who was a bit confused, and I smiled at her as I knew perhaps the depths and lengths I personally had been through with young, rebellious Stanley were a precious secret that only God and I shared (and Stanley’s mom). After all, I had showed up unexpected on their doorstep on several occasions looking for him, and twice I had even danced in that little strip of gravel road to try to convince him to come back to the Ranch, to continue seeking God’s will for his life.

And so I hopped down from the passenger’s seat of our truck and shouted over to Stanley, who had just gotten down from our truckbed, “Is it okay if I say ‘hi’ to your mom real quick?”

His face suddenly dropped, an instinct probably acquired due to the many times I’d had to ‘say hi to his mom’ for negative reasons, but suddenly a huge smile appeared on his face as he realized this time he had nothing to hide. We both laughed as I patted him on that back and said, “This time it’s good news.”

I waited at the twine gate, but they quickly passed me through to the more intimate realm of their property. I guess after having visited a house so many times, you sort of become like family. Stanley’s mom suddenly appeared from behind the thin curtain hanging in the front door, and we embraced, as we have on many occasions. This time, however, instead of Stanley escaping out the back door or hanging his head low, refusing to look anyone in the eyes, he stood tall right next to his mom, proud.

His mother instinctively looked worried as she wondered what had merited my unannounced house visit (as in, what-has-my-son-done-this-time), but I quickly reassured her that this time I came to brag on him and announce the fantastic news that he had earned a daily average of 89% during his first week of intensive preparation and had exhibited an entirely new attitude among his peers and towards us. Tears welled up in his mom’s eyes as I told her that her son had even begun taking great leadership among his peers and is a godly example for the new students to follow. Respectful, attentive, enthusiastic and hard-working during the daily hour of physical training. He had even completed all of his homework over the last several days, which had never happened before.

And so we gave thanks to God, I embraced his mother one more time, and we were off to do similar visits with the other students who remained joyfully squeezed in our truckbed.

We went house to house down long, remote gravel roads as we embraced mothers and step-mothers — both ones we’ve already had a relationship with from last school year along with ones that we are just now meeting for the first time. We had, after all, just spent the entire afternoon at a local park with our students who had earned a daily average of 80% or higher during their first week of intensive preparation for the school year, and we were eager to bear that good news to their parents.

In our rural community that hobbles around, bound by laziness, apathy and self-pity (not to mention rampant violence and a culture of lies), to see teenagers — especially those who in years past have been on the margins of society, on the brink of self-destruction or turning into instruments to destroy others — become fully alive, read God’s Word, and suddenly acquire a dogged work ethic and new hope regarding their future truly is miraculous.

On one of our last stops, at a small one-room shack with several barefoot little girls running about in the dirt yard, we shared the news of Charlie’s revival with his step-mom, who truly cares for him and who had been quite worried last year as time and time again Charlie slipped into irresponsibility and self-pity before finally failing his school year entirely. We had worked hard to convince his dad and step-mom to allow him to keep studying with us after his first year was an apparent failure (for we know the secret that many local parents don’t: this battle for salvation, for transformation is one that is done over the long-haul and one that cannot be given up on if the first year or two or three don’t go as planned). Charlie, who is 13 years old but has the appearance of an 8 or 9-year-old due to malnutrition, stood tall, his chest puffed out and his face serene as we enthusiastically shared the news with his step-mom. Charlie had earned a daily average of 97% in his first week of intensive prep, and his gracious attitude, servants’ heart and leadership skills — things that were not visible in him last year — shone brightly. His step-mom glowed with joy as she commented that she, too, had seen a distinct change in him over the last several days.

As we said our goodbyes and began walking down that little rocky dirt path back to our car, our 15-year-old son Brayan, who did a phenomenal job in his first week of classes, turned around and said jokingly, “And my house visit?” (As in, are you gonna brag on me too?) I laughed, knowing that we had already bragged on him more than 653 times this past week and I said with a grin, “I think your mom already knows that you did a fantastic job.” He smiled like a little boy and reached out a long, muscular arm towards me and said, “You’re my mom!” and I nodded my head and laughed.

And so we’ve been reading a lot of the book of Proverbs and the students have been copying whole chapters for homework. We’ve been reviewing basic math, assigning personal reflections each night to get the kids thinking, and participating in quite intense physical exercises with them each afternoon. The majority of our students come to us with an extremely weak academic base and need to be taught (or re-taught) the basic of subtraction, multiplication, etc, along with basic grammatical norms and reading support. This can be a tedious process as many of our students have learning disabilities/delays, but this week — praise God! — it was fun and effective. All but two of our students attended every single day, which in and of itself is a great triumph because discouragement and lack of attendance tend to be rampant in the educational system in Honduras.

The first week of intensive prep involved roughly 20 students (those who are new to our program along with those who need additional support), and next week roughly 20 more will be joining us as we enter our second and final week of academic, spiritual and physical ‘bootcamp’ before the official school year begins in early February.

And so we took that small group of students who truly fulfilled that first week of ‘bootcamp’ with excellence to a local park to participate in games of soccer and volleyball, enjoy the pool, and generally play. We are very excited to be able to do this type of positive reinforcement (we call them ‘good consequences’) from the get-go to establish healthy limits and a good foundation of choices/consequences with our students as we enter into this year of intimate commitment with them.

parque — Miss Ligia, one of our beloved local teachers (who by trained profession is a lawyer) who has signed on for another full year shepherding wily, precious youth for God’s glory. She squeezed in that little truckbed with 13 youth on the journey to the park!

parque1 — A photo our 9-year-old son Jason took from the inside of the truckbed as more and more youth piled on! Everybody make room!

parque3 — Darwin explaining behavioral expectations and guidelines as we arrived at the park. Although this is a weekly trip we make as a family, the majority of our students had never had the privilege to enter, so it was a new experience for most. We hit a ‘home run’ by treating each kid to a soda and ice cream, which was also a very special treat that the majority of the local youth in our neighborhood very rarely if ever experience!

parque2 — Stanley, left, with whom we have a long and treasured history and Eduardo, right, a new student who just entered our high school program this past week

parque5 — Miss Isis, one of our very dedicated local teachers who has been with us since August 2015, leading Michelle to the pool. Michelle is 10 years old although she physically appears to be about 5 or 6 due to extreme poverty/malnutrition. She has been in school with us several times over the last two years but has had very little constancy in her education because her family moves frequently. She is currently in first grade learning the basics of reading and writing with our daughter Gabriela.

parque6 — Charlie (back left), one of our other students who did not pass seventh grade last year and was hesitant about re-entering, enjoyed a phenomenal first week at the Ranch alongside of his cousin, Nixon (front right), who just entered our program this year.

parque17 — Our 12-year-old daughter Gleny, who does not officially enter her classes with us until this upcoming Tuesday, helped out tremendously during the first week of intensive prep as she spent several hours tutoring a new student in reading and math. We are so proud of her!

parque13 — Our 15-year-old son Brayan, who had a 99% average in his first week of classes/intensive training, enjoying a soccer game alongside of his new classmate Eduardo. Brayan has never been a good student (he repeated fifth grade with us several times), but a change has occurred in him and he has begun taking great initiative with his homework, assuming positive male leadership among his peers (something that is also new), and showing a newfound gratitude and enthusiasm in all that he does. Praise God for this transformation!

parque14 — Darwin, who is naturally a very gifted swimmer, got in the soccer mix as he, Dayana and Brayan (our two oldest kids) teamed up in an intense math of 3-on-3 against three of our local students. In this photo he and Stanley are going full force for the ball! (Not bad, Darwin, considering the kids are 20 years younger than him!)

Please pray with us for our students (and for our team of teachers, counselors and mentors) as we are beginning a new school year with more youth than we have ever had in our program before. Please pray also for my health, as my insomnia remains a daily constant, and I physically am weak and prone to acquiring viruses/infections, as I have one right now (high fever and throat infection that has lasted much longer than it should). The insomnia greatly affects my mood, daily energy levels, and my relationship with everyone around me. Pray that this burden may be taken from me so that I may be even more effective in this great work the Lord has put before us.

Amen! Glory to God!

Family, Living Waters Ranch Secondary School, Personal Reflection, Prayer Requests

Urgent Prayer Request (Sandra’s Disappearance)

January 15, 2017 jenniferzillycanales 2 Comments

We are seeking active prayer on behalf of Sandra, the 16-year-old young woman who lived with us for 8 months in 2016 as Sandra’s mother sought refuge for her daughter from a situation of abuse with the mother’s then-husband, Sandra’s step-father.

Sandra moved back in with her mom, who has been a devout Christian trapped in deep poverty and abusive relationships nearly her whole life, in August. Her mother valiantly left behind the abusive step-father as she took great steps, trusting only in God without even having the tools that most people would consider necessary to start a new life – a job, the ability to read and write, childcare for her three younger children.

God has provided in many different and powerful ways for Sandra’s mom and her family of four children in this past year, and our relationship with her mom (Geraldina) has deepened as she has begun laboring part-time with us at the Living Waters Ranch, participating in prayer meetings with the rest of our team, inviting us to her home for fellowship and holding many personal conversations with Darwin and me as she has actively sought Godly counsel and friendship.

We hold this sweet family very dear to our hearts as they exemplify faith in Christ and total dependence on Him, and we daily admire Geraldina’s bravery as she goes against cultural norms to be a steadfast single mom walking in purity, constantly seeking God’s will for her family despite tremendous odds.

Last night around 11:00pm Geraldina called us in tears as she told us that Sandra had run away from home, leaving a note saying not to look for her. Darwin, our 8 kids and I had all spent time with Sandra earlier that day and she did not show any signs of her plan nor did she communicate anything to us, but last night it came to light that several people knew of her plan but did not think she was serious, therefore committing the grave error of not telling us or Geraldina.

According to those who knew of her plan, she left with a long-distance boyfriend (who she had never met face-to-face) who is a gang member in another part of the country that is about a 4-5 hour-drive’s distance away. In Honduras, droves of young women get lost in this confused search for love and acceptance as they get carried away by violent men and become sex slaves, accomplices to the gang’s Satanic activities or murder victims. This happened about a month ago to another young women we know in our neighborhood. Her parents did not give her permission to have a boyfriend, so an unknown car pulled up in front of their house, she mounted, and the only news they have is that her friends believe she is living in a gang-infested area with other runaways.

At this point we have no information on the whereabouts of Sandra – Darwin left home last night at midnight with our 15-year-old son Brayan to search for her in our small town and console her mother, and he went out again at 5:00am to scour the strip of highway that runs through our small rural town to see if he might find her catching a bus or leaving town. Nothing.

Last night after having received Geraldina’s devastating call we sat in a tight circle on the tile floor in our bedroom as we prayed with our four teen/pre-teen daughters for Sandra. It came to light that Sandra had invited one of our other daughters to escape with her earlier that day, but our daughter had refused to go. We praise and thank God that she had the strength and wisdom to not accompany Sandra down this dangerous path.

Please pray with us that God might illuminate Sandra’s mind so that she might see past any lies of the Enemy to see clearly the decisions she is making – how they are affecting her own health, that of her family and that of her relationship with God. Please pray that she might find a way to escape if she is, in fact, already in a situation of sexual sin or danger and that she may choose to trust in the abundant love that Father God has for her rather than the fleeting, twisted lusts the world offers. Please pray with us for repentance and renewal of her commitment with Christ and that Sandra’s mom (Geraldina) would experience God’s love and compassion during this incredibly difficult time. Thank you.

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First Update of the New Year

January 13, 2017 jenniferzillycanales Leave a comment

January 13, 2017: It has been over a month since I last wrote as we’ve unplugged from nearly all internet and administrative duties over the last several weeks. With great joy we finished off the year 2016 dedicating nearly every moment to the careful daily task of ‘building our nest’ with the 8 children our Father has placed under our (His) wings, three of which are already well into their adolescence.

Our daily rhythm has been slower as our beloved local Honduran laborers have been on vacation and our large rural property has been populated only by our family (Darwin, our 8 kiddos and I) and our night watchman’s quiet family. In these last few weeks there has been much time spent character-building, bond-forming and behavior-training as there has been less movement of people and activities on our rural property. We’ve been able to focus more fully on those under our roof who are blossoming into beautiful young men and women in the blink of an eye.

cayos86 — 16-year-old Dayana, who has been living with us as our daughter for over three years and whom we are in the process of legally adopting, with Darwin

cayos70 — 12-year-old Gleny, who has been living with us since November 2013 with her two siblings, will be entering our discipleship-focused homeschool program after having attended a local private school these last two years.

cayos58 — Brayan, who first moved in with us when he was 12 years old in 2014 and nearly fit under my armpit, now is nearly as tall as Darwin!

We’ve enjoyed weekly trips with our kids to a local park to swim and play, numerous family movie nights with popcorn and ice cream treats, and many family work days as we’ve slapped on our rubber boots and old clothes to do property maintenance, painting, and repairs together. We’ve moved furniture from one building to the next, cleaned out our classrooms’ stuffed-to-the-brim bookshelves, taken down doors, spent countless man hours sanding window bars, and gotten our fingernails dirty in just about every way imaginable.

