Lessons Learned

Hey y'all!

It is officially the end of week 3! Austin and I are chilling out around the Harmony House waiting for the next group and other summer staffers to arrive back from Montego Bay. This past week's group was amazing! There were 18 of them from Carmel Baptist Church in North Carolina. Even though we had to rearrange the schedule around this week, the team was in high spirits and were so cooperative. I am gonna miss y'all so much!!

There is a song by Relient K called "Failure to Excommunicate" and I cannot get these lyrics out of my head!
Jesus loved the outcasts.
He loves the ones the world just loves to hate.
And as long as there's a Heaven, there'll be a failure to excommunicate.

Jesus loves the outcasts... There is a woman at the Infirmary who has downs syndrome. The nurses do not know her name but they call her Becca. The first time I was there this summer, I just watched people's interaction with her. She would kind of just be passed up because she couldn't talk and if you approached her she would cuddle up like a ball on the floor with her head face down. Some of the residents at the Infirmary said things like "don't bother with her, she doesn't understand" or "she can't talk, so just leave her alone". They even have some mean names that they would throw out at her. Becca is an outcast. It broke my heart to see how they were treating her.. like she wasn't even a person. This past week, I spent the hour that we have there just sitting on her bed. Even though she couldn't talk and wouldn't look at me for like 30 minutes, I just rubbed her arm and held her hand and told her that I loved her. She finally looked up at me and got this huge smile and started laughing. She was mumbling words that I couldn't understand but she was communicating happiness back to me. In that moment, I just broke down and cried. To this world, Becca may be an outcast. But to Jesus, she is everything. She is His princess and He knows everything about her. He knows what she is thinking and the words that she wants to say but cannot express... It made me think that as a believer in Jesus Christ we are outcasts living in this world. This is not our home. We do not belong here. So, in all truth, we should be honored to be considered an outcast for Christ. I want to stand out and be bold for him no matter what the cost. So I want to throw a shout out to Becca and thank her for reminding me that I am also an outcast. And I hope she understands how much she is loved!

So, we only have one more week before our mid-summer retreat! I can't believe that the first half of the summer is almost over. Please continue to pray that the love of Christ will pour out from us Jamericans and that we will give Him the glory in all that we do and say!!

Kells