Merry Christmas everyone!
Last week, sitting on the curb, my heart was heavy… Rosario is only 13.… already covered in scars… some open and oozing… some self-inflicted… others, reminders of the harshness of life… Countless scars on the outside… outnumbered only by the unseen ones, on the inside. My mind flew back to the first time I saw someone cutting themselves… his tears mixed with the blood that dripped on the sidewalk… “They look my dog away…” He was older, a street person… and someone had taken away his dog, his companion… his family…
That was 20 years ago… I could almost feel his pain, in the blood, steadily drip, drip, dripping… each drop of life - a silent cry of anguish, agony…. As I looked at Rosario´s “marks”… I know there is a story for every cut… Her glue bottle came out… the glue numbs the pain… but doesn´t take it away…
“Take her to a kids´ home, Hermana Corina.” I took a closer look… surprised to find out she was a girl… Her “boy look” apparently started 3 years ago, her “protection” when she found herself living with a group of older street kids when her mom was in jail the first time…
Her mom has been back in jail for a month… This time Rosario didn´t have anywhere to go… She´s no longer welcomed by the street kids where she used to live… Her relatives in another city wouldn´t accept her with her scars… Her older sisters (15 and 17) already have started their own families… so where could she go? …to the streets…
…but the scars and living on the streets didn´t start a month ago… Rosario is a second generation street kid… basically growing up on the curb beside her mom…. She is more comfortable there than anywhere else… (So how do we say “Merry Christmas” in a situation like this??)
“Do you want to go to a (children´s) home?” The answer was an emphatic shake of the head… “no”…
Rosario came with me to El Jordan to have a shower, eat and wash her clothes while I tried to get a hold of her mom in jail… We ended up driving to jail to talk with Sara (the mom)… Rosario doesn´t have her documents so she isn´t allowed in…. From her mom, I found out that Rosario is kind, hardworking and very loyal to her mom… but she also has a very violent, cynical and fearless… Back at El Jordan, she folded up her wet jeans to take with her - she wasn´t planning on coming back… The jeans were stained and torn… but special to Rosario… “My mom gave me these jeans…”
As I write, “Christmas on the Streets” is being prepared.… 2 a.m. and the pork is being cooked… and soon we´ll start on the rice and plantain… We´ve cut back our numbers and made some big changes… to make it a more “family affair”… Rather than give out a hundred plates, people will be taking out 6, 8, 12 plates… sitting down on curbs, chatting, showing them that just like Rosario´s jeans, stained and torn, they are special to Jesus…
Pray that the group that is going where Rosario “lives” will meet up with her … and be able to share the Christmas message with her – in word and deed…
For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given,
and the government will be on his shoulders.
And he will be called
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
7 Of the greatness of his government and peace
there will be no end.
Isaiah 9:6,7
For to us a child is born… to us a son is given… this precious gift is for each and every one of us!
For to us a child is born…. to us a son is given… Jesus didn´t stay in heaven on His throne, distant and unattainable… He came as a child, a son… reachable, attainable…
And the government will be on his shoulders…. A son, a child… but there is nothing weak or powerless about him… He is strong, powerful
And he will be called Wonderful Counselor… How many of our “kids” coming through El Jordán have said to me, “There was no one to tell me what was right and wrong…” “If only I had known these things when I was young…”… For all those who have no direction in their life, whose right and wrong is so skewed, Jesus wants to be their Guide… their Wonderful Counselor…
Mighty God and not only can He lead and guide us, He is MIGHTY… ABLE… to change any heart and life… Even mine… Even Rosario´s…
Everlasting Father… In the 21 years that God has allowed me to work with street kids… I haven´t met ONE with a good relationship with their father… Their earthly fathers abused or abandoned them… Any “kindness” was tied to some ulterior motive…. Last week I asked one of the girls to tell me about some good memory from a Christmas past… Tears filled her eyes… she shook her head, “I don´t have any… I never knew my father… I never had a Christmas where we were a family – mom and dad and kids…” Jesus is the only one who can fill that void… as the Everlasting Father…
Prince of Peace. One of our prayers for El Jordan from the very beginning was that this would be a place of Peace… where people could find an oasis from their darkness, terror and hopelessness… and in that oasis be free to “see”… and hope… The key to that peace? The Prince…
Of the greatness of his government and peace there will be no end. This great Christmas gift doesn´t fade like the bright lights… or end like the Box Day sales… He´s not a passing fad… This Prince of Peace reigns forever…
So back to the “Merry Christmas”… This is what it is all about… the Good News… “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given…” that is what we want to share with our students, their families and those who are still on the streets… we want to share it through our live and love… so that one day, as the Holy Spirit touches their hearts, they would understand these words…
Merry Christmas to all!!!
Pray for us as we go to the streets later today… for Rosario and others who we will be meeting up with… We have felt lots of the enemy´s darts and discouragement in the last days through things like phones that won´t work, the “t” and “y” and “o” not working on the computer keyboard, finding out that El Jordán owes almost $11,000 US in back taxes (our taxes were paid… but they updated the value of our properties and charged us the difference plus fines for the last 5 years…)… a windshield breaking, a truck getting stuck… the pig meat cutter getting drunk and more… sigh…
Of the greatness of his government and peace there will be no end. Lord, help us not get lost in the shadows… or lose sight of your Forever Greatness…
MERRY CHRISTMAS everyone!!!
Lots of love from Marco, Corina, Keiden and Marlee… (and all the El Jordán family…)