We even got away for a few nights in December with our kids and escaped to a desert island off the coast to explore the ocean, go snorkeling, kayak, and fish. (Our kids caught a venomous snake, an octopus, a lobster, an eel, and even a few normal fish!) It was a new and exciting experience for everyone, and all ten of us squeezed into a little two-room rustic cabin that stood on pillars with the ocean’s waves passing underneath.

cayos44 — 8-year-old Josue, who will soon be celebrating his two-year anniversary of living with us. He and his older sister Jackeline have monthly contact with their biological family, and by God’s grace we maintain a very positive relationship with their relatives.

cayos19 — 9-year-old Jason and 15-year-old Brayan, roommates and brothers in Christ, enjoying the snorkel sets we rented to explore the ocean off the coast of where we live in Honduras.

cayos41 — Dayana and Gleny, biological sisters, learning to put into daily practice God’s perfect love despite personality and age differences

Darwin has begun reading through the Bible page-by-page, devouring many chapters each night, and two of our daughters have begun doing the same. 8-year-old Gabriela, who is lightyears behind her peers developmentally due to severe abuse suffered in her early childhood, has spent many hours each day receiving classes from her faithful tutors (local teenagers who are our students during the school year) and, miraculously, is in the very beginning stages of learning to write the letters and begin working with numbers. She will be entering first grade alongside of a few local students in our homeschool-style program in a couple weeks.

15-year-old Brayan, who has been successfully living with us for nearly three months now for ‘Round Two’ of being a member of our household, has been waking up early with Darwin every morning to go milk the cows, which has been a wonderful bonding activity for father and son and likewise a phenomenal work-ethic-building activity for Brayan as he is acquiring more maturity and consistency.

cayos45 — Darwin and I exploring the ocean in a kayak. The waves booted us out of the kayak twice!

cayos18 — Walking hand-in-hand with the little ones, who developmentally are about 3-5 years old

cayos5 — Our beloved Wild Man, Cow-Milker and Big Brother who is acquiring a surprising amount of maturity, humility and wisdom as he continues his daily walk with Christ

cayos83 — Darwin and Brayan at dawn (or dusk? who knows?) fishing on the pier

These slow-paced vacation times have also allowed for many long one-on-one discussions, intimate times of confession and repentance, and conflict resolutions among siblings. Family foot-rubs, late nights spent giggling and story-sharing with our teenage girls, praying together as we sit cross-legged on the tile floor to give thanks to Father God.

I’ve also been dedicating a chunk of time nearly every day to teaching our six oldest kids (ages 9-16) math classes homeschool-style as we gather around a long wooden table in one of our empty classrooms and I stand at the front with the whiteboard, scribbling numbers all over the place as we work to fill in many educational gaps they’ve suffered due to chaotic, no-school childhoods before arriving at our home.

cayos8 — Gleny and I after having jumped off the pier

cayos73 — The tribe the Lord has formed among us: 10 people of various ages (and races) from six different biological families all living under one roof, united as family by Christ’s blood

cayos57 — Darwin overseeing his young fishermen

cayos9 — Our precious pianist (we call her “Beethoven’s great-granddaughter”) and adventure-loving big sister who is daily taking steps to find healing and freedom in Christ

Our local students will return to us full-time January 24 as we currently find ourselves in a three-week stage of preparation, brainstorms, communal prayer, strategic meetings and book discussions as we are seeking God’s perfect will for this new school year (the Honduran school year begins at the end of January/beginning of February and finishes in late November).

We currently have 40 students (ages 8-18) signed up to study at the Living Waters Ranch this school year (including the 8 who live with us), with all but 2 of our 25 students from 2016 returning in addition to several new additions.

cayos36 — 12-year-old Josselyn, who has been living with us a year-and-a-half and who is daily being transformed by God’s love as she learns and grows within healthy limits

cayos55 — Accompanying our young sailors on their sea vessel destined for Africa

cayos68 — Our 8. (The five more adventurous ones jumping while the three keep-it-safers hid out on the float below)

cayos33 — Developmentally-challenged Gaby and Josue ‘kayaking’ on the shore. (We kept the life jackets on those two at all times — even during mealtimes and when they went to the bathroom!)

As our influence in the community is growing, God has brought more workers to labor alongside of us in these times of planting, watering and harvesting. Miss Isis and Miss Ligia, who were featured on this blog several times throughout the year 2016, have committed to continuing their service for God’s glory in 2017, and three additional teachers/mentors have been added to our team: Domingo, a well-respected local pastor in his fifties (who is the father of one of our students) and who has experience in military service and as a carpenter; Reina, a local Christian teacher in her late forties who has many years of experience in the classroom and had approached us many months ago wanting to work with us due to the comments her neighbors had shared with her about our purpose and vision; and Erick, the very wise young man who lived at the Living Waters Ranch with us for nearly a year in 2013/2014 and who has a very strong gifting in evangelism and discipleship.

cayos4 — 13-year-old Jackeline and 16-year-old Dayana, roommates and sisters in Christ, exploring the coral reefs around the island

It has been a very special privilege in these first couple weeks of 2017 to be in such gifted, dedicated company as we’ve all put our heads together as a team – as Christ’s body – to search out God’s will for us as his sons and daughters, as a beacon of light in our very dark neighborhood, as a school for many youth who would not otherwise study, as a ‘rescue shop within a yard of hell.’ Our kids have actively participated in these meetings (oftentimes lasting 3-4 hours with many different speakers, activities, moments of prayer, etc) as they are taking an increasingly active role in participating in the ministry the Lord has entrusted us.

Thank you to all who read this blog and share with us your generous support, prayer and counsel. Please continue to pray for us as we are in the formative stages of this new year of service and love for God’s glory.

Amen!

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Diplomas, Choir Songs, and More: Our Yearend Celebration in Photos

December 8, 2016 jenniferzillycanales Leave a comment

We recently celebrated our end-of-the-year academic promotion and music recital with our students and their families. Each of our 25 students (12 in elementary and 13 in high school) received diplomas for the different extracurricular clubs they had participated in — Sports Club, Christian Leadership, Art Club, etc — along with their official certificate for having passed their grade. Darwin’s musical group performed various piano and recorder pieces along with singing several songs, and the students from Cooking Club prepared delicious snacks for all the guests.

We handed the camera off to several kids as they dashed about as undercover paparazzi, but the camera’s battery died before the majority of the invitees arrived and the actual event began!

Enjoy the photos from the set-up…

clausura1 — Some of our teachers and students preparing the decorations for the event in the porch of the small building that serves as our high school/music training center/office.

clausura10 — Miss Luz, a local Christian woman who served with us this year as the special needs teacher and prayer group leader, was putting the finishing touches on the snacks…

clausura9

clausura11 — The two cats we got recently to help with a rat infestation in our pantry — Kitchen Guard and Rat Police — were making sure everything was going smoothly with the snack preparation.

clausura8 — Charlie, a 13-year-old local student who did not pass our 7th-grade discipleship program due to immaturity and a general lack of academic preparedness, was very brave and showed up for the event even though he wouldn’t be receiving the official certificate for having passed his grade. He is a faithful member of Darwin’s recorder group, so he participated in the music recital and was awarded several diplomas for his consistent participation in Christian Leadership and other extracurricular clubs. (This is one of the young men I wrote about in the previous post whom we tracked down and convinced to enroll again next year even though he was upset he didn’t pass this year.)

clausura16 — 13-year-old Arnold, one of our local students who passed our 7th grade program after much blood, sweat and tears (or something like that) during our two-week intensive yearend bootcamp, was helping his teacher tape up the decorations.

clausura12 — While everyone was stressed out, zipping around from one decoration to the next and getting diplomas and everything in order, I took advantage of the microphone set up for Darwin’s choir and had a little too much fun playing the event’s quite animated ‘announcer’…

clausura27 — Anybody know any good jokes?

clausura13 — Miss Ligia (high school teacher, left) and Miss Isis (elementary teacher, right) enjoyed my jokes.

clausura14

clausura28 — Our 13-year-old daughter Jackeline getting ready to sing and play piano. She passed fifth grade with flying colors in a local private school and is currently doing sixth grade (the last grade in elementary school according to the Honduran educational system) right now during school vacation so that she will be able to enter 7th grade (the first year of high school) in our discipleship program in February. We are very (very, very) proud of her as she has experienced a dramatic transformation after having spent a very difficult first year with us in 2015 that was riddled with laziness, depression and very poor decision-making. Keep it up, girl!

clausura20 — How many more people, tables and musical instruments can we fit on the porch? Keep ’em coming!

clausura2 — Yexon, the 12-year-old son of our night watchman who has been in school with us along with three of his siblings for two years. He passed both second and third grade this year in our accelerated elementary program for students who are academically behind. He’s trying to look serious for the photo!

clausura3 — Josue, our 8-year-old son with special needs who has been living with us for almost two years, enjoyed running around our yard while everyone else frantically made preparations for the event. Exercise is a great way to keep away the stress!

clausura4 — Go, Josue, go! Feel those endorphins!

clausura5 — And he just kept on running and laughing!

clausura7 — Gotta pass right through the mud puddle!

clausura17 — 9-year-old Jason and 15-year-old Brayan, two of our pianists (and sons), enjoyed playing a few songs on the keyboard as the beginning of the event drew near.

clausura18 — Darwin had many choir and musical ensemble members to get ready for the big outdoor event. Everybody get in line to get your red ribbon!

clausura22 — 15-year-old Marina and 10-year-old Paola (both of whom look much younger than they are due to malnutrition they suffered in early childhood), two of our faithful elementary school students, arrived at the event with several of their siblings and mother. They are both on their way to fourth grade in our accelerated program after having spent their early childhood in deep poverty with no education. They are some of the first people in their very large family to learn to read and write and be involved consistently in school. We are so proud of them!

clausura19 — Our 12-year-old daughter Gleny — who we are in the process of legally adopting along with her two siblings — had had enough of my antics with the microphone!

clausura21 — Arnold, one of our local students who generally displays a ‘too cool for this’ attitude, has recently confessed how much his experiences this year at the Living Waters Ranch have meant to him. In the last couple weeks he and Darwin and I have made many phone calls and house visits to persuade his parents to allow him to continue studying with us (the father, who is not a Christian, was looking for a more ‘traditional’ educational experience for his son). After much effort, his parents finally agreed and understood that this is the best place for their son to study and grow in God’s will, and Arnold has since come to sign the enrollment papers for next year! Praise God!

clausura24 — These precious young women are 16-year-olds Sandra and Dayana, our two eldest daughters and two of our students who successfully passed our 7th grade program. Sandra is successfully living with her biological mom again as the mom has valiantly left behind the abusive step-father to look for new, healthier beginnings. Dayana continues to live with us as we are in the process of legally adopting her.

clausura25 — Here are three of our strapping young gentlemen getting ready for the big event. For teenage boys who are accustomed to wandering gravel roads in torn, dirty clothing and surviving year after year in suffocating poverty, getting ‘squeaky clean’ and all dressed up in formal attire to participate in an organized music concert (that they’ve been practicing for for months) is a really big deal. All three of them were baptized in October and have signed the enrollment papers to come back again next year.

clausura29 — Derbin, a local young man who is not our full-time student because we do not offer the grade he is in (ninth), but who participates very faithfully in choir, piano, Christian Leadership and Bible study, was excited to attend the event with several of his young siblings. Nice mustache!

Amen! Glory to God!

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Bringing in Lost Sheep: The Dangerous Duo Hits the Streets

November 30, 2016 jenniferzillycanales Leave a comment

“Don’t make me do this again.” I shook my head back and forth slowly as I repressed a smile. Had it really come to this again?

I looked across the nearly bare living room in the cinderblock house at the young man slouched in the torn-up armchair. He was put-off and determined not to register for school next year.

Despite our attempts to encourage him he had dropped out of our yearend two-week intensive academic catch-up program and was embarrassed to come back again next school year only to repeat 7^th grade.

This was now my third visit to this young man’s house in a very short time, and this time I had brought Miss Ligia, our worldly-lawyer-turned-Christian-teacher with me as backup. It was registration day, and he had pulled a no-show, as expected.

Having heard this 15-year-old young man’s testimony of faith in Christ on various occasions and having seen first-hand the beginning stages of a very real transformation in his character as he had been involved all year with us in Bible study, prayer groups, Christian Leadership and other faith-building activities in addition to daily academic classes, we refused to allow him to simply ‘disappear’ into the multitudes of lost young men who wander the streets in our rural neighborhood and eventually fall into a life of crime.

This unexpected onslaught of rebellion and negative attitudes he had been experiencing in the last few weeks was surely an attack from the enemy, and we – as God’s hands and feet (and voice) on earth, had to intervene with the truth, bring him back into the fold.

So Miss Ligia and I left the rest of the team behind at the Living Waters Ranch as they continued receiving new and old students for registration day, and we hopped in our old Toyota pickup and headed down that long gravel road in search of that same young man who is becoming infamous for his disappearing act.

