Saturdays at New Day
Saturdays around New Day are a little different. In the afternoon, the orphanage hosts Kids Club for the kids from surrounding villages. They come, and get to play on the playground or soccer field for about an hour and a half. After that, they have a short Bible lesson and then they are fed a large meal that is prepared by ladies from the local church. There are usually about 80 - 120 kids. This is the biggest meal the kids will have all week and a great opportunity to feed them the Word as well. It is amazing to see young kids carrying the even younger kids on their backs all the way here. They never stop caring for them and watching over them, even when they are given the chance to forget about life for an hour and just be kids. The kids sang all of the books of the Bible (in Tonga of course) and worked on learning the memory verse for the week. The lesson was about being a cheerful giver which takes on a while new meaning when what you have to give may literally be ALL you have. In the States, we struggle with just giving from a savings account or giving our time to ministry and never actually giving until in hurts.
Watching babies shiver from the cold because they don't have the proper nutrition to keep themselves warm will put a whole new spin on just flipping on the heat or going through the drive-thru.
There's a quote that goes "If you want to go with God, you can't stