"Eat our Peanut Butter"

Have you ever read the story about the widow that gave her last two coins?  The rich had come through a given much more money than the widow, but all the widow had was two small coins, and she gave them away (Mark 12, Luke 21).  We experienced that today at Casa Esperanza.  Daniel opened up a cupboard and showed us two large jars of peanut butter.  He said, "I love your American peanut butter!  In Chile we don't really have peanut butter, so if you are lucky enough to find it at the store it is very expensive."  Then he looked at the boys and said, "Oh!  You probably miss peanut butter!  Here, take this peanut butter - please, have it for yourself."  It is hard to put into words how the big the hearts of those at Casa Esperanza are.  Big!

I took the day off today, so we all went to Casa Esperanza and got there a little after 10:30 a.m  We started in on our little project of the day shortly after arriving.  There is a gravel entry way at Casa Esperanza, but some big rocks are still left around from before they built the entry way and this will cause problems over time.  So we began pulling up the big rocks out of the entry way.  I found a garbage bag and picked up small bits of trash on the property.  All four of the boys worked hard.

The boys tired of this after awhile, and went inside to find some girls to play a card game with them.  The girls seemed to really enjoy this, since the boys would look at their cards each hand and basically tell them what to do next.  Steffy said to Noah, "You're the boss!  Show me what to do!"

Today was a busy day at Casa Esperanza.  One of the beautiful young women there, 18 or 19 years old, had gotten pregnant recently.  Pregnancy out of wedlock is very difficult and many people can be quite judgmental when this happens.  Casa Esperanza embraced this young woman and said, "Everyone makes mistakes.  You are loved and accepted here."  Yesterday, this woman began having complications so Willie and I think Daniel took her to the hospital.  She had miscarried the baby (it sounded like she was in her first trimester).  While everyone was sad at the loss of life, it also seemed as if there was some sense of relief - that this woman would be able to go on and finish her education and start a new life.  Willie, Patti and this young woman arrived back at Casa Esperanza today at about 1:00 p.m.  Just in time for lunch.  Many hugs and kisses were given all around at this homecoming.

Lunch was amazing!  Patti had made a soup with potatoes, chicken and other spices that was really great.  She also made spaghetti with a meat sauce.  My favorite thing that she made was a corn dish.  I cannot remember what it is called, but you peel the skin off corn, make this mixture and then wrap it up in the skin of the corn and boil it.  Wow!

We arrived back at the apartment tired as usual, but so filled with love and joy.  We came here to serve, yet we are the ones that are being so blessed and shown what it really means to be generous and love like Jesus.