Activities: We visited ten sites that were either church run organizations, government run organizations or missionary organizations. We visited schools, day cares, orphanages and the city dump. We interacted with the kids and did a 3 hour Bible school at some locations.
In the Bible school we told Bible stories, sang songs, did games and crafts and had a puppet show which shared an evangelistic message. |
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One “Snap-shot”: On Thursday, January 3, 2008, our team arrived at the Baptist Daycare Center in Guatemala City, a preschool where mothers leave their children as they go to work at the city dump. They are the lowest paying jobs in the worst part of the city. Many of the jobs involved recycling trash from the dump for resale to big, ugly, filthy trucks that drove up to buy the plastic and cardboard and etc. by the pound from the poor people who sold it.
I was there in front of little three-year old Juan. His short hair was almost blue-black in color and stuck out in all directions. Looking into his deep, dark brown eyes you could imagine many untold stories. I was there on my knees face to face with him making the straps shorter on his new backpack to fit his small frame. It was not our habit to kiss the children but I could not help kiss him on his baby-like cheek. He looked at me and said not a word. His eyes said volumes. His eyes said thank you. But the thank you was not so much for the backpack, but for the attention. He seemed to say, thank you for caring, for caring that I exist, for looking into my eyes, for caring that the backpack fits, for sharing an embrace. His eyes said, I believe I really do matter after all."
Bob Beams 1/9/08
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