Highly Recommended Book: Hope Lives - A Journey of Restoration by Amber Van Schooneveld
I recently ordered this book online and could not be any more in love with it. Many of you are probably aware either from talking with me in the last few months or reading my blog that I have been wrestling with many tough questions since I moved here like: Why are there so many poor people? How does God feel about the poor? Why does He allow half the world to live off of less than $2.50 a day? What am I supposed to do about this? Does this ever go away? Can I do anything to make a difference? I was looking for any sort of book or bible study on poverty and God's heart for the poor and I came across this online, over looked it a million times, kept coming back to it and reading more reviews, and then finally I gave in and just ordered a copy. This book is very very similar to Shane Claiborne's book Irresistible Revolution in subject matter and presentation - tons of awesome photos throughout and is made to look like a scrap book of sorts - but different in ways that I love. This is a 5 week bible study journey looking at what Scripture has to say about the poor written by a woman who has traveled extensively with Compassion International. I have been challenged everyday, encouraged and uplifted with each reading.
The whole first week is about understanding poverty. Growing up in beautiful Cocoa Beach, Florida - I've never seen real poverty. Sure I've seen American housing projects, homeless people and those who can't afford to buy the latest fashions but honestly, I've never been face to face with people who have no running water, no electricity, live off of less than $5 a day, and who live in shacks made of trash in a slum until I moved here. I'm becoming very convinced that only America looks like America - the rest of the world (with few exceptions) lives very very differently than what we are accustomed to. The author has led me through Isaiah 58. This chapter of Scripture describes a time when the people of Israel were complaining to God saying that they pray all the time and go to church everyday and offer all these sacrifices but that God isn't really paying attention to them. So God responds back with this:
"Is this the kind of fast I have chosen,
only a day for a man to humble himself?
Is it only for bowing one's head like a reed
and for lying on sackcloth and ashes?
Is that was you call a fast,
a day acceptable to the Lord?
Is not the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
and break every yoke?
Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter --
when you see the naked, to clothe him,
and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?"
- Isaiah 58:5-7
I don't know about you but that hits me hard. God was not impressed with the Israelites and I'm pretty sure He's not at all impressed with my religiosity either. So what is it that God wants from us? What pleases him? Feeding the poor, caring for the oppressed is not easy - it's messy, it's hard. Perhaps though, what God is asking of us - his people - his church - the body of Christ - is something different than sitting at home and "perfecting myself." God knows I'm incredibly guilty of that. Don't get me wrong- that is important - but I think there is more. This is crushing. I love thinking about it. What do you think?
If you'd like to read the book for yourself - visit my friends at the Family Christian Bookstore for a copy http://www.familychristian.com/shop/product.asp?ProdID=57241
Meet one of my favorites: his name has been somewhat of a mystery for a long time.... At times I've called him something between Javier, Jaer, and Andaer. His name is actually Leonardo Jahir and he goes by the 2nd name. I'm beginning to think that he has hearing problems because he always yells and has a large speech impediment which explains partially why no one could figure out his real name. I do know that he is 7 years old and that this is his first year at Casa Hogar Douglas and every time I am at Douglas, he comes over and hangs out with me whenever he sees me. Two women came to visit him a few weeks ago while I was there- maybe one is his mom or grandma but I'm not totally sure. He didn't seem very eager to see either of them which worried me a bit. What drew me to him initially or so was his anger towards just about anything and his yelling. Regardless, this little boy has held my attention since I moved here 9 months ago. Two weeks ago, many of the Casa Hogar Douglas kids spent friday afternoon swimming in our pool. I spent most of the afternoon swimming with a 2 year old name Angel until the pool floats finally got inflated and little kids started to get into the big pool with their new floaties. One of those kids happened to be who i often refer to as "my son" (pictured above). I'm confident that this was one of his first times in a pool and it was also his first time in the big pool (we have a kiddie pool and a large pool). An adult was making fun of him and saying that he didnt know how to swim. That angered me to no end- regardless of if she was joking around with him or not, I wasn't going to take it. So i jumped in and tried to teach him how to swim in spanish. He doesn't have much confidence and didn't want to lay parallel to the water and kick his legs but he had a great time and it boosted his confidence I'm sure. I spent at least an hour pulling him back and forth in the pool like I was the motor for his boat and he loved it. He kept yelling at the other kids in his slurred spanish to watch him and see how fast he was going. It was awesome. So if you ever get a chance to visit Douglas and want to know which kid is my "son" just listen for the yelling- that's my kid.
