Many of you have shared a desire to help on projects when we found a need. After being here for several months, we have identified two very worthy projects.
Join us in serving Granadilla:
We would like your help in raising funds for a community center in a small town called Granadilla and to construct a home for a generous Young Lives volunteer.
Early one Monday morning I joined the Young Life National Director at a meeting of a few community leaders to discuss the building of a community center in a small town called Granadilla. Young Life has a strong presence in the community and they have been holding club at the current community center for years. The current community center is below.
It is hard to explain my thoughts after visiting, but it is basically a tin building built with scrap metal and wood. There are, I believe, two light bulbs that give light to the inside during evening meetings. There are no windows, but some light flowed in through the walls during our morning meeting.
The people meeting us do not work for the city. The city would not attend a meeting like this because they have no funds to make improvements. These are citizens. They are like you and me. They care about the lives of kids in the community and want them to have a place to go and things to do other than some of the poorer options available, like drugs and gangs.
We are meeting to discuss the building of a community center and trying to confirm that we can start with construction in June of this year. We are prayerfully planning to build a community center and a small concrete soccer field, which is a big sport down here. The field is about the size of a volleyball court with two goals on either end. They could play indoor soccer and have a great way for kids to have fun and stay out of trouble. As is typical here in Costa Rica, the city dumped sand and rocks for the court but the concrete never made it. Our hope is that we can raise $15,000 to build the field and the community center. GIVE
A home for the Family of Reina
You do not know Reina and may never meet her but you know the type of person. She is like the woman in the bible that offered two small copper coins. They were a tiny donation, but it was huge in the site of the Lord. Reina does not have much but she gives in ways that continue to blow people away here. She gives of her time; she cooks for the teen moms here, and she has never complained or asked for help or a handout.
We went to the place where we pray we can begin to build her home and words cannot describe this place. It is in a town called Tirasas and it is dangerous and extremely poor. There are no roads; only narrow pathways that you can drive a moto or small car through. When it rains things get really bad. From the animals to the sewage it is comparable to those places you heard me speak of many years ago in Mexico. It is a desperate looking place.
And this is where the Lord continues to amaze me because in this place that I could not imagine spending a night, Reina and her husband have hope. Hope of building a home that they can call their own; and hope that they can care for their family there. Not just their three kids. That is not how family works here in Latin America. ‘Family’ often includes our brothers and sisters and parents. We tried to determine exactly what we needed to build and asked Reina and her husband how many people would be living in the house. They seemed to be reluctant to tell us, not because it was embarrassing but because I think they felt like they were asking so much. They are such humble people. Always smiling. And in the end, they are hoping to house 15 people in their little home.
After we met with them and they left I stood with a friend and said nothing. What can you say when you are around people like this that give and give and give and never want anything in return. I told my friend that I needed a long walk with the Lord. It is good for me to write about these things because it helps me sort out what to do next.
I stood in that barrio like so many others with house after house as far as you can see and try and figure out how my life looked so different. Again I am thankful for knowing people like Reina, that despite having so little, again define for me the word JOY. A joy in the Lord.
We can’t do this alone. Will you help us give a home to a person that does nothing but give? We are trying to raise $10,000 for her home. It will not be much but it will be a place for her to care for her family and continue to bless the teens that she mentors and continues to pour out her life in a difficult place called Tirasas. GIVE