Wednesday 20 March 2013

Day 3 :: Building Day 2

During breakfast this morning the whole team decided that it was a good idea to donate money to the family for grocery shopping. Each family received $470 for shopping. A group of three or four from each team along with a translator were able to accompany them. Although I did not go I heard so many great things about the shopping trip. At home, we are used to buying too much and stocking food, if a box of cereal is on sale we buy three boxes. In these families, they buy only as they need - or can meagerly afford. So while the families were being so cautious of how many bags of rice or boxes of crackers they were placing in the buggy, the group was right behind them trying to secretly throw in five more.

While the family was out shopping, all the finishing touches were being worked on such as: finishing off the roof, putting the trim up and touching up on our painting job and a group of people starting on assembling furniture such as the bunk bed and dinning room chairs and table. the cool thing about the furniture package was that the family did not know that they were receiving it.

Today was not as hard physically as emotionally. We were not carrying piles of shingles up the ladder, cutting and hanging dry wall, installing windows and doors or painting everything for the first time. We had our dedication ceremony for the family which consisted of handing over the keys, a bible and a plaque. We all stood in a circle and shared our prayers and last words with the family. Then the family was able to open their doors and take ownership of what was now theirs. We followed in after a few minutes and prayed for them and wished them a blessing one more time. The mother had tears in her eyes, but once the middle daughter started to bawl, there was not a dry eye in the room. It was a hard day for a lot of us, having to say goodbye to the families. What was even harder, was to comprehend the joy and graditatude they had for a 16x20 ft home, a house smaller than most of our garages.
 the other house and team picture was not available at time of writing.  
  

Tonight we ended off like we do everynight, by sharing our highs and lows. the past two days have been a great experience, and although the families were thanking us, we were the ones who should be thanking them for giving us the opporitunity to do this for them.

Thank you congregation of Living Hope for providing for our financial needs and our prayer requests because with out any of that, none of this could have happened.

My highs and lows for today are:

LOWS:
- hitting my finger and head with hammer
- not being able to fully communicate with the families 

HIGHS
- hearing the teams final prayers and words to the family
- seeing the smiles on the families faces
- being able to walk away, confident that we wern't doing this to make ourselves feel better.
- seeing the team work so hard and dilegently to finish the home and create new relationships with team members, YWAM staff and the familes.

-Alyssa Haak

Prayer Requests:
- Tomorrow we are learning to run a short children's program for a nearby primary-type school.  Pray that we might be fast learners and effective in ministry there.
- It's becoming evident that the Lord is working in many of the lives of the youth and leaders on this team - pray that the Lord would continue to make Himself known to all of us, and to make clear his purpose and plans for our lives.

- thanks Alyssa!!!
~Adam.



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