the final week...

so, i was just going to cease to write more of the blog...but my dad said it would be good to refer people to in my support thank you letters...so i thought i'd give a little update.

DAMAR week: MI week 4.
so crazy. it needs it's own post.
the prep week before DAMAR was busy; getting alternate crafts ready, taking inventory of the summer...we made intern gifts the WHOLE day Friday, which was quite fun, but tiring. and. I RAN 5 MILES!!!!!!! i made my goal of running 5 miles by the end of the summer a week early. 54 minutes. i could not have done it without my dear running buddy, andrew. :].

i'll be honest that i didn't have the best attitute about DAMAR the whole week and it got worse over the weekend. DAMAR is a facility for mentally retarded kids. it is a really nice facility and they do a good job of making it not seem like an institution...so, going into Sunday night, i was praying HARD for an attitude change, and asking others to pray for me to. we met our group saturday and they were AMAZING. a few of the girls knew about sex trafficking and we were able to chat about it, and i was SO encouraged by bethany's passion. it seems that everytime i get discouraged about wanting to work with trafficking victims, God always brings me some kind of encouragement. it was so cool.

well, after our orientation day monday, i got that attitude change i was praying for. all the kids needed so much love. some didn't have families, many have been abused, physically and sexually, and had horrible things done to them. we went on a tour of the facility and met some of the kids we would be working wtih (13-18 boys and girls- 2 seperate groups). one boy didn't want to come to VBS. the lady in charge then told me it was because he had participated in an exorcism where someone stuck their fist down his throat and beat him to try to beat the autism out of him....how would someone do this?! i was seriously speechless over this...how? why? ...and i am supposed to love my enemies. mmm...

i was ready heading into tuesday. meg and andrew and i prayed that night. tuesday. in all my time at mission indy, i never wanted to quit...after this day, oh, i was struggling bad. to avoid bashing on DAMAR and ranting on for a few paragraphs, let's just say, our schedule got switched and it was chaotic and stressful. but praise the Lord for the interns. at our debrief, they all sat and listened to me gush about the day and then each one prayed over meg, andrew, and i. it was so encouraging and i was so thankful. i prayed alot this week.

wednesday ended up going really well. meg, andrew, and i went out with our group to jimmy john's which was delicous and south bend chocolate ice cream followed! :] God worked it out that night. andrew ended up coming to sit with me and two other girls from our group when we got to talking about politics and one of the girls said very negative things about homosexuals...not seeing them as people, creations of God. oh, i had to watch my tounge and hold myself back a few times, but we ended up having a really great conversation with her and God gave us both words to say.

thursday was hectic again...and i started writing my VBS evaluation of the summer, which took up all the free time i had. we did tie-dye as the craft, so we had to leave early...it was just go, go, go from wednesday night until thursday night. i was worn and stressed...the DAMAR kids came on thursday night to dinner and worship. it was great to be able to just hang with them and not worry about anything...one of the boys was an amazing dancer and walked it out to Lecrae. they all went to the front during worship and danced. it was beautiful. then one of my favorite guys told me i could come to his band practice and i started crying...because, i won't ever be going to his band practice. i won't see him anymore. oh, this is where i struggle so much sometimes. is it worth it to be there for a week, when you won't see the kids again...are we just more people who walk in and out of their lives? andrew says that we are planting the seed...and i get that. at least for a week they were hoepfully shown the love of Christ, but it's still hard.

by friday, i was ready to be done. i told the group that we would get starbucks on friday since they did an AMAZING job. my motivation became starbucks...so i kept having to remind myself to do everything for Christ, to show Christ's love to the kids... the debrief was great. it was amazing to see how much the group changed from the beginning of the week, and they changed because of the DAMAR kids. it was so cool...so encouraging.

it took me over a week to process...im still working on it...and to see the good that came out of DAMAR week, because honestly, i struggled so much. God worked it out. i sang the song...'Jesus can work it out, Jesus can work it, work it' He was present in every area...from the people in the group, to the kids we got to work with....even in the chaos. i let the tears flow during our debrief time...our final one. oh, i miss my new family so much.

there is more to come...final thoughts on MI and how God ruined my life.

peace.