Again it has been a long time since I last blogged, and newsletter appear to have become a thing of the past! This is partly due to my increasing lapse of focus in communicating with you lovely people and partly due to technical difficulties (particularly in the case of newsletter). Therefore, as always I begin with an apology for not being in touch as often as I should. I think part of the problem is that the longer one stays in one place and works in the same job the more things seem routine and therefore, from ones perspective, less interesting to share! It is easy to forget that for those of you who are not hear in the nitty gritty of El Refugio life it is still interesting and that you want to hear what is happening here, both in the ministry and in my life.
Well in my life, as I have said and the title indicates, it has been a bit of a nightmare with technology! my camera has decided not to work, my laptop is running very slow and Microsoft office has given up on me (hence the issue with newsletters) and now the screen has gone funny too! Then last weekend I forgot that ipods are dry clean only and put mine in the wash with my sheets!! (I forgot it was on my bed!) despite several days in rice it has not been resurrected :(. However, there is an old cliché en YWAM for when things seem to be going badly "what does God want to teach me through this?" and I think I know the answer! I am a person who is very easily distracted, be that by TV, social media, games etc and can often be drawn away from spending time with God by spending time on such things more than with him. I have discovered it is a common tactic for my heavenly Dad to confiscate these things to refocus me and draw me back to Him, I think that is what is happening again!
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| In the pool with my new friend Gabriel |
That said, this year has been a relatively good one in terms of my personal times with God, a challenge in the beginning of the year to see "quiet times" not so much as a "religious obligation" but rather as "dates with Jesus" I realise that sounds cheesy, but hey I am cheesy so deal with it lol! but it changed the emphasis from something I should do because good Christians, especially those with the title "missionary" always have daily quiet times, the longer the more spiritual you are! to something I do because I want to, just as when you start a romantic involvement with someone you want to spend time with them and look forward to doing so, so it was with me, I wanted to get to know Jesus more, despite being a Christian for 22yrs I have only occasionally had a sustained intimacy with Him, and I wanted more. As this year comes to an end I cannot say that I have had quiet times every night, but I have filled my journal for the first time ever and have had many great conversations about serious issues and things I have long struggled with which has been really great and I am hoping that things with go from strength to strength in 2015.
This movement personally has really affected my ministry, in that although I came back from the UK ready to start Casa Esther, the project I feel called to establish here, and thought that by this time I would have a house and a small group of girls I was working with, I have not moved forward at all! this could be seen as a failure or as a frustration, however I see that my personal spiritual life is an important foundation for any ministry that I hope to start in the future and so although over the last 6 months I have not been able to take any time out of El Refugio to make any headway in Casa Esther I am happy with that as I can see that a solid foundation is being built in me.
The reason I haven't been able to take time out is that the El Refugio team is very small at the moment with just me and the teacher Doris still being here from the established team of last year, and the only fulltime help we have are the 2 German gap year students who, although very committed and eager, cannot be left alone to keep things going, and our new cook Lucy. Martin and Rossy are not often in the building as they are home-schooling their children and so work more from home in the administration side of things. Therefore as the most senior member of the team, I am there fulltime making sure all things run as they should. A case in point is today, a mother came to El Refugio this morning to discuss her teenage son who no longer attends the youth group, she told me he appears to have started getting involved in drugs and wanted our help. If I had not been there the German girls would have been at a loss to know what to do, they don't know this mother or her son, and the mother would have gone away feeling discouraged. So for now I am happy to rest in Him and await his timing for things to move forward for me.
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| Photo of the youth from 2011, front right is Vicky |
Generally things are going well in El Refugio, at a reunion for the youth that are not attending any more we heard that one of our teenagers, Jesus Alberto, is graduating from high school this year and has won a scholarship to study Psychology at a local university which is fantastic, and he knows he can come to me for help, although I am not sure how much I remember and how much I could explain in Spanish!! Also this years small group has made great progress academically. On a sad note we unfortunately lost one of our old youth, Vicky, this month to pneumonia which was left undiagnosed and untreated due to the clinic being overrun with a virus called Chikungunya which is ravaging the city at the moment, one of the main symptoms is a fever which is also a symptom of pneumonia, so when she went to the clinic she was told it was the virus and to go home, by the time she was seen by a doctor, on the 3rd visit, it was too late and she passed away the following morning. It is so annoying to see how, due to lack of education and self confidence, people are dismissed and patronised resulting in them not receiving their rights.
Well, that is an update, we have 5 weeks of work to go before Christmas and they will be busy!! Next week we are celebrating the 15th anniversary of El Refugio, then thanksgiving, the national YWAM conference in Medellin and then our end of year activities. I will be spending Christmas here in Cartagena with friends from the USA and Czech Republic.
God Bless you all
Petra
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