Camp with the Reghin kids :-)

While there have been harder weeks for me emotionally and physically, this past week with the Reghin kids stretched me more than ever. My faith, my strength, and my heart was so pushed by the Lord in what He taught me. Here are several highlights:

--most of the kids on my team (“Echipa Brazilia”) this week were severe special needs. Two of my girls took a lot of attention, everything from helping brush their teeth to cutting up their food. While this was draining, I loved being able to take care of Simona and Maria. They both touched my heart so much this week.

--a little about Simona…this girl is probably shorter than 5 feet and cannot speak. I met her on Tuesday since she does not live at Reghin. I fell in love with her immediately. She was at my side the entire week, holding my hand. If I wasn’t holding her hand, she would just grunt at me and grab it. All week, I wondered what was going on inside of her, if she could understand anything that was going on. When she began to pull me down to hug her, I could tell that she could tell that I loved her. On Thursday, the psychology side of me came out and I decided to get out paper and markers for her to draw. At first, she drew squiggles in rows over the entire page. It was so orderly and exact, true signs of Autism or Ausburgers. When I saw this I wondered if that was all her brain saw; if her brain was only static. I flipped over the paper and wrote Simona’s name. I was amazed to see that she could somewhat copy the letters. It was very rough as if she has never learned to read or write, but it was something. What amazed me even more though, was that she began to draw a person after this. It looked like one of the blob person figures that a 4 year old would draw, but I was shocked to see her draw this. Every line and mark was so deliberate. It was so encouraging to see this, because it meant that there is more inside of her than what you would think. On Thursday night, as I prayed over each kid on my team, the Lord brought to my heart to pray for healing for Simona. All week, she would only nod or grunt when she wanted my attention. My heart broke when I thought about what would happen to her one day. I was full of questions for the Lord of who would take care of her and how she would function without being able to communicate. But then I had to remember that the Lord has her, He will take care of her and that I need to trust in His plan for each of these kids’ lives. That night when we were praying, the Lord moved in several of our hearts to pray healing over Simona. Brian spoke to everyone when we gathered back together about following the Lord’s prodding to do something that may be uncomfortable. My heart broke when I realized he was speaking about Simona, that we were going to pray for her to speak. She didn’t speak that night except making some different sounds to me when I put her to bed. But then on Friday morning, when Brian asked who would pray for our breakfast, Simona’s hand shot up so fast. She ran to the front and while we couldn’t hear her praying, I knew she was. I am convinced that one day I will hear Simona’s story from her own mouth, whether that may be on earth or in Heaven, it is in the Lord’s plan. Experiencing life with Simona this week completely pushed my faith in the Lord to take care of each of these sweet kids. And I have full confidence that even though I doubt in the hope they have to have a good life, the Lord knows and has a plan for each of them. One thing that I ask of all of you is that you pray along with us that God heal Simona’s voice, that she be able to speak one day. One of our prayers this summer has been that the deaf would hear and the mute speak. Please pray alongside us in that, so that we can praise the Lord for what only He can do. I fully believe that God is the ultimate healer and I look forward to hearing reports of how He has worked.

--we had a couple of discipline issues this week with the kids. It’s so hard because you want to have so much mercy for them, you want to believe everything they say, but sometimes you just can’t. You have to set rules and stick to what you say. We had an issue with plates being stolen. Brian gave them several chances to return the plates without getting in trouble, but told them that if they weren’t all returned, we were not going to the Weekend. It ended up that we had to decide to not take the kids to the Weekend. It broke our hearts to have to punish the entire group for just a few kids’ bad choices, but no one returned the plates, so we had to stick to our word.
--this week I realized that I only had this week and next week of camp left, that I just need to pour all of myself out. I don’t want to leave Romania with regrets that I didn’t love on the kids enough, that I didn’t give my all to serving the Lord here. God gave me so much strength this summer to get through homesickness, to handle some intense weeks of camp, to learn so much about how I lead and serve in a group setting, and so much more than I could even imagine. It has been a great summer, but the great part about that realization is that I have one more week of camp left and I can give it all I have and more because the Lord is my strength.

--i could go on for hours about this week. there are so many small and big breakthroughs that i saw with the kids, the staff, and volunteers. it really was a great week.

Well, I have only two more weeks from Monday until I get home. I am so excited to go home, to be with my family and friends, to just soak in all that I have learned here in Romania. Something that all of you could also be praying about for me is a job for me when I get home. I have no idea what the Lord wants for me. Please pray that He guide me to the perfect job and the perfect location, and that He continue to give me a peace about His plan. I love all of you very much and look forward to being able to speak to many of you about even more of what the Lord has done here. Thank you for praying, for reading, and for supporting me here.