4 years in Mexico

Four years ago today, I walked up to my new room at Casa Hogar Douglas. It smelled of fresh green paint. On the big blank wall were welcoming posters made by the 9 girls who I was to care for.

That evening we played together laughed together and prayed together for the first time. All the while I kept thinking and hoping my face wasn’t showing how scared I was.

I grew to love those 9 girls. And today I celebrate 4 years of Mexican faces, colors, sounds, smells, loves, cries, and music.

My memories circle around the experiences I’ve had here:

1. Caring for a total 17 teen girls (I will never forget this number).

2. 3 dorms or apartments where I have laughed at funny movies, baked brownies, and eaten spaghetti with my girls.

3. Singing melodies of hope after night time prayers.

4. Being huddled by a team of supporters and friends who cover me in prayer and watch as Jesus performs his miraculous healing right in front of my eyes.

5. Training over 500 people, including volunteers, mission guests, staff, and caregivers on what it means to be a healing presence in the life of a child from a difficult past.

This journey has been much more than I ever dreamed or imagined. He has taken me to countries I never thought I’d go. I have cared for girls, I never thought I ‘d know. And I have loved children, I never knew existed.

So today I celebrate! I celebrate that Jesus has been faithful to never leave me every step of the way. When the day seemed never ending he sang over me as I fell to sleep. And when it seems like all was lost, he helped me see how his promises are still at work.

I’m thankful for graduations, quinceñeras, relationships with sponsors, late night conversations, praying before bed every night, relationships with biological families, times when they hurt and I was able to hold them, and because when I hurt Jesus held me.