So when we arrived at the young man’s home, he – not surprisingly – was nowhere to be found. His mom received us with a big, warm hug at the little front gate made of twigs and barbed wire, and quickly let us inside. (Each time I arrive unannounced at their home, the greeting gets warmer and I am allowed farther into their home.)

We quickly devised a plan to hide behind the front door to scare the daylights out of the young man as he would likely come strolling home at any moment. (And if he didn’t return home soon? Well, we would be waiting for quite some time…)

After all, traditional butt-chewings are falling out of style (due to their ineffectiveness), and new, crazier approaches are in.

One of his family members, a female student who had already gone earlier that day with her mom to register with us for next school year, got in on the plan and was set to give us the cue when she saw him coming up the dirt path.

Miss Ligia and I – wedged like two sardines behind the open front door – began giggling uncontrollably. The student’s father – who had not been present during my previous rendezvous to convince his son to keep studying – just stared at us oddly, undoubtedly concerned why two adult women – his son’s teachers! – were laughing like little girls (and poking each other) while hiding behind his front door. Why on earth had his wife let us inside?

A few minutes later our student sure enough came home. His young female relative gave us two quick knocks on the door to cue us, and we began in a loud, spooky voice, “Sta-a-a-n-le-yyyy, Co-o-o-o-ome ba-a-a-a-a-ck tooooo the Raaaaanch!”

He jumped back and began laughing for an instant as we came tumbling out from behind the door, but once his mom pulled out the little wooden stools for us to sit on and talk cold turkey, he turned cold (turkey).

After a couple minutes of utterly useless communication – his mom chewing his butt and him slouching even lower in the ratty armchair, refusing to look us in the eyes – I said, dead serious, “Don’t make me do this again.”

His mom continued, undeterred, “If this boy doesn’t go back to school, what’s he gonna do? He’ll go straight to the street, I know it. Just goes to the street every time to wander around and get into trouble. The street –“

I interrupted her tirade rather boldly, and said, “Well, if he goes to the street, you can bet that I’ll be right there waiting for him. In the street. Dancing. Let’s go, Miss Ligia!”

I grabbed the 29-year-old lawyer with her beautiful flat-ironed long black hair and fake fingernails and before you could say “Footloose” we were both out the front door and in the gravel street.

This time my dancing was accompanied by loud proclamations that I’m sure the entire neighborhood could hear (and that was the point). Miss Ligia began some rather creative steps and arm combinations as we both spun about on the narrow street. The neighbors from the wooden-plank house across the way all came out to watch:

“Hello everybody! Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen! We’re here because this young man, Stanley Rafael Torres, does not want to study! Yup; that’s right! He just wants to wander the streets, but we’re here because we really like this kid and want the best for him! If you’re with us and want Stanley to study and seek God’s will for his life, shout ‘Yeah!’”

No one but Miss Ligia shouted “Yeah!,” not even the middle-aged man who happened to be strolling by. (He avoided all eye contact with us despite my best efforts.)

Miss Ligia continued her contemporary dancing as I did mine, her complementing my steps as I admired hers. We refused to be denied.

“We’re just gonna keep on dancing until this precious young man – did I mention his name is Stanley Rafael Torres? – decides to get his butt back in school!” My voice projected itself all around as our footwork just kept getting fancier. “God has a plan for his life, and we’re here to make sure it gets carried to completion! If you agree that Stanley should go back to school, shout ‘Yeah!’”

Again, no one shouted. This time a teen boy passed by not three feet from us. I looked him in the eyes and repeated, “If you’re with us, shout ‘Yeah!’”, hoping to get some crowd support.

He began walking faster. Away from us.

Soon enough Stanley – our stubborn run-away student – had whipped out his cellphone as was filming our antics as he sat watching us on his tiny front lawn.

Several minutes of rather aerobic dancing (think Billy Blanks in a floral blouse and skinny jeans) passed before I teetered over to the twine hammock in their front yard and collapsed under the heat of the Honduran sun. Miss Ligia and I panted dramatically before getting up again and continuing onward, determined not to leave the street until we had collected the prize. We were committed and there was no turning back.

His mom suddenly appeared from behind the front door curtain with two little pink plastic cups of cold water for us. She wanted us to continue!

We glugged down the water, sweat pouring down our temples and large earrings swinging to and fro with our rhythmic dancing until I suddenly heard Miss Ligia say, “He said ‘yes’!”

I looked up, snapped out of the intense focus required to choreograph an original interpretive dance, and Stanley, still video-taping us, smiled big. He agreed to come back!

I continued dancing a little bit more – this time out of joy rather than as a tool of persuasion – as he went inside to change.

“Careful he doesn’t slip out the back door! Somebody get an eye on the kid!” We laughed and waited for him as I continued my two-step in the street, Miss Ligia and I drenched in sweat, bathed in victory.

The moment he appeared out the front door with his mom, we threw him in the car and headed straight back up the road to the Ranch. We had other scheduled stops (other run-away students) on our agenda after him, but we couldn’t risk that he would change his mind or jump out of the car. So off we went!

Sure enough, we arrived safe and sound (and he only jumped out of the car once, but continued walking in the right direction, following the car rather than bolting away) and he registered again for 7^th grade, which he will begin at the end of January when all of our students return. God’s love: 1. Shame: 0.

As we finished the very quick registration process, Miss Ligia and I with Stanley and his mom jumped back into our old Toyota pickup along with four of our other returning students and someone’s little sister. We headed back into our rural town to drop them off and continue onward with the rest of our scheduled rescue missions.

Charlie, a very precious 13-year-old student who likewise had not passed our 7^th grade program due to immaturity and many absences, was next on our list. Stanley, with a very happy grin on his face as he sat in the car’s backseat, promised to show us the way to Charlie’s house (it would be Charlie’s first house-call.)

Everything was going fine as we were a couple minutes into our very short drive when somebody shouted, “There he is!”

My attention snapped to the left, seeing a small dark speck along a far-off gravel path that had been identified to be Charlie. I felt paralyzed – what to do? If we drop off Stanley and his mom first, Charlie might keep on walking (where was he going?) and we would lose all chance of finding him. I had to act fast!

In a split-second decision, I glanced over at Stanley and his mom and blurted, “You okay with participating in this rescue mission?” and, before they could reply, I swerved the car to the left and began rather quickly bouncing up that rocky path.

Nearing the small boy in tattered clothes and dirty flip-flops, I forced the car into park in the middle of the road, put on my flashers and hopped out of the vehicle. This had to be a surprise attack, otherwise he would surely run.

I sprinted around the far side of the vehicle and came upon him as I said, panting, “Charlie! Come back. We love you. Today is registration day, and we’ve been waiting for you.”

As expected, he wouldn’t look me in the eyes and was very mopey, on the verge of some kind of extreme self-pity attack. Was ashamed and discouraged, had no plan, no desire. He was on his way to the river, the favorite pastime of the dozens of lost youth in our neighborhood who have no daily commitments. No school; no work; just wandering around gravel roads aimlessly and wasting their lives away at the river before eventually turning to crime and vice.

Soon enough Stanley’s mom – who is in no way related to Charlie – hopped out of the passenger’s seat of the car and began participating in the rescue attempt. Miss Ligia came out, too, and several of Charlie’s old classmates formed a large cloud of loving witnesses in the truckbed.

Seeing as we were getting nowhere – all of our well-intentioned persuasive techniques only seemed to propel him further down the well of despair – I clapped my hands vigorously and called upon my sidekick, “Miss Ligia! You know what we’ve gotta do!”

My sweat-stains growing exponentially in my nice floral blouse, I turned in a wide circle and announced as loud as I could (and that’s pretty darn loud), “Okay! Charlie Anthony “Tony” Rodriguez doesn’t want to study, so his teacher and I are gonna start dancing to convince him to continue trusting in God’s good plan for his life! This is all for Charlie Anthony “Tony” Rodriguez! Gosh we love this kid, and God loves him more! Hit it, Miss Ligia!”

So we began Act II of the Dancing Rescue Mission (within a yard of hell) as we began prancing about on that very rocky road in the middle of nowhere surrounded by rural homesteads steeped in poverty. Stone-cold Charlie broke down almost instantly and began laughing. His classmates – who had not been present for Act I and had no idea that Miss Ligia and I were such talented dancers – began cheering as everyone looked at little Charlie expectantly. Would such an extravagant display of love convince him to return?

After a bit more dancing and a few more loving words of encouragement, he hopped in the truckbed and we zipped him off to registration day.

With Charlie in the backseat, I turned as I was driving to look at him: “Charlie, you know that this is not about you being our ‘student’. If you are in 7^th grade or 8^th grade, that makes no difference. This is about the work that God has already begun in your life, and we want to be able to continue to walk with you day after day after year as He continues to teach and transform you according to His love.”

He smiled shyly, as you do when you’re completely convinced of what someone is telling you.

I added, wanting to make sure he understood that we do not see him merely as some poor teen or sub-par student, “Charlie, you decided to get baptized last month. In Christ we’re family.”

He spoke up for the first time, visibly content. “I know,” he smiled big and glanced up at me after having had his eyes trained on the floorboards.

That afternoon – several hours after the rescue mission with Miss Ligia – my husband Darwin and I and the 8 kids/teens the Lord has placed in our family had arrived at the local park for an afternoon of play. As we hopped out of the car, Darwin began dancing in a very silly fashion and making up nonsense songs to get the kids to laugh. He extended an arm toward me to include me in the goofy routine, but I sighed wearily and said, “Oh, I’ve had enough dancing for one day…”

Darwin and the kids looked at me, perplexed – had I not spent the day just as everyone else, signing up students and stapling paperwork? – and I began telling them the story…

Amen! Glory to God!

Answers to Illegal Immigration to U.S. Borders, Child/Youth Leadershp, Community Life, Discipline Techniques, God At Work Among Us, Homeschool, Information About the Mission, Living Waters Ranch Secondary School, Personal Reflection

Hello, My Name is ‘Ashamed.’

November 22, 2016 jenniferzillycanales Leave a comment

“It is so nice to meet you!” I extended a long arm toward the hunched-over young man in front of me, eager to make him feel genuinely welcome. He looked to be about 15 or 16 years old and sat motionless on one of the concrete benches in our front yard, staring at the soil at his feet.

An awkward moment passed, my open hand lingering in mid-air, waiting to be received in his. He finally extended his limp hand toward mine without ever lifting his eyes from the soil.

My husband Darwin and I stood under the shade of a large tree talking with a middle-aged woman who had come up to our rural property with three of her teenage children, hoping to enroll them in our homeschool-style high school beginning next school year. They had heard about the program though a neighbor who has her son enrolled with us.

The mother was very kind and alert, commenting to us that she wants her children to be instructed according to God’s Word — which does not happen in the local public high school where chaos generally reigns. Her sons, however, did not match her enthusiasm. They seemed depressed or entirely uninterested.

After Darwin and I had given her the information about registration day (when we will be meeting/evaluating possible new students), I then turned to the young man on the bench — the one who had very reluctantly shook my hand — and I asked with great sincerity, “What is your name?” I believe my tone of voice soared even higher than it should have in an attempt to counteract his attitude of total apathy.

Another moment or two passed as he remained unresponsive. I began opening my mouth to reiterate the same question when he finally blurted his full name at the ground.

Somewhat caught off guard with the force with which he spat his name and entirely unable to understand him due to the way he murmured, I asked again, love spewing out of my voice: “Could you look me in the eyes and tell me your name again?”

Everyone present seemed to be caught off guard by my loving insistence, as bad manners such as the ones he was displaying are often accepted as normal in our area. I continued to stare at the top of his head as his eyes remained glued to the soil at his feet. I insisted. Waited.

He finally raised his eyes if only for a split second to meet mine before immediately glancing downward again, again murmuring his full name without me being able to understand him.

His mother, very well-meaning, immediately interjected with a slight laugh, ready to explain her nearly-adult son’s strange behavior, “Oh, he’s ashamed.”

She said so with the tone of voice that you would use to answer, “He’s cold” if asked why your son was wearing a scarf and mittens.

The next morning I spoke on the phone with my own mother about the prior day’s event with the ‘ashamed’ young man, and she commented very accurately, “People [in Latin American culture] use ‘shame’ as a way of naming people. Like, ‘It’s a boy’ or ‘It’s a girl.’ ‘He’s ashamed.'”

So, in this culture where many people from birth carry the stamp “Ashamed” across their forehead (and all well-meaning family members defend their right to carry it), an interaction such as the one we had yesterday is not something new to us. How many of our local students or live-ins, upon arrival, actually looked us in the eyes, were not ‘ashamed’? Very few.

So when this young man’s mother wanted to come to her boy’s rescue, defending his debilitating sense of ‘shame’ as if it were a genetic condition or acceptable form of behavior, I laughed in a very kind way and said, “Oh, there’s no place for shame here.”

