Stretching your limits

On Friday, it was time to share with the 20 street kids again in their 'Friday Church' service. What do you do when you only have a limited number of occasions to share with a group of kids who have experienced different abuses, losses and disappointments in life, and are sitting right in front of you?

We arrived at the Drop in Centre, and Carol went with our friend Margaret and Tabitha to the centre of the city to look for craft materials for MEFI. (I make that sound easy, but I assure you it is not). Meanwhile the street kids were finishing their shower routine and getting something to eat. (Not a great idea before a church service.) I was trying to go over what I had chosen to say, and first one of the kids who has been really incredible at the centre, very respectful and considerate, came in to chat in the office where I was working. He just wanted a quiet space to chat, to find out a little more about our family, how much longer we were going to be helping with the work, and how he was grateful that we were there.  As soon as he went out, another kid came in. He started to tell me that he was from Veracruz, and his father had walked out on the family when he was very young, and his mum had a new boyfriend who hated him, and would hit him, so he ran away from home. He was 7 at the time, and after street homes for young kids, and moving cities, he had been in Mexico City for about 7 years now. He's about 24. I told him that he had been just a little younger than Oscar when he ran away from home. It was hard to stomach.

Food time again.

Talk about raising the stakes. What do you share, in Spanish, with a group of kids who want to know more about God?

Well, you tell them about Jesus, who helped the poorest, the outcasts of His society, and showed them respect, and told them how to be right with God. You tell them that they are valuable in God's eyes, and that they can turn to Him. With the best Spanish you can muster, stretching your vocabulary and grammar to their limits, you point them to One who died for them because He loved them.


This is the work of MEFI, the work of the team who give their energies to talk, play, give haircuts and pick out head lice, treat wounds, (we've seen all that and more this week) and yet take the time to share with them something that can actually give them hope for the future. PLEASE pray for this team.

Just to finish though, I hope you can make out in the picture below our Oscar, who has fulfilled a dream to play football in Mexico with street kids. He even scored 2 goals this time. (I think he gets his football skills from his mum...)

Meanwhile right beside the football pitch was a play park, so Zara got to find ants, butterflies, flowers and weeds, slides, cobwebs and plenty of dust. 2 happy kids.