Just a little note to update you on a couple things…
A while ago, I mentioned Janeth having a biopsy taken… and waiting for the results… A little history to remind you who I’m talking about… She and Ricardo left the streets at least 6 years ago when they moved to a town 50 kilometers north to be caretakers of a little piece of land… Janeth has dedicated herself to looking after her 6 kids (and in certain seasons making reed mats to sell) while Ricardo works at a soy/corn mill where they make animal feed… He gets paid very little but there are a few benefits like the farm truck to pick him up and drop him off… and being able to bring some feed home for the animals they are raising… (right now two pigs and 9 chickens… they used to have 2 small cows but they had to sell one when their youngest son got sick… and the other one died…)
Janeth asked me that day at El Jordan to pray for the biopsy results, and if it was cancer, “You’ll help me right?” Inside I kind of cringed because what if my “yes” means time when there’s none to spare… or money when there isn’t? I answered something to the effect of us being here in the good and bad… we talked about God who wants us to know Him… and we prayed…
A month later, her biopsy results are positive for cancer… She is having different tests to see if the cancer has spread… She has a lump on her head… her one leg swelled up twice the normal… and she has a lot of pain… Also, when she was 14 she had a cancerous tumor in her mouth/nose (she doesn’t remember it as cancer, but she was in the same hospital, lost her hair etc)…
Janeth was in the hospital for about a week… Here if you don’t have someone to buy your prescriptions (down to syringes, needles and IV fluids) or pay your tests, nothing gets done… Janeth’s “husband” has to work (there were several men laid off this past week… and Ricardo doesn’t want to miss work for fear of being the next one laid off), Steven (the oldest son – 14) has school in the mornings… which leaves 12 year old Corina to accompany her mom in the hospital… and 10 year old Keily to cook and look after 1 year old Glenn… Heily and Cristian are in between… and just roam…
At home, Corina is afraid to go to the store by herself… and too afraid to ride the family bicycle… Now she’s had to go from office to office in the hospital, looking for discounts for her mom, reserving hours for different tests, looking for medicines and so on… God brought Wade and Kathy from Alberta to visit us for a couple weeks; they came along side to help and encourage Janeth. They were a reminder to me… and to Janeth of God’s faithfulness and mercy in providing in ways that we couldn’t see before…
Please continue to pray for Janeth, her health, her family… We have tentatively planned a day “visit” to Janeth’s house on August 18th – volunteers and students… to take groceries that everyone has gathered, to cook, clean and wash clothes for the family… and to have a little “church” meeting with them… Janeth has made a profession of faith... you can pray that God confirms that in her, giving her a desire to know Him more...
Other things that have been happening:
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Believe it or not… Last week I was redoing all my paperwork to get my drivers’ license renewed (the other paperwork was obsolete because too much time had gone by….) If you remember, the last time I tried to get my license, I was stopped at the last point because my “double identity” was still in the system… After many visits to the Identification place, I was assured that I WAS THE ONLY ME… Hmmmm…. I took two mornings to get all the requisites for the renewal (and that was taking Marlee with me to get to the front of lines!!!)… and I was at my last stop… I started worrying when the lady behind the computer started shaking her head… Sure enough… my paperwork has been stopped once again… The other ME is still THERE!!!!! Sigh… (Now if that other me could wash the dishes and mop the floors it wouldn’t be bad at all!!!)
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Paperwork is not my favorite thing to do… and I tend to procrastinate whenever it comes to filling in forms, standing in lines, waiting and so on… Well… as a Bolivian citizen, Keiden only needs his ID card to travel to Peru so when he was a baby, I waited on his passport until I had to renew mine… Unfortunately, because he was already 2 years old, he first had to go through a whole process of proving his Canadian citizenship… We were getting worried when it didn’t come back with my new passport 3 months later… They told us not to worry, it can take up to 3 years!!!!!!!!!! Yikes… and all because I procrastinated…
Two years later, we finally have a full-fledged Canadian son… Yeah!!! Now we can get his passport… and we are one step closer to you all actually meeting my family in person!!!!!!!
