thoughts.

In just a few short hours we are heading out to the northern border of Honduras to a town called Copan Ruinas. It is a well-known Honduran landmark filled with Mayan ruins. In my two-and-a-half years of living in Honduras, I have yet to visit this popular tourist destination. So let’s just say I am a little excited! John, Becca and I, along with our two Micah interns: Hannah and Israel, are taking Maycol, Yeison and Cristofer to help out with a medical brigade that will be coming down from Houston. The bilingual ones of us will do translating for the doctors, while the others will help run a vbs-type program with the kids in the small village we will be working in. It should be an exciting week of ministry and an opportunity for the boys (and us) to do something out of the normal routine!

And while I am very excited to be going on this trip, my heart is heavy. A few months ago I got the chance to get to know a very special street kid, Kevin. Here is a blog post I wrote about him in early December: http://micahcentral.blogspot.com/2009/12/street-kid-spotlight-kevin.html
Kevin is 17, and has been coming to our weekly street kid soccer games for some time now. However, about two months ago, he decided he wanted to do something different with his life, and after a couple of failed attempts he was finally admitted into Casa Alianza, a group home/rehab center for over 150 teenagers in Tegucigalpa. He was doing well, and over Christmas vacation a few of us started going regularly to Casa Alianza to visit with him, encourage him, pray for him and occasionally bring him gifts to show him how proud of him we were. Last Saturday we were on one such visit… (actually Marvin Morazan, one of the older Micah guys who was on Christmas break from his university in Costa Rica, planned a little concert for the kids in Casa Alianza). As we were there hanging out with the kids, I began chatting with my friend Kevin. He complained that he was bored of living in CA and that he planned on leaving the project the next morning. We talked and talked with him, trying to convince him otherwise, trying to help him see what he would be throwing away if he left. Finally, he decided to make a deal with me.

Here’s how the conversation went:
K: If you take me right now to go get some Chinese rice, I will stay in Casa Alianza.
J: You’ll stay?
K: Yeah, I will stay, I promise.
J: For how long?
K: For three years. I will stay in Casa Alianza for three years… I will start studying again… come on, let’s go.
J: So you’re telling me that if I buy you one plate of Chinese rice, it will determine your future for the next three years?
K: Yep. You don’t believe me?
J: Not really.
K: And if you don’t, you can bet that I will leave here tonight, I will go upstairs right now and get my stuff and leave…. and you can tell your friends that I left because you wouldn’t buy me Chinese rice.
J: Well, I guess we better go find some Chinese rice… but you promise you’ll stay?
K: I promise, for three years.

So… we went and got the Chinese rice! Kevin was still in CA two days later when we went to pick up a few of the girls for a couple hours of bracelet making, which Kevin decided to tag along to. He seemed to be doing really well.

Then tonight, we were at soccer with all the street kids, and guess who shows up. I look over and there is Kevin, standing at the edge of the soccer field with a bottle of glue in his pocket. My heart sank. I hurried over to him, “What happened?” “Kevin, what happened? What are you doing here?” He said that the project had given him 3 days leave to go visit his family. Yet here he was, not with his family, but with his glue bottle instead. Several of us chatted with him, trying to encourage him to make good decisions, and in the end, he said he would be back at Casa Alianza on Monday like he’s supposed to be.

PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE PRAY WITH ME THAT KEVIN MAKES THE RIGHT DECISIONS. Please pray that he chooses to spend this weekend with his family, not wandering the streets like he used to. Please pray that he will return to Casa Alianza on Monday, clean and truly ready to give what it takes to turn his life around for the best. Pray that Christ’s love touches him in the deepest parts and gives him purpose in his life. Thank you for hearing my pleas for Kevin. Please know also that there are hundreds more Kevins in the world… and keep them in your prayers as well!