I glanced over at one of the other benches a few yards away where Brayan and Arlen sat. These two precious teenage students of ours had just finished participating in a very intense Round 5 of rock-hauling, endless push-ups and frog-jumps as part of their character-formation process. They were beet red and had waterfalls of sweat pouring down their faces as their white school uniform shirts were heavily stained with dirt. I addressed them for the first time in a rather loud voice, “Is there any reason to have shame, boys?”

They both sat, exhausted to the bone, staring me in the eyes, and shook their heads ‘no’ as they confirmed verbally, “Nope.”

I threw my head back and laughed in victory. Yes! Had we not just spent over an hour with these young men along with several other of their classmates, hauling rocks across our large yard and hurling them over the fence? Had we not been loudly proclaiming truth over them as they did so —

“Let’s go, boys! Our life on earth is but a breath! There is no time to waste; submit yourselves to God’s will because He is good and faithful! You have been made in God’s image and redeemed by Christ’s blood! God loves you enough to have sent Christ to die for you, and He wants to adopt us as His sons and daughters! Your life is infinitely valuable, and there is a bright future ahead of you, but you must take hold of it in faith! Haul those rocks!”

I continued yelling out one edifying comment after another, allowing godly instruction to flow from my mouth non-stop as the youth ran back and forth all around me, sweating, bending over, lifting and throwing rocks. Suddenly I realized that many of the themes and Bible verses we’ve been studying together all year were being proclaimed over these young people as they engaged in the very difficult activity of manual labor:

“God desires to raise you up to be fully equipped workers — disciples of Christ! — who are ready and willing for any good work! We know that the harvest is plenty but the workers are few! May YOU be the workers God is seeking; take hold of this moment as training for your future! God has an entire Kingdom prepared for those who love and obey Him, but we must persevere until the end! So persevere even now, hauling these rocks, even though it is difficult! You are doing such a great job! God’s Word says that even in difficulties, God desires that we remain rooted in His perfect joy — so even now find Christ in this moment of pain, even now be joyful! Run!”

By the end of the activity my throat was sore and raspy and the kids were dog-tired. So, when I glanced over at 15-year-olds Arlen and Brayan, both of which we’ve known and been closely involved with nearly three years (they were the first local youth we met shortly after moving here) and both of which struggled mightily in the beginning with looking you in the eyes, telling the truth, maintaining focus, receiving God’s Word, etc, I felt inundated with new hope for this slouched-over young man who all his life had been taught it acceptable to call himself “Ashamed.”

And so I laughed. I laughed right there under that shady tree because I know God is still in the business of redemption, that He has a big eraser in His hand to rub off “Ashamed” from this young man’s forehead and replace it with a giant stamp that reads “Loved.”

And while my own thoughts warned me, “This kid is bad news. What kind of influence will he be on the others?,” my heart rejoiced because I know that this is exactly the kind of young man God wants to call home, wants to renew.

And so, a couple days after our encounter with the ‘ashamed’ young man, I found myself coaching our two developmentally-challenged kiddos, Gaby and Josue (both age 8) as they worked together to haul several big plastic buckets full of dirty clothes to our outdoor washing area that lies a good walk from our front door.

They were both struggling to do so as their faces scrunched up in concentration and their little fingers sought to get the best grip on the buckets’ handles. Gaby grunted in exertion and Josue teetered back and forth as he sought to keep pace with Gaby. The buckets were heavy, and they were wondering if they actually had the strength (and coordination, teamwork, etc) to get the job done.

Seeing as we engage in this character-forming activity with these two little ones every Monday morning, I began encouraging them as usual. As we crossed our large grassy front lawn — me a couple paces in front of them — I began calling out: “Let’s go, Josue! You got it, Gaby! Let’s use your strength to serve God; utilize your bodies as instruments of justice! You can do this! We must work as unto Him and not for men!”

They inched across our front yard, each little one supporting one side of the bucket (and there were three more buckets waiting for them when they finished with the first!), each showing several visible signs of exertion but almost no reaction to all of my verbal encouragement and instruction. I continued:

“God is with us and He loves us, so there is no reason to be afraid — ”

Gaby suddenly piped up, interrupting me, and added, “or ashamed!”

She caught me entirely off guard, as she generally displays almost no understanding of God’s Word despite participating in numerous Bible studies and other Christian activities each week. Is this little person with a big-girl body but little-girl mind possibly absorbing — and understanding! — more than we had thought?

She continued, as if to erase all doubt from my mind: “We don’t have to be ashamed because God loves us! Gotta work for Him and not for men. Jesus died and came back to life!”

As we passed the small high school building and neared the kitchen with still quite a long distance between us and our final destination, Gaby and Josue all the while hauling the bucket one step at a time as a towering pile of dirty clothes rocked about perilously between them, I felt as though our Father allowed me to see them in a new light, to understand His love for us in a new way.

These two children who have been abused and neglected, who are not very attractive physically and have numerous behavioral issues, Josue who wears diapers, Gaby who mispronounces words, both of whom are lightyears behind their peers developmentally and socially — these kids who the whole world probably looks at with pity, who would give them every reason to be ‘ashamed’! — are learning the secret of freedom from all shame, all fear: God’s love. If the Creator of the universe loves you and longs to include you in His family, His kingdom, what on earth is there to be ashamed of? No shame; only gratitude. Joy.

Amen! Glory to God!

Bible study, Child/Youth Leadershp, God At Work Among Us, Homeschool, Information About the Mission, Living Waters Ranch Primary School, Living Waters Ranch Secondary School, Personal Reflection, Teaching

Glue Sandwiches: The Definition of a Chaotic Life

November 16, 2016 jenniferzillycanales Leave a comment

Recently 8-year-old Gabriela (who is about 4 years old developmentally and is prone to being quite off-the-wall in her general speech and re-telling of daily events) commented to me across our large dining room table as several of our other kids were arriving home from school, her face all scrunched up and her arms waving about wildly:

“Ma! Isn’t that right that this morning you grabbed that piece of bread and poured glue all over it?” Her stubby, uncoordinated hands mimicked the action of pouring glue all over an imaginary slice of bread as she smiled big.

12-year-old Gleny walked through the dining room door in her school uniform and too-full backpack in tow, overhearing her little sister’s odd comment. She glanced over at me and rolled her eyes in response to the little one’s crazy tale. Glue on a sandwich?

Gabriela continued, unaware that anyone else was listening to her: “And Ma! You – you grabbed that bread and put…put…what’s that called? What’d you put all over it?” Her enthusiasm grew with each passing moment.

I glanced up from where I was folding the clothes, a little grin growing on my face, and I helped her out: “Deodorant.”

“Dodorat! Yeah! And then! And then – you, Ma, you picked up the bread and you poured hydrada – what’s it called?”

I continued folding clothes and smiling. I knew Gleny was staring at me in disbelief, but I didn’t look at her. “Hydrogen peroxide. ”

“Hydraden peroside! Yeah. You poured it all over the bread, and then you asked who wanted to eat it!” She wagged a short finger back and forth and said, “Not me!” Her giggle grew and overtook her small frame as her body shook with delight. She repeated, “Not me! Nobody wanted to eat it!”

A moment passed as little Gabriela paused to recall other details.

Her eyes lit up. “And then, Ma, you stomped on the cellphone and broke it! I saw you!”

Gleny, who had grabbed her lunch from the kitchen and began making her way toward Gabriela and I at the table, had the strangest expression on her face as she wondered why on earth I was encouraging little Gabriela in her odd fantasy. She glanced at me again, and I just smiled innocently without interrupting Gabriela nor defending her.

What Gleny didn’t know was that her oddball little sister who has a very real struggle with lying and tends to ‘stretch’ the truth may not have been as off-the-mark this time as she might have thought…

Earlier that morning in our twice-weekly Bible study time with all of our students and Christian laborers (Gleny and two of our other children were not present because this year they have been attending a local private school) I had wanted to make a point. I knew that many of our students and laborers were growing in the truth of God’s Word due to distinct character transformations we’ve seen and sincere comments of faith people have shared with me, but I felt frustrated that frequently as we came together on Tuesday and Thursday mornings the majority of the people seemed to have ‘forgotten’ what we had learned together in the prior meeting. Nearly every Tuesday and Thursday as I enthusiastically asked what they remembered from the prior Bible Study, I was frequently met with blank stares and discouraging shrugs as our students would murmur, “I don’t remember.”

You don’t remember? You don’t remember that just two days ago we talked extensively about the joy-filled life, that God expects us to live day by day giving Him thanks and rejoicing in Him – even in the midst of difficulties — because in Him we have a hope that cannot be altered, an Eternal Father who has invited us to share His entire Kingdom with Him, and He Himself has paid our entrance with His Son’s own blood? Must we start again from ground zero, say it all again because you’ve ‘forgotten’?

So I got a bit creative and entered our Bible study time with some special supplies. As we finished our time of praise and worship, Darwin leading us on the keyboard, I took my place along one of the long wooden benches in our rustic dining room and informed everyone very plainly, “Okay, go ahead and open up your Bibles to the book of Philipians. We’re gonna keep reading chapters two and four about the importance of rejoicing in the Lord at all times.”

I grabbed a children’s book and held it upside down in my hands, very seriously searching the contents for Philippians chapters two and four.

As my brow furrowed in concentration and my fingers flipped through the upside-down pages, the atmosphere in our concrete-floored dining room suddenly fell awkward as several silent moments passed.

Then, two or three brave souls began to giggle. Then, everyone.

I looked up, an utterly surprised expression plastered across my face, and asked, “Well what on earth are you laughing at? Open up your Bibles!”

Someone said, “Uh…that’s not a Bible.” More giggles sprinkled about.

I pretended to be taken aback. I turned the book around and began investigating the cover carefully, “Well, how on earth do you know that?” I squinted my eyes and searched for clear evidence among the large drawings and bold font on the bookcover.

“Well, you people, I certainly didn’t tell you just now that this wasn’t a Bible? You mean, at some point in your life someone taught you what a Bible looks like, and, based on that knowledge, you were able to decifer just now – without any problems whatsoever – that this, in fact, is not a Bible?”

Everyone around the circle nodded slowly as they stared at me, slightly confused. Man, she’s talkin’ weird.

“Dang!” I sighed, impressed by their extremely accurate use of past knowledge, and closed the book. I took one last good look at it as I turned it upside down, inspecting it one more time. “And you mean, you didn’t forget? I mean, I imagine they taught you quite a while ago, or was it just this morning that someone reminded you what a Bible looks like?”

The majority of the roughly 30 people in attendance just stared with a couple verbally affirming that, yes, in fact, they were taught long ago what a Bible is and isn’t and that they had not forgotten the valuable piece of information since then.

I put the book to one side, shaking my head in amazement, and I continued onward, murmuring to myself, “Wow. They didn’t forget. Man, they’ve got a good memory…”

I suddenly changed the topic.

“Look, I’m real sorry, but I didn’t have time to eat breakfast before Bible Study and I’m really hungry, so if you don’t mind I’m gonna go ahead and eat real quick.” I pulled out a couple pieces of wheat bread and placed them on a bright blue plastic plate in my lap as I looked at all the blank faces around the oblong rectangle, seeking everyone’s approval.

Everyone just stared at me, somewhat confused – was this truly the appropriate time to be eating breakfast? – but no one protested.

I opened the two slices of bread as if I were about to prepare a sandwich and began applying the ingredients little Gabriela had quite accurately recalled – glue, deodorant, hydrogen peroxide. (She forgot to mention the q-tips that I sprinkled in between), and then I cut the gooey sandwhich into four pieces with a pair of scissors. Anybody want a slice?

Nearly everyone pulled their head back in disgust, voicing the absurdity of my offer. “Gross! No!”

My jaw dropped open. “W-what? You don’t want a slice? I mean, I’ll share it with you. C’mon.”

“No way! You put glue all over it! And…deodorant!” A riot was breaking out as many voices chimed in at once. Who on earth would voluntarily eat a sandwich like that?

“Well, now what do you mean you don’t want to eat glue or q-tips? Why not? I don’t get it.” I threw my hands up in frustration, looking around the circle for someone who would want to share my sandwich with me. No one?

“Glue’s not meant to be eatin’! You could die!” A cacophony of voices rose from all around.

“Well, what on earth is it for?” I sighed dramatically, determined to find answers.

“For…sticking things together!”

I put my hands on my hips, my mouth still slightly agape with brow furrowed. “And how do you know that? I mean, I certainly didn’t teach you guys that just now. Gosh, you people seem to know so many things.”

The kids began catching on. This was a game. Their eyes twinkled with mischief as they shouted: “Someone taught us when we were younger!”

“Ohhh. Someone taught you at some point in your life that glue is not meant for bread?”

Everyone in unison, exasperated: “Yes!”

“And you mean you haven’t, like, forgotten?”

Dozens of voices crescendoed: “No!”

“Because, I mean, you probably learned it for the first time like a long, long time ago. Or was it just last Tuesday?”

“It was a long time ago! But we haven’t forgotten!”