Behold our cave. Actually I think our cave wasnt visible from this photo angle and was actually a bit lower- not much though. Still a death climb if you ask me. This "hike" turned out to be more of a free face rock climb. At times I honestly was not sure if I was going to survive the climb because the rock was so slippery. I blamed my shoes until after we got home and I looked the place up on wikipedia and read about how it is known for being difficult to climb due to it's limestone surface which made me feel better about myself.
I insisted on taking a picture at the "first" cave. We had only been hiking for about 5 minutes when we came to it and everyone laughed at me because they said that this cave didn't really count. We had only just begun. They were right. Ask anyone who has ever been hiking with me and they'll tell you that I like to lead and that I'm very confident, fast, and daring. NOT on this day! It took us an hour to climb up to the big cave. As we started to climb back down, Hope and Ruby both commented on how interesting it was to see me scared and not ultra confident for the first time since they've met me. I had absolutely no traction with my feet and had to climb the entire way down on my hands and rear. I did the "crab walk" for our vertical decent because my shoes could not grip anything to save my life. 
To the left is our only trail marker - someone else's grave marker i think? I was told that someone fell from this location and I believed it. There really were no trails. You just started climbing on your hands and knees upward until you found some caves.
To the right was our view looking back through most of the climb. There was a huge bike race going on that day. I've decided that mexicans love biking and lance armstrong more than americans. They are everywhere, especially in the mornings on the highways. All in all though, this was a beautiful and stunning location. The rock faces come shooting up out of the ground and sheets of rock are left perpendicular to the ground making for some awesome rock climbing but this is not what I would call HIKING. So don't believe anyone if they say this is a HIKE. 
Ever since I moved here 9 months ago, I've found myself drawn to a sibling set at Casa Hogar Douglas. Monica (15 years old) and Tere (18 years old) have lived at Douglas for about 12 years now. Whenever I visit Douglas, I make sure to say hi to them and see how they are doing. And sometimes, I find myself singing High School Musical songs with them in english and dancing with Monica or mopping floors with Tere. They are among the oldest at this particular children's home and I got the feeling that they are often over looked by visiting groups so I've always made it a point to be intentional with them. Over the Easter Holy Week when ALL of mexico is off from school and work, I made it a point to spend everyday with them. To the right is Lola (12 years old from Douglas), me, Monica, Kenzi (fellow B2B Stinter), and Tere at the river walk in Monterrey for a day of people watching, lunch out, snacks, the river, and a chance to leave their orphanage. 
To the left is a photo of us eating snacks during a break from swimming in the pool. We were in the pool that day for hours! It was a special treat for them because each day that week, I picked them up for some planned activity. On this day, it was the Back2Back pool. The Holy Week here was very interesting for me because the entire country is off for a week or 2 week long vacation in honor of the crucified Christ. Everyone travels somewhere - to the beach or to visit family - but orphans just sit at the orphanage bored.
Photo right is us with ice cream sundaes after our pizza fest. The week before the Easter Week vacation, I asked the two of them what their dream day would be if we could do anything and they both said, "swimming at the Back2Back property, and High School Musical movies in your apartment, and pizza and ice cream." Are they easy to please or what?! Yeah so I made all of that happen. I will admit that it was a bit tiresome to watch all 3 High School Musical movies and hear all the songs and then listen to everyone try to sing them in english over and over again BUT the girls loved it.