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At El Jordan we have several girls who are really struggling… and a couple who have gone back to the streets and/or to their addictions from before… Sometimes it might seem that our work is in vain… but it isn’t…. there have been seeds planted, watered… their children have had a chance to learn so many things that they won’t forget even if their mom doesn’t come back to El Jordan… We pray, hope, trust that where-ever they might be, God will be working in their hearts, opening their eyes and drawing them back to Himself… We are in a battle for their lives… if we don’t pray and fight for them, who will? (That’s why I write YOU, so you can be included in this battle…)
This is one of the reasons why El Jordan doesn’t work with a “6 month” or “year program”… rather we say that we are here to “walk along side of the girls in their process of change”… Imagine for a minute a bad habit you would like to leave behind… you know that it is wrong, it doesn’t glorify God… Are you able to leave it completely? Do you ever have set backs? Do you ever have to shake your head, repent in your heart and get up and try again? Maybe our slip-ups or set-backs aren’t quite so noticeable… maybe they don’t seem so “bad”… maybe they don’t take us to the streets or sitting at a table stone-drunk at 3 in the morning while our kids are at home alone… but for our girls, that’s where a bad choice can take them… Sometimes when the morning comes, they realize what they’ve done, they stand up, set their eyes on God’s heart of justice and mercy… and keep going… Others, when they fall, that bottle of beer, the easy money, or bad friends are like magnets that pulls them in further…
Ana María hasn’t been coming to classes… Every time I go to her little room, I only find her kids at home alone… Nayer (who just turned 7), Maité (2)… and Yamil (10) (who if he finds any money, disappears for hours on end, playing video games in the market)… They think their mom is “working hard” to save up money for a fridge and that’s why she is so rarely home and why she doesn’t have money… The other day, I asked what they had to eat… they showed me a small handful of rice and three eggs…
On Monday Ana Maria’s sister who lives in another city called El Jordan, worried because the kids had gotten someone to call her – that their mom hadn’t been home since Saturday! Oh dear! Ana Maria did show up that night… but by the time I got there on Tuesday, she was already gone again… The kids told me, “We miss El Jordan!”
My heart is especially heavy for the kids… their dad died a couple years ago… and they really don’t have anyone else… I want to talk to Ana Maria… because social services will step in and take away the kids if she doesn’t turn things around… Could you please urgently PRAY for Ana Maria with me?
Please pray for El Jordan as we try and stand in the gap for Ana Maria and many more… The battle we are in feels relentless… yet we know God is Able… However, we have an enemy who doesn’t want to give these lives up… Pray that we will depend on God’s strength… and that we will be instruments, clean and useful to Him… pray that our girls will seek God and be willing to be changed by Him…
Other girls that you can pray specifically for are: Ruth Shirley, Katy, Laura, Leidy, Rosy and Ibet… Thank you…
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El Jordan says thanks... can you find Marlee...Do you remember Cam and Ken who were driving their bicycles across Canada??? Two months, Horseshoe Bay BC to Charlottetown PEI and 6,125.8 kilometers later… they completed their dream!!!
Thank you Cam and Ken...Congratulations Cam and Ken!!!! …and THANK YOU for including El Jordan in your adventure… and THANK YOU to everyone who donated to our ministry in their honor!!! You can’t really see the sign very well… but it says “Gracias Cam y Ken”. We appreciate what you did for us!!
Who would have ever thought that God could provide for our needs through two people driving their bikes across the country? God never ceases to amaze me!!!
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Well… I’ve taken over a week to write this so I better get this off… Please continue to pray for workers for the boys’ shops… wisdom and protection as we serve here…
Thank you for joining us… as we walk alongside our people here…
God bless and keep you!
Corina… for Marco, Keiden and Marlee