“And, you mean you’ve put into practice this knowledge of glue-is-for-sticking-things-together-and-not-for-eating ever since then with positive results?”

Everyone at once: “Yes!”

I sat back, resting slightly against the cinderblock wall behind me. “Ahhh. I see. You learned.”

I let my statement hang in the air a few moments. A few eyes lit up. They were getting it.

We continued onward.

Socks on my hands. Skirt on my head. Household appliances wrapped in sticky laminate paper. ‘Drinking’ my bottle of water by pouring it on my knee. Trying to open a pillow with my keys.

“Gosh, I just – ah, excuse me. This dang cellphone of mine just keeps on buzzing. I mean, I just… I just can’t stand this phone. Everyone’s always calling me. I think I’m gonna just go ahead and turn it off so I can get a bit of peace and quiet for once.”

Everyone’s eyes were trained on me as I grabbed the little black cellphone that looked exactly like my own (no ‘Smart’ cellphone by any stretch of the imagination) and threw it violently on the ground at my feet before emphatically stamping it under my heel repeatedly, my sandaled feet crushing the small device before I picked it up quite calmly and broke it completely in two, my tone of voice remaining utterly even: “Whew. I’m so glad I turned my cellphone off.”

Several mouths gaped open, as they were convinced I had, in fact, completely destroyed my actual cellphone. (What they didn’t know is that it was an old cellphone that no longer worked.) No she’s really gone overboard.

“That’s not how you turn off a cellphone! You completely ruined it! To turn it off you’ve just gotta press the little button!” Many students were seriously worried.

My mouth dropped open in shock. “What? What do you mean that’s not how you turn a cellphone off? How dare you say that?”

Everyone in unison: “Someone taught us!”

“Oh, you mean a family member or friend taught you once that that’s not how you turn a cellphone off, and since then you’ve actually been able to remember that information?”

“Yes!”

“But…surely you were taught that valuable piece of information long ago, right? Or was it like last Thursday? I mean, it’s hard to remember things from like two or three days ago, right?”

“They taught us a long time ago, but we haven’t forgotten!”

I sat back again, impressed by their ability to remember important information. “Lookie there. And, putting into practice this information has been useful to you in daily life, or have you daily tried to destroy your cellphone as I just did?”

Everybody laughed as mental lightbulbs began doing off. Ah. There’s a lot of things we’ve learned – maybe we were only taught once, maybe even by mere observation – and that knowledge has stuck with us. What’s more, we’ve relied on that information to make daily decisions about how to live, what’s important to us, how to lead a successful life. Why, then, are we so easily content with saying we’ve ‘forgotten’ a lesson on the truth that we’ve learned but two days ago (or ten minutes ago)? Is this not a grave problem that must be confronted?

Is this not one of the Satan’s invisible strongholds in our lives — that we have become a people ready and able to learn anything and everything — how to operate complicated technology, how to drive a car (or bicycle, motorcycle, plane!), how to store countless trivia and academic information in our minds — yet we fail to learn the truth, are slow to grasp what can actually save us? We are experts in the details of life that, in the end, have zero effect on our relationship with our Creator. Begin talking to us about eternal matters — about life and death, sin and justice, truth and lie — and people’s minds shut off. Sure; I read the entire manual for my new SmartPhone or tablet and can now adeptly maneuver every button, every screen, every app with perfect execution and confidence, but what was that again that so-and-so shared with me — or that I read personally, that I’ve heard dozens of times over and over again in different ways! — about the truth, about a loving God who goes beyond this world, who holds the keys to death and Hell? I don’t remember.

Holding the destroyed cellphone in my hands, I continued, “I’ve gotta ask. If someone lives ‘forgetting’ all they are taught, failing to put into practice what they know – pouring glue on sandwiches and destroying cellphones in a misguided attempt to turn them off – what kind of life is that?”

A short silence engulfed the room as everyone thought about the question. After a couple moments, a soft voice from across the circle said, “…a chaotic life.”

“A chaotic life!” My finger enthusiastically pointed at the person with the prize answer.

They’re with me. I dared onward into the real territory, the actual lesson of the morning. “And a life that is spent receiving God’s Word in one ear and letting it fall right out the other, a life that never actually puts into practice what God’s Word teaches?” I continued, putting it into the specific context of the lesson we had been learning for several weeks – “A life spent ‘forgetting’ to rejoice in the Lord always, a life spent rather complaining, gossiping, and murmuring, never content? A life spent refusing to embrace the goodness of God, ‘forgetting’ to give thanks in all occasions and never experiencing the joy found in Christ? What kind of life would that be?”

Two or three youth answered together as I believe many others, too, found the answer silently in their minds: “…A chaotic life.”

I bent forward, my voice even, serious. “We musn’t forget. Just as in daily life we cannot afford to forget that 2+2 is four – or have to learn it over and over again every day for years – we cannot forget that we are all in need of a Savior. Even as we’ve just become angry with another person, Jesus says we’re no different than a murderer. Just as we cannot afford to ‘forget’ that a toothbrush is for teeth and not for brushing our hair, even moreso – infinitely more so! – we absolutely cannot forget every Word of truth, every word of hope, of eternal instruction that we have been learning here together twice a week for this entire year.”

I continued, “So many people see the simple act of ‘forgetting’ what we’ve learned about God as an innocent act of negligence, but the Psalms say that those who ‘forget’ about God are wicked. Can you think why?”

Someone from across the room spoke: “Because…apart from union with Christ, we’re all wicked. So…if we forget the One who saves us from our wickedness — who grants us His own justice, then we’re right back in the same boat with the wicked.”

Another teen spoke up, “If we forget God, then…we’re back in the group with Adam and Eve. Without Christ’s power over sin and death. Satan wins.”

“Yes! And so, kids, every Tuesday and Thursday that we meet here — and every other time that you go to church with your family or are exposed to God’s Word in other contexts — I do not want you to lazily shrug and say that you ‘forgot’ what it is we’re learning together. This is serious business. I want to be able to run into you guys in town in 20 or 40 years and be able to talk about things we’ve learned together this year. This is so absolutely important. We cannot forget. Forgetting the truth is the equivalent of rejecting the truth – never putting it into practice – and living a life of chaos, a life that doesn’t make sense, a life that is full of suffering and, in the end, leads to destruction.”

Serious, listening faces stared back at me. We had gone from a hoot-and-holler cellphone-destroying riot to touching the heart of God’s desire for us – to remember Him in all that we do, to heed His Word and put into practice every single one of His teachings so that we would not be like the foolish man who built his house on the sand.

May our Father empower us to remember every word He has spoken to us, and may He defend us against the thief who desires only to steal, kill and destroy the truth that has been planted in us!

Amen! Glory to God!

Bible study, Child/Youth Leadershp, Discipline Techniques, God At Work Among Us, Homeschool, Information About the Mission, Living Waters Ranch Secondary School, Personal Reflection, Teaching

Forming Character The Old-Fashioned Way: One Rock at a Time

November 11, 2016 jenniferzillycanales 1 Comment

“Snake! Snake! It nearly bit me!” Cristian, a very shy, gangly 12-year-old student who has been a shining star in our intensive two-week program, shrieked as he pulled his hand back.

His five male classmates and I immediately arrived on the scene, intrigued by the snake sighting.

The young men had obediently commenced that morning’s character-forming project bending over, grabbing rocks of all sizes and then pitching them over the chain-link fence (the fenced-in area around the four little buildings that constitute the Living Waters Ranch has rocks everywhere you step, so I’ve taken it on as my personal project to move them to the open pasture where they’re out from underfoot). As the boys began crouching and hauling, unearthing and slinging, I had casually warned my teenage comrades, “Be careful, boys. There’s a boa that lives somewhere around here. Hopefully the rock you grab doesn’t happen to be his favorite hiding place.”

They had looked at me, dumbstruck, several of them with a smirk on their face as they assumed I was kidding.

[Seeing as I participated rather enthusiastically in competitive basketball teams and year-round athletic training from second grade until my high school graduation, I have taken these two weeks with our students as a bootcamp of sorts. (And I’ve had a little too much fun managing that bootcamp.)

Two days prior, as we neared thirty minutes or so of doing the rather demanding activity of launching rocks, everyone drenched in sweat under the hot Honduran sun, I clapped my hands vigorously and barked out orders, “That’s it! You’ve done great! Now hustle up – we’re gonna go around to the other side of the fence where you’ve just thrown all the rocks, and we’re gonna pick ‘em up and throw ‘em back on this side!”

They had all frozen and swiveled to look at me – the first time they had actually shown any recognition of all the noise I had been making – and their jaws dropped open. One of the boys expressed everyone’s thoughts, “That’s a crazy person’s work! No way!”

I had bent backward, thrown my head back and let out a belly laugh before recovering my rigid coaching tone of voice, “I’m just joking, kids! Now get your butts inside and we’re gonna continue reading more chapters of Proverbs and work out the kinks of long-division! You’ve done a phenomenal job! Hustle up now! Teamwork on three!”]

So this morning I laughed as I looked at their faces, unsure whether I was joking or not about the boa. (Our 13-year-old daughter Jackeline was standing by giggling and nodding her head in agreement, for she knew we had seen the boa several times and, thus, my warning was legitimate.)

“Nope, this one’s for real, boys. Good luck, and keep a tight watch on your fingers. I’d hate for anybody to lose one.”

They gaped and protested. I laughed. “No need to worry, boys. It’s not venomous. The only thing to fear is its long fangs. Just a slight sting, nothing more. Now fling those rocks! Let’s put everything you’re learning from the book of Proverbs into practice and form you into wise, hard-working young men for God’s glory! Hurl!”

As I stood right there on the sideline, shouting incessant verbal instruction and lavishing on praise, my throat started to ache due to my extreme coaching style. Not a moment passed that I wasn’t yelling some edifying comment or specific instruction to those young soldiers-in-training.

“That’s it, Exson! Keep it going, boys! We’re developing a good work ethic in you guys so that one day you will be useful instruments in God’s hands! Great job, Charlie! What great strength, Arnold! Wow, you guys have great perseverance! Keep slinging ‘em one after the other!”

Arms extended backward like catapults as rocks soared one after the other high over the fence. Fingernails turned black with dirt and muscles were put to the test as larger stones were taken on one by one and heaved over the precipice with great exertion.

“You need to run from Point A to Point B! Have a sense of urgency, boys! You don’t walk; you run! Show me that you deserve to pass seventh grade! Let’s go, boys! Use your strength to serve God; dedicate your bodies to serve justice!”

As the young men picked up their pace, heeding my verbal instruction to run from one rock to another rather than taking an easy stroll, sweat pouring mightily down their temples, I continued in my edifying verbal barrage: “May God form hard workers out of you, young men! You’re doing such a fantastic job! Keep it up, so that some day you can serve God, be responsibly married and provide for your family with the sweat of your brow! Remember that no good woman wants to marry a lazy man!”

A couple of the young men who had shown no prior interest in any of my many loud verbal proclamations until my last comment, stopped in their tracks, stared at me, and then let out a slight laugh before they kept on running.

All of our students are very familiar with the book of Hosea (the prophet whom God instructed to marry an unfaithful prostitute so that Hosea — and all those who would then come to know his story henceforth — would know how God, forever faithful, feels with unfaithful humanity who is constantly wandering off to prostitute itself to Satan). Making the connection between my comment about their future wives and the Scripture that we’ve been studying for months, Arlen, a 15-year-old student who ran past me with a rather large rock cradled in his hands, glanced up at me and asked with a tricky grin, “But we’re not gonna have a wife like Hosea’s, right?”

I laughed and praised God in my heart for all these young men are learning about His Word.

So, in these first four days of intensive work with those students who throughout the year had become notorious for playing hooky, not turning in homework on time and generally displaying rather irresponsible behavior day after day, we have enlisted them in a military-style boot camp founded on God’s Word in a very intentional attempt to form these young men (and woman) into disciplined, wise youth who are rooted in the truth. (And we’ve loved every minute of it even if they haven’t!)

With tears nearly welling up in my eyes, we’ve seen lazy, unmotivated young men begin to be transformed into hardworking, positive young men who leave all excuses aside, roll up their sleeves and get to work diligently. Now that there are less students to manage (the academically solid students are already on vacation), we can address and correct bad work habits individually, take the time to go over basics that they should have learned years ago, and go at a pace that they can understand and take hold of. Heck, I think these four days of intensive small-group military-style training have been more helpful to them than perhaps the entire school year in the normal classroom environment with all the other students and general distractions.

So when skinny Cristian with his Mohawk and wide eyes jumped back and set off the snake alarm, we all immediately showed up on the scene. Undoubtedly their thought was: Heck! She wasn’t kidding!

As we all drew near, Exson, the oldest student in our program who turned 18 this year, took the lead and grabbed a stick. He valiantly began removing rock after rock as his young friend informed him: “Right there! It disappeared into the dirt right there!”

Exson poked the stick about as we all bent over, faces forming an elevated circle above the suspected snake location while we all held our breath. It has almost bitten Cristian.

