I’m so sorry for not updating since Christmas!! Time has really flown by.
Right after Christmas Cindy and I were busy making preparations to host a team of 11 people from Living Hope Baptist Church in College Station, Texas. They were such an amazing blessing to us! I’m sitting here trying to think of how to describe this group of people, and I don’t even know how to put it into words. They were so incredibly focused on serving and loving this Malawian community, and they did it with so much passion and enthusiasm. God accomplished some amazing things through them, and I’m so honored to call them friends.
Kristin Copher packed paints with the team, so after their departure I started working on murals at Esther’s House. The first mural was done in the dining hall, and it’s of Jesus sitting with children, with the Bible verse Matthew 19:14 underneath.
“Let the little children come to me, for of such is the kingdom of heaven”
Over a year ago, when the Kennedy’s were living here, they stenciled James 1:27, the verse that Esther’s House was built on, on the wall but didn’t have paint to fill it in. This is also in the dining hall.
"Religion pure and faultless is this: to look after the widows and orphans in their distress."
The next week I started on a mural in the classroom of Noah’s Ark. Eugenio and I picked out the best verse pertaining to the story of Noah’s Ark, and decided on Genesis 9:16.
“The rainbow will be in the cloud and I will look on it to remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature on earth.”
This one was the most fun to do, if for no other reason than the excitement of the kids that were watching! As I was painting the lions, all of the kids started roaring and walking on all fours, pretending to be lions. Peter was an especially cannibalistic lion--he spent most of the afternoon chasing all the other kids around!
The last couple of weeks we focused on having some of the older kids work with art. Most of them had never used colored pencils, and none of them had ever used paints. They all had so much fun and did really well!
We’ve been having fun just playing with the kids--when it’s rainy, they like to do a lot of clay molding.
We spent the morning making trucks, buses, people, dogs, snowmen (although they don't know what snow is!), and cups.
We had the kids and the house parents over for dinner and a movie last Friday! =) We watched Madagascar 2, which they loved!! The next day they were singing "we like to move it!"
I think I have enough pictures of Enelesi to make an album completely of her! She's so adorable.
The last couple of weeks has been plagued with sickness. As the rainy season continues, the number of mosquitoes are beginning to multiply. Peter, our 5-year-old residential orphan, came down with a horrible case of malaria last Monday. A few days later Nedson, our 6-year-old residential orphan, developed a milder case of malaria. (Both children are better now!) Two of our house parents fell ill with different sicknesses, and a 3-month old child in our village passed away with malaria. We’ve taken multiple numbers of our non-residential orphans to the doctor for malaria. Going into the weekend I developed a stomach infection that kept me at the house for 3 ½ days (unfortunately). Today Cindy is showing signs of the same infection that I had, so please be praying for her to recover quickly!
I’m so grateful for all of the new friends that I’ve met since living here. I’m overwhelmed by how people, who were strangers to me 6 months ago, have been so supportive during my whole time here and especially during the last week as I’m preparing to go home on Sunday. I’m going to miss everything about this place so much, and the fact that I’m leaving in a few short days seems to just now be setting in. Driving away from Esther’s House is now all it takes to make me cry! I expect that acclimating back into Western culture is not going to be an easy thing, and I’m so grateful for all of the support you've given me!