A moment or two passed as our hearts beat faster. Suddenly two eyes and a small head burst upward from the soil with lightning speed as I instinctively let out a blood-curdling scream and pulled my head up and away.

Not only did it almost bite Cristian; now it’s gonna bite all of us! The boa wants vengeance! If, in fact, it actually is the non-venomous boa and not one of the many poisonous snakes that are also found on this mountainside! Who can tell the difference anyway? Everybody run for your life!

My hands flew up to cover my face as if that would protect my ankles from the attacking fangs. The boys, too, had jumped back in surprise and let out similar gasps.

Everything happened in a half-second blur of terror and adrenaline before it registered in my mind: Wait, that wasn’t a snake. It was a gecko.

A gecko.

We all began laughing hysterically as Cristian, who is typically very reserved, grabbed his chest in relief and sighed in very dramatic fashion.

After the boys had a good laugh at my squealy reaction, I resumed by coach-like authority and commanded, “Alright, back to work. Twenty more minutes of intense labor until recess, and I must warn you to watch out for the geckos. They are, after all, the most dangerous of all animals. More dangerous than a shark, more menacing than a lion, the gecko, young men, is to be feared above all other creatures. Now sling those rocks over the fence and watch out for gecko fangs!”

Amen! Glory to God!

Child/Youth Leadershp, Community Life, God At Work Among Us, Homeschool, Information About the Mission, Living Waters Ranch Secondary School, Personal Reflection, Teaching

A Most Unusual Butt-Chewing

November 8, 2016 jenniferzillycanales 3 Comments

Yesterday morning something rather peculiar happened on a lone side street in our rural neighborhood.

Yesterday (Monday) was the first day of an intensive two-week academic catch-up program for our high school students who, even after nearly a year of being under our care, are still experiencing the effects of the incredibly weak academic foundation they brought with them from their experiences in the local public elementary schools.

My husband and I have felt a lot of hype building up to these two weeks of intensive tutoring sessions for our weakest students as we are excited to be able to focus exclusively on those who are in most dire need of help. (Our six academically sound students who passed our 7^th-grade program with no problems began their school vacation as of yesterday while the seven who need additional help will be coming for the next two weeks.)

Darwin would be teaching classes on Monday while Miss Ligia, the official 7^th grade teacher, would be helping paint the entryway and bathroom of our little high school building. Everyday we would be taking turns between Darwin, Miss Ligia and myself.

Well, 7:00am rolled around and Darwin took attendance (which is extremely easy to do when the group is so small and you intimately know each person!). One of our teenage boys (the one whom I wrote about in the previous blog who shared his testimony in the Christian Leadership class) wasn’t present. I asked the other students if they knew why he hadn’t shown up – please tell me he’s on his deathbed or got an emergency call from China to travel on business! – as one of our other boys shrugged and said he had seen his classmate moping around his family’s porch that morning while the rest of the students began their walk up that long gravel road to our home.

I was alarmed that our M.I.A. student decided to play hookie on such an important day – their performance (and most importantly attendance!) during this two-week intensive program would determine whether or not they passed 7^th grade! I thought he had matured quite a bit. Well, I mean, he definitely had. But why would he pull a no-show on the first day? How many times do I need to be reminded that the process of transformation is just that – a process. Everything takes time.

I felt disappointed, as I had sincerely been rooting for the kid to make a big, last-minute redemption of the school year and finish strong.

I shook it off and continued getting all the household business in order before I could leave in our old truck to spend the day in town working on the computer and running errands.

About an hour later as everything was finally in place and I rolled out the front gate, I felt God calling me to pass by our rogue student’s home and see what had happened, why he wasn’t in class. This certainly wouldn’t be the first time we’ve made a house call to go chase down run-away students (See: By God’s Design: Zebras in Honduras), but in my heart I felt as though I shouldn’t have to do so, that by golly he should have just pulled himself up by the bootstraps and gotten his little bum to class on time just like everyone else.

As I rumbled down that rocky road that passes through the little neighborhood where the majority of our students live, I finally gave in and turned the steering wheel down the narrow side road that leads to his home. Yes; God’s will is always greater than my own, and, yes, this young man was going to receive a loving house-call even though he probably didn’t deserve it because we’ve all received a free salvation that we most definitely don’t deserve.

I pulled to a stop a couple paces in front of his house and, suddenly experiencing an unexpected surge of energy and God-given joy, hopped out of the car as several neighbors whom I don’t know observed me carefully from a distance. I threw up my arm in a generous wave and sent them enthusiastic verbal greetings through a big smile, which threw them off as they, in turn, decided to greet me warmly.

I approached the small gate to our student’s home and called a general good-morning greeting through the thin curtain that hung in the front doorway.

Very quickly our student’s older sister, who happens to be the mother of another one of our students, came out to greet me with a big smile and, of course, she immediately knew why I was there. She began rattling off all that had happened that morning – the misunderstandings, the bad attitudes, the self-pity – and that, despite her incessant scolding of her younger brother as she tried to get his butt up and off to school, he wouldn’t budge. He was discouraged and had decided that it wasn’t worth going.

In a culture/neighborhood that is steeped in very low self-esteem and almost zero perseverance, a story such as this one is no longer surprising to me. What is surprising is that God is granting me a healthy dose of compassion for these youth who I used to think just needed a swift kick in the rear and a thorough butt-chewing.

I smiled genuinely as I listened to his very well-intentioned sister. When she started to lose a bit of steam, I asked if I could talk with her brother. He is, after all, 15 years old and should very well be present if and when any butt-chewing should occur.

I caught her off guard when I asked to speak face-to-face with the culprit (aren’t we all used to just getting riled up and gossiping without reaching any kind of actual conclusion?), and she immediately called her little brother’s name three times (really loudly) before he finally appeared from behind the front door’s curtain.

I smiled big when I saw him (He came out! He didn’t hide and refuse to show his face! Let’s count that as a victory! Atta boy!), and he returned the smile, although it was obviously tainted with a bit of shame for having skipped out on a very important responsibility that we are both directly involved in.

I spent a moment or two saying with great sincerity things that have been said to this precious young man dozens of times before: “You can do this. Don’t give up. We truly love and treasure you and are committed to doing everything possible to see you succeed, but you’ve also got to do your part. We love you and really do miss you when you don’t show up.”

In our first couple years of this ministry to broken youth, I thought it absurd and entirely unnecessary that we found ourselves saying the same things over and over to the same people day after day. Can you say ‘broken record’? Can you say ‘broken record’? How many times do we have to reiterate that we love the person, that we believe God has a plan for their life? How many times do we have to give the same advice to someone before they actually believe us, before they put it into action?

My thought on this has changed drastically over the last couple months as the Lord has revealed to me that I, too, have heard the same things over and over for years, and I am still slow to believe. How many times have I read, heard – preached! – that God is love and that He truly loves each one of us enough to have sent Christ to reconcile us with Himself, adopt us as His very own sons and daughters, heirs to an eternal Kingdom brimming with life, justice and joy, and even so in my heart I doubt, think Surely His love is for others, but not for me. It’s too good to be true. Oh, truly I am just like this immature young man, for I must hear the same things over and over again for years, and even so I struggle to receive, to rest in the truth.

And so, before much more time passed, I layed out my ultimatum with intense eyes and joy permeating my voice: “Look, if you don’t go get your butt ready to go to school, I’m gonna start dancing right here in the middle of the street until you get really embarrassed and decide to get ready.”

I had no idea where that came from (I’ve definitely never said anything like that before), and his older sister, very enthusiastic to support any butt-chewing I might be handing out, let out an immediate, “Yeah! You heard her!” before her face contorted oddly, finally realizing the absurdity of what I had said. Huh?

They suddenly both looked at me, eyes ablaze with wonder – was this tall, gangly white woman who is crazy about telling others about God really about to start dancing in public? It couldn’t be so.

To erase any doubt from their minds, I bowed low in a dramatic, silly curtsy and began thrusting my long arms to one side and the other, an undoubtedly awkward mixture of ‘groovy’ and ‘ridiculous.’

I spun in large circles and began some strange combination of fancy footwork that in no way kept the same beat as my wild arm motions.

A small boy on a bicycle rode by me on the street and nearly fell off as his eyes widened and his head swiveled around, unable to believe what he was seeing.

The neighbor ladies who had carefully observed and then greeted me only minutes prior also watched from a distance, alerted by the extremely joyful behavior being displayed. Who on earth would dance so freely – and so terribly! – on their street, especially in the face of such circumstances that typically provoke despair? Why, I must be crazy (or have a hope for this young man that goes beyond the despair of this world.)

My smile grew wider and wider as I informed our beloved student: “You see, I’m gonna keep dancing until you go get ready for school. Yup, I’m gonna keep on embarrassing you…”

Both our student and his adult sister laughed out loud, their eyes aglow with wonder – what an incredibly unusual butt-chewing! – as they watched me from but a couple yards away in their desolate front yard.

I only had to dance another ten seconds or so before he finally nodded his head, fully convinced that I would gladly continue my uncoordinated interpretive dancing until he really did get his butt ready for school.

I gave his sister another big, warm hug and laughed all the way to the car as I then continued on with my errands as planned.

That evening as my husband – who had been the one to give classes that morning while I had been away running errands – and I were talking over dinner, I asked him if our no-show student had arrived after all for his classes. He confirmed that he certainly did arrive and had a fabulous attitude throughout the day.

As Darwin continued to talk to me about that morning’s events in the classroom, he mentioned that it was curious that when the young man arrived late for class, he came through the front door not angry or ashamed but rather with a very innocent grin on his face. Why would that be?

I bit my lip and asked, “…Did he tell you how I convinced him to come to school…?”

Amen! Glory to God!

Bible study, Child/Youth Leadershp, Community Life, God At Work Among Us, Homeschool, Information About the Mission, Living Waters Ranch Primary School, Living Waters Ranch Secondary School, Marriage, Personal Reflection, Prayer Requests, Teaching

My Efforts (In Vain) to Move the Rescue Shop Farther from Hell

November 7, 2016 jenniferzillycanales 3 Comments

A few days ago my husband and I travelled to three of the public elementary schools in our rural town to announce in the sixth grade classrooms (the last grade in elementary school according to the Honduran educational system) the opportunity to study in our discipleship-based high school on the 7th-grade level.

Last November was our first time to travel to local schools making the general invitation as we groped around in the dark, seeking God’s will in an extremely new endeavor and rather daringly inviting others to follow as we designed a new homeschool-style high school for a small group of local students.

Having roughly a year of experience under our belts (and many, many trip-ups and lessons learned the hard way), this time we began making the rounds at the local elementary schools with a sense of familiarity. Many of the students at the schools we would be going to are younger siblings of the teenagers who are currently in our program.

As we parked our old Toyota pickup truck (which is becoming quite well-known in our small town) in front of each of the schools, asked permission from the watchman to enter the front gate, and walked across dirt playgrounds teeming with children to visit overpopulated open-air classrooms, certain thoughts streamed uninvited through our minds as we observed our surroundings:

In these public elementary schools, so many of the students don’t learn anything. Look! There are kids wandering aimlessly about everywhere. Do they ever receive actual classes? It seems like they are always canceling class because the teachers don’t show up. Over there! Pre-teens holding hands inappropriately; young men rubbing up against young women; teachers sitting around doing nothing. Kids in deep poverty tapping away on expensive cell phones; trash littered everywhere.

A sense of despair almost palpable (moreso in certain public schools than in others), our thoughts next wandered to our own experiences…

How many of the students who study in our home who came to us from these same public schools got up to fifth, sixth, seventh grade without having learned basic math and writing skills? Oh, the struggles we’ve had with our students this year of breaking all the bad habits they brought with them! How grueling the war has been that we’ve waged so that 15- and 17-year-old students might learn the multiplication tables, something they should have learned years ago! Oh, our students who came to us with devastatingly low self-esteem and an immaturity that’s off the charts! Teenagers who haven’t learned to look you in the eyes; young lives already heavily tainted by lies, theft and a consuming sense of despair. 15-year-olds who behave like 6-year-olds! Everything’s upside down! Many of our 7th-grade students arrived at our home in February on about a second- or third-grade academic level…

And now we’re out here in the educational wilderness looking for more to add to the growing bunch…

I sighed. Please, God, send us good students this year. (Or at least students who have a concept of the times tables and have enough self-discipline to arrive at school everyday…) The difficult ones are just too much work!

As Darwin and I passed by classroom after classroom, we peered inside to see children standing up, hitting one another, or altogether leaving the classroom without permission. I glanced overhead and saw a hand-decorated poster that seemed to be a bright spot in the midst of the chaos: the honor roll. The poster had a small handful of students’ names written in perfectly-cut stars that had then been glued onto the clean poster board.

A sense of dread filling in my chest at the possibility of receiving a whole new batch of woefully behind, undisciplined students at the start of our new school year in February (the Honduran educational calendar finishes in November and begins again in February), I laughed sarcastically and elbowed my husband: “Hey, we should jot down the names of the honor roll kids and then invite only them into our program!”

Immediately as the words escaped my mouth, I repented of having fallen once more into the trap of yearning for ‘easy’ and ‘nice,’ of essentially turning our back on those who most desperately need the loving, edifying environment that our home offers; the message of salvation that is daily proclaimed.

Jesus came not for the well, but for the sick; not for the ‘good’ people, but for the ‘bad.’ He spent time with the prostitutes, thieves and sinners! Who am I to want to hide out with the healthy people — the nice ones, the pretty ones! — who’ve got it all together? Oh, Lord, forgive me once more.

How many times has our Father confirmed that our home is not to be a hide-out for ‘good’ people but rather a daring rescue mission within a yard of hell? Thank You for stationing us here within a yard of the flames even though so many times in my selfishness I’d like to move this rescue shop a little bit farther into safe territory. A rescue shop within a hundred miles of hell sounds a bit more appealing, or better yet within a yard of heaven.

Oh, but the ‘bad youth’ are the ones He’s specifically chosen to find Him through us! This is our cross to bear.

My mind immediately snapped into focus as I remembered last Tuesday afternoon when we had our last Christian Leadership class of the year.

For one last time (until February when the new school year starts up again) each person passed to the front of the class to share a personal testimony — something the Lord is doing in their lives, something they’ve learned recently from Scripture, etc. We began implementing this activity into the weekly class as a way of truly developing the participants into active leaders who are always prepared to explain the hope that they have in Christ.

One by one each person passed up to the front with a maturity, a dignity that had not been present but a few months ago. A sense of God’s presence fell over our little classroom as each person assumed a vulnerability that had not yet been expressed.

A 15-year-old young man in our 7th-grade program — the same young man whom in my heart I had scoffed at when I realized he had signed up for a Christian Leadership course! (See: Unlikely Disciples) — took his turn at the front. Sure enough, he had not dropped out of the intensive course but had faithfully attended since July along with the rest of this ragtag band of disciples that surely any ‘wise’ person would not have chosen for a leadership class.

He passed up to the front, the rest of us seated in the students’ desks. He shifted his weight from one leg to the other and adjusted his white uniform’s collar. I could tell he was nervous, but it wasn’t due to the fact that he had to speak in front of the group. We had all been speaking in front of one another in this way, giving testimonies and teaching Scripture together for many months. I sensed he was nervous because what he was about to share would be extremely personal, a little too close to home.

He began, and he went way over the at-least-a-minute-or-two time suggestion as his voice softly trembled, his words carefully chosen and said with great sincerity. His large, wide eyes were alert and joyful. He began sharing with us — in his own words — the transformation that I believe everyone around him had already noticed.

“Before I began studying here, I was…so disrespectful. My mom would talk to me and tell me to stay at home, and I would just thrown up my arm and storm out, going to the river or just wandering around the neighborhood aimlessly, day after day…”

I remembered, for his story is always very present in my thoughts. His parents had kicked him out of the home the year prior, had sent him off to another town to live with his uncle and do manual work after he had dropped out of the public high school and got mixed up with the wrong crowd.

“But this year, I’ve learned about Christ. I feel that I’ve learned so much, and, what He wants from me –”

His eyes light up even more and a big smile overtakes his face: ” — is that I follow Him.”

He continued onward as everyone else remained in a respectful silence, eyes locked on his (another triumph that has been fiercely battled for and won among rogue, undisciplined youth!)

He confessed that at the beginning of this school year he had been so disrespectful of his teacher, Miss Ligia. He stopped suddenly, smiled shyly and glanced across the room at her. She returned the smile, for she, too, was about to share a testimony of God’s transformative power in her own life.

This brave young man with his rockin’ teenagery haircut in his daily school uniform continued, as he laughed and said, “I mean, at the beginning of the school year I didn’t even know the times tables. Someone could ask me 3 X 4, and I wouldn’t know the answer. And, I mean, that’s the easiest one! All throughout elementary school when I was younger I was so undisciplined, and I didn’t want to learn anything. I would just go around bullying everyone and messing around…”

He continued onward, talking easily about the impact our twice-weekly Bible studies have had in his life as he’s come to learn about God’s will, His perfect love. He spoke also of his participation in Miss Isis’ prayer group.

As his very sincere, powerful confession of God’s grace in his life came to an apparent close, he hesitated. It was as if a part of the story was missing, but he wasn’t sure if it was too dangerous to share. He looked at me, and I sensed I knew what he was going to say.

Seeing as no one had yet to make fun of him for his daring testimony in this roomful of ‘sick’ people who’ve come to be healed by the Savior, he took the risk. “There’s…one more thing. Last year.”

The room suddenly felt heavy. I definitely knew what he was going to say. “Last year…when some of my friends and I came up to the Living Waters Ranch…to steal. I was involved, so I was guilty too. The cops came and took us to the station in La Ceiba. And…Darwin arrived and he gave me really pivotal advice, told me to seek God. And…now I truly feel that God is transforming me. I’m not the same anymore.”

Many in the room probably had no idea what he was talking about while others knew too well as he continued valiantly talking about his participation in the robbery that happened last August on my birthday. (See: Justice in a Lawless Land)

My heart felt heavy with joy as the young man before us finished his testimony and sat down quietly. Before I knew it another one was standing up, sharing a strikingly similar testimony of salvation and life — life abundant! joy! — found in Christ. Here. In our midst, in these little melon-colored houses at the end of that long gravel road.

Lord, please forgive me for wanting ‘easy,’ for wanting to surround myself with polished people, with those who have it all together. Thank You for bringing these broken, lost young men to our home, to learn of You and to be transformed. And thank You for transforming me in the process, for renewing this hardened hart of mine and for utilizing me in the midst of this great rescue mission You are performing all around the globe. Lord, may You continue to be glorified in and through us, and may You grant us the strength to remain faithful to the calling You’ve given us.

Amen! Glory to God!

Bible study, Child/Youth Leadershp, Community Life, Family, God At Work Among Us, Homeschool, Information About the Mission, Living Waters Ranch Primary School, Living Waters Ranch Secondary School, Marriage, Personal Reflection, Prayer Requests

Buried in Baptism, Raised with Christ

October 31, 2016 jenniferzillycanales 2 Comments

Two Thursdays ago we held a baptism for our children, students and neighbors who desired to publicly be buried with Christ and raised with Him to new life.

God planted this desire in us because several of the children/youth in our school (and in our household) had confessed faith in Christ over the past months and years but had yet to be baptized. Also, a beloved adult neighbor of ours shared with us that she had long-since desired to be baptized but her local church refused to do so despite the fact that she had been faithfully attending the church and obeying God’s will for many years.

Taking that as our cue along with Jesus’ command to “go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything [He] has commanded [us],” we scheduled the baptism a couple days out and extended the invitation.

As a community, family and school, we have been faithfully proclaiming God’s Word to the same small group of people several times per week in our rustic dining room since February, so the baptism gave the opportunity of confession to those who have been exposed to God’s Word this year but perhaps had not come to confess faith in Christ in a public way.

We met up on a gravel road about a mile from our home alongside a local river. Some arrived walking; others found our car passing through town and hopped in the truckbed. Below are the photos that were taken during that beautiful morning.

baptism43 — Before beginning the baptisms in a local river, we gathered together with our foster kids, the majority of our students, our three teachers, our night watchman and his wife, my mom and step-dad and several other neighbors to read aloud the majority of the book of Romans as we all meditated on what it means to be buried with Christ in baptism and thus raised with Him in new life.

baptism42 — My husband Darwin as we went down to the river

baptism2 — Miss Luz (a local believer who serves as our special needs teacher), Darwin and I praying before receiving those who desired to be baptized

baptism47 — The first one to come down to the river to be baptized was Sandra’s mom, Geraldina (pictured above in the yellow blouse). Sandra is a 15-year-old local teen who lived with us for the greater part of this year in refuge of a situation of abuse at home with her step-dad. Sandra’s mom has been a very sincere, humble believer for many years and was finally able to escape from the control of the abusive step-father several months ago as she has valiantly been looking for new, healthier beginnings for her and her four children (Sandra included). When we finished praying and looked to the shore to see who wanted to be baptized first, she was standing there eagerly with a big smile on her face. Praise God!

baptism49 — Sandra, Geraldina’s daughter (who has also been like a daughter to us during this past year as she lived under our roof from February to August), was the second person to get baptized!

baptism5 — 16-year-old Dayana, our eldest daughter who has been living with us almost three years and whom we are in the process of legally adopting, was next!

baptism8 — Jackeline, our 13-year-old daughter who has been living under our roof nearly two years, was next in line!

baptism12 — 12-year-old Josselyn, another one of our precious daughters (we have quite a few!) also decided to get baptized publicly!

baptism50 — My ‘Wild Gleny’ was the next one in line! Praise God for this huge step in her life! May God continue to be glorified in and through her!

baptism16 — This is Cristian, a 13-year-old young man in our primary school who is one of our night watchman’s children. He arrived at our front gate roughly two years ago without ever having entered school. He and three of his siblings have been studying in our homeschool-style primary school program ever since, and they’ve learned to read, write and do basic math in addition to being continually exposed to God’s love. In the accelerated program he’s in for older students, Cristian is about to graduate fourth grade with very good grades. He also plays recorder in Darwin’s musical group and is a very faithful member in the weekly Christian Leadership class I teach.

baptism18 — Cristian was the only one of his siblings who decided to get baptized. During the sharing of God’s Word before the baptism, God touched Cristian’s parents’ hearts to make a commitment to Christ as well, so they are in the process of legalizing their marital union as they’ve asked us to help them plan a double celebration in the upcoming months: their wedding and baptism!

baptism21 — Here comes Brayan! We are so proud of this young man who lived with us for 8 months in 2014 and continues to be like a son to us. He’s been in 5th grade with us for nearly three years, and in these past few months he’s begun to develop a really good work ethic even though academically he continues to struggle due to abuse/neglect suffered in his early childhood. He’s becoming quite the gentleman and remains very involved in Bible study, Christian Leadership, and several other clubs at the Living Waters Ranch in addition to accompanying us on various family outings. A couple days prior to the actual baptism when we announced that those who wanted to get baptized would be able to do so, he was the first one to raise his hand and announce in front of the large group that he wanted to be baptized!

baptism27 — Our 9-year-old son Jason was next!

baptism32 — Charlie, a 13-year-old precious young man in our secondary school program (7th grade) also decided to get baptized. Please pray with us for Charlie and the commitment he has made to follow Christ, as he recently left his parents’ home and has been making very poor choices. He will most likely not pass 7th grade as our school year comes to a close next month, so please pray for wisdom and an increased work ethic on his part as he actively seeks for God to transform him according to His good will.

baptism57

baptism33 — This elderly man is Sandra’s great-grandfather. He accompanied Sandra, her mom, and younger siblings at the baptismal event to support them but had not planned on being baptized himself. Upon hearing God’s Word, he felt called to become a ‘new creature’ in Christ, so he, too, entered the waters to proclaim faith in the Savior. He was very excited to do so and has since asked us for a Bible to deepen his understanding of God’s will.

baptism36 — One of Sandra’s younger sisters, Paoli, was next! She is one of the great-granddaughters of the elderly man who was baptized.

baptism62 — Rolan, a very kind young man in our 7th-grade program, was the last one to get baptized. He is always very attentive during Bible study and has a mind that is very hungry for the truth. He had talked with us at length a couple days before the baptism about the many questions he had about getting baptized, and we were wonderfully surprised that he took the leap to publicly proclaim his faith in Christ as he entered the waters two days later at the public event. He is one of our better students academically and recently told us that he has been very content this year to be in our program as he had not previously had people in his life to lovingly guide him according to God’s Word.

Amen! Glory to God!

Bible study, Child/Youth Leadershp, Family, God At Work Among Us, Information About the Mission, Living Waters Ranch Primary School, Living Waters Ranch Secondary School, Personal Reflection, Special Needs Kids

A Life Sweeping Away Bat Poo: Christ’s Peace in the Midst of ´Never Enough´

October 24, 2016 jenniferzillycanales 1 Comment

(Written Sunday, October 23, 2016): About a week and a half ago on a Saturday I was frantically converting our office room into a makeshift guest room for my mom and step-dad who were already well on their way to our home. I had commanded kids to help me sweep and mop porches and tile floors (a job that never ends in our rural, open-air home filled with shedding dogs and all kinds of insects and dirt-caked barefoot kids) in a sincere attempt to make a warm welcome. I felt like the morning had gotten away from me with our long efforts with the lice shampoo and comb (for the fourth consecutive day), managing everyone’s chores and in-home musical practices, washing bucketfuls of clothes out in the spicket and counseling one of our daughters through a difficult situation.

It was already almost 2:00pm and I hadn’t even begun preparing lunch! I guess my idea to prepare a nice bouquet of flowers/plants from our yard to place on the table in our guest room will have to wait until their next visit…

I slid the slightly off-kilter old wicker table in our office room to one side as I flung the broom underneath, finding a whole lot more dirt and grime than you would in a sealed, air-conditioned home in the suburbs. Hadn’t we just swept and mopped this room top to bottom like yesterday?

My large, baggy pijamas – Pijamas! I had been up and buzzing about since five-something that morning and had yet to have 12.68 seconds to change into decent attire! Only crazy people are still wearing their pijamas at 2:00pm! – were drenched with sweat, soapy detergent suds and large droplets of lice shampoo as my long, gangly arm flung the broom all about the small room.

When wedged into one of the room’s corners and pulled quickly away, the broom brought with it a prize: fresh bat poo that had fallen from the gap in the ceiling. This, of course, is not new and is to be found in nearly all of the little buildings on our property. My eyes traced upward wearily as I saw that familiar little gap between the ceiling planks and the cinderblock wall. When on earth would we have time to fill in those cracks? Another thing to add to the to-to list! For now, I’ll just sweep it away. More will surely fall tomorrow…

I swept the powdery poo over to that pile of dirt and grime that was growing exponentially with each passing moment.

I was exhausted and frazzled but at the same time filled with great emotion at the thought of my mom and step-dad’s week-long visit that would begin any moment – Any moment! I need to go change my clothes and brush this nest of hair! And the kids! They’re all dirty! Where are they, anyway? Probably running about, dirtying the porches and staining their clothes… Oh…

In the midst of bat poo piles and lice shampoo suds, sweat pouring torrentially down my cheeks, (Had I even remembered to put deodorant on that morning?) I experienced the following very clear thought in the midst of quite a tsunami of mental activity and adrenaline pounding within me:

I could spend all day every day sweeping and mopping this one room (even if we get around to filling in the cracks in the ceiling), and it would never be enough. There’s always more to be done, another scuff mark on the floor to be polished away or a new little pile of dirt particles that floated in from the open window. Shoe tracks that appear instantaneously, cobwebs that seem to grow back instantly after having been whisped away. In an odd sense that may not even make sense, cleaning this one room would be a full life. I could stay in just this one room, sweeping and laboring for God’s glory, preparing guest rooms for beloved guests, and I would never finish the task.

With that first thought, many other, similar ones came flooding in:

I could spend all day every day just counseling and praying for our daughters — Or even just one of our daughters! Pick any one of them, and dedicate your life to loving and cultivating her, and the task will never be finished! — and that would be a full life, a complete life. A person could spend a life just teaching and guiding one classroom full of kids, and it would be a full life, bursting with divine purpose. Nevermind the other millions of schoolkids around the globe — a life fully dedicated before God to one classroom would be hugely impactful, eternally useful! I could spend an entire life just prayerfully planning and then proclaiming God’s Word in our home/mission — nevermind the parenting, the endless cleaning, reading classes, and grocery shopping! — and that would be utterly pleasing to God. To raise even just one child according to God’s will; to spend a life doing the small things, the invisible things with great joy as unto the Lord and not unto men. To spend a day – a life! – in fervent intersession for a lost world; to spend an entire afternoon – decade! – listening to and loving the broken children our Father has brought us. Even just one of these things — or many others that aren’t mentioned here! — taken on as God’s personal assingment, would consitute a life full of purpose.

Heavy under this newfound realization, I felt suddenly both terribly blessed and even more frantic than before. Why so much, Father? So full…

These thoughts of fullness have accompanied me over the week or so since then as our days have been perhaps more full than usual.

We are nearing the end of our first school year with the small discipleship-based school the Lord has led us to design, lead and teach, and the paperwork, planning, decision-making, meetings, classes, etc is off the wall. And none of us have a teaching certificate or have taken any kind of pedagogy class! Yes; our Father has chosen the unlikely to create a school for outcast youth from scratch and lead them to Him!

And to spend a life just cleaning floors, sweeping away bat poo would be enough, would satisfy You. These blessings are too precious, too demanding.

Over the past couple weeks our hair has been on fire, and I’m certain I’ve commented out loud more than a few times to my husband: “I haven’t even had time to write! When will I be able to write? Everything is just go, go, go and it doesn’t look to change anytime soon!”

If joy and gratitude have been the pillow, a to-the-bone exhaustion and a sense of constant frustration have been the fringe.

My own experience of childhood was as an only child with a stay-at-home mom who dedicated herself wholeheartedly to me. Now on the other side of motherhood as mom rather than as child, I feel dogged by a constant sense of guilt that I’m not able to give our 7 what I had in my own childhood. Oh, how many times do they approach me needing something or with some very long and involved tale they want to tell me, and I have my autoresponse as I go, zipping about teaching classes and running errands: ¨Wait just a few mintues! I’ll be right there — I’ve just gotta finish…¨

Seeing the drastic changes being brought about in the lives and character of our local students as they are being transformed by their knowledge of and obedience to God’s Word, we cannot deny that there are more youth from our neighborhood who might be eternally impacted — and then their children, grandchildren, for God’s glory! — if only they were consistently exposed to the truth, to God’s love, over time in an environment filled with faith in Christ.

As Jackie Pullinger, an English missionary with a powerful testimony who has been serving Christ in China for about 50 years, said: ¨I could spend my whole life loving the people on just one street.¨ And what about all the other streets?

How do we attend the many lost youth from our neighborhood without losing all intimate time with those under our roof?

And to think that even the simple task of sweeping away bat poo would constitute a full life, Lord…

How do we manage all that you have entrusted to us? What of those on the outside who remain lost, wandering? How to reach them, love them for Your glory, without dying of exhaustion in the process?

Our efforts will never be enough.

This evening after having spent a couple incredibly peaceful, blessed hours as a family – Darwin and I with the 7 kids/teens who the Lord has placed in our home – sitting around our square wooden dining room table doing homework, working on projects together, eating rare snacks and generally putting aside all else that demands our attention, the day’s light dissipated and our family’s Sabbath Hour began approaching quickly. Kids were commanded to shower and others to pick up their school notebooks and tuck them away in backpacks.

13-year-old Jackeline and 12-year-old Gleny were on kitchen/dining room duty, so they began washing the dishes, sweeping rather large floors, wiping down tabletops and cleaning electric stoves. Jackeline, who just this year has begun developing a healthier work ethic after having previously suffered from extreme laziness in almost all that she did, became visibly frantic as she suddenly had many things to do and not much time to do them in.

Fold the clothes on the table. Take them over to the house (our kitchen/dining room is separate from where we sleep). Wipe the countertop down with a soapy rag. Do it again. Do it slower. Put the food away. Don’t forget that your notebook is still on the table. Your sisters are calling for you to come, but you can’t go be with them yet because you’ve got to finish your kitchen job and do it well. Work with excellence.

I headed over to our house, crossing the high school building’s small porch as I batted away hungry mosquitos. I arrived at our nearly silent house as I began to write the next day’s schedule on the small whiteboard that is duct-taped next to our front door.

Suddenly that same Jackeline with her frizzy hair and rather tall, developed body came bursting forth much to my surprise.

I greeted her: “Aren’t you supposed to be in the ki–?”

“Yeah, yeah. I just came because I need to bathe Josue as well.” She breathed heavily, obviously agitated with all that she had to do. “I just – “ She approached the bathroom, realized it was occupied, and then pointed a finger at her little special-needs brother: “Just stay here, Josue. I’ll be right back. Gotta finish in the kitchen. When Jason gets out of the shower, go on into the bathroom stall and I’ll be right there –“

Josue looked wide-eyed at his stressed sister and shrugged, for he knows very few cares in his daily life with us. He looked up at me with a wide, toothy grin and smiled big. As quickly as his sister had appeared at our front door she disappeared back into the night, determined to finish her kitchen chore well.

I patted Josue on the back as my neck extended out our front door: “Jackeline!”

Not a moment later she appeared, even more frazzled. Had she forgotten something else, or was I going to add to the many demands that had already been placed on her? She greeted me with eager, hurried eyes.

“Jackeline…” My voice totally counteracted her overall tone as I spoke soft and slow, very intentional in my message to her: “Do not become anxious with the many things you have to do. Even in the midst of being ‘busy,’ God wants to fill you with His peace.”

She waited a moment to see if I had finished and then smiled a big, fake smile, still very stressed, and said, “Yes; yes; I know!” and turned to leave. Her and I had talked about this topic many times.

“Jackeline – Go with Christ’s joy even in the midst of many obligations!” My voice chased her in the darkness.

I felt that she heard me but that she still didn’t ‘get it.’ (Did I?) Every time she has an unusually heavy homework load or additional chores, it seems as though all joy is sucked from her body as she converts into some kind of super-focus, high-stress woman intent on checking things off the check-list, nothing more. (And don’t I do the same thing?)

I paused in front of the whiteboard as God spoke to my heart: “Bathe Josue. You, not her. I want to use you to bless thing young woman in the midst of the many responsibilities she is trying to fulfill.”

Now, bathing Josue (or changing his diaper or brushing his teeth, etc) is not something at all foreign to me. Darwin, Jackeline and I work together to shoulder the precious burden that he presents to our family. Many mornings Darwin gets him up and on the toilet around 5:15am, I follow with the showering and changing and then at some point later on during the day his older sister helps with his care and bathes him again.

But tonight? Tonight after I had spent over 7 hours that morning updating contracts (in the midst of my general duties as ‘mom’), drafting next year’s schedules and crafting one strategic brainstorm after another? Had I not already tended to Josue’s many needs throughout the day in addition to those of the other six? How many times do you have to cook before it’s ‘enough’?

He whispered again: “You. Go.”

In the blink of an eye, my voice became lovingly peppy as I led Josue into our bathroom to begin the familiar routine. Although very tired from the day, I was filled with a sense of rest once I submitted myself in obedience to my Father’s will.

Having showered Josue, I squatted in front of him to secure the little diaper velcro straps. He interrupted my intense focus as he smiled and said in his broken speech, ¨Hi Mom!¨ I looked up at him, surprised that he would be greeting me (is not bathing him just about getting the job done, not actually enjoying it or finding any real communion in the process? Oh, I have the same struggle as precious Jackeline…)

I looked up at him with his light-brown shaggy hair and breahted deep. Smiled. ¨Hi Josue. I love you.¨

Having finished, I sent little ones off to bedrooms and turned our CD player on soft with worship music. I began quietly moving around our bedroom as I organized papers, made plans for the next day, and put things in their place.

Several minutes later, recently-bathed Jackeline suddenly appeared, still a bit frazzled, in our open doorway with a big, sincere smile. She had successfully finished her job in the kitchen, gotten a shower, and was off to her room as we all entered into our Sabbath Hour.

I took a couple steps to the open doorway to meet her, where we both moved to hug one other, as we do several times throughout the day. Her head nestled easily into my shoulder as I rested my head on top of hers. She was still breathing heavily.

Without letting go, I said again: “Jackeline…There will always be things to do. We cannot decide that we will enjoy Christ’s peace only when there is nothing to do –“

She laughed and tried to wriggle free, “I know! I know…”

I held on tight, both of us giggling now, as I said, “I know you know, but I say this for both of us…”

Her body suddenly calmed down, realizing that this was not a motherly rebuke but rather a reminder from our Father of His desire to grant peace to both of these wayward daughters of His.

We both breathed deeply, still embracing in our little living room out in the foothools of some mountains in some violent country that has become world-famous for its catastrophic murder rate and gorgeous beaches, as we listened to the truth of God’s desire for us once more: to rest in His love, to live His peace, even in the storm – especially in the storm!

As I gave her a quick kiss on the top of the head, she smiled big and headed off to the room she shares with two of our other girls. I returned to my shuffling about in our dimly-lit bedroom, suddenly inundated with Christ’s peace for the first time in many weeks.

Exhausted to the core but beyond content with the work the Lord is etching out among us, I looked over at Darwin as he worked on planning his high school English classes. I carefully considered the many things I could begin doing, but God whispered in my consciousness: ¨Now you can write. It doesn’t matter that you’re tired. Do it now.¨

And so I did.

Even in the midst of year-end efforts and contract renewals and blazing this still-very-new parenting trail, Christ’s peace can be near. Even when our efforts will never be enough – even when we see the many, many roaming, lost youth in our neighborhood day after day, knowing we will never be able to reach them all with the good news of Christ – even as we live out the reality that the harvest is rich but the workers are few! – Christ is knocking on the door, desiring to enter our innermost soul and flood us with His perfect peace, which goes beyond the understanding of this world.

Amen! Glory to God!

Community Life, Family, Information About the Mission, Living Waters Ranch Primary School, Living Waters Ranch Secondary School, Marriage, Music, Special Needs Kids

Up that Long Gravel Road and to a Birthday Party We Go!

October 4, 2016 jenniferzillycanales Leave a comment

This past Saturday we celebrated the joint birthdays of Jackeline (13) and Dayana (16), two of the young women the Lord has placed in our household as daughters. Although they are not biological sisters, they were both born on October first, so they decided to have a shared birthday party (with two separate cakes, of course).

We handed our digital camera off to many small, eager photographers who very contentedly ran here and there, functioning as the event’s paparazzi. They did a pretty good job with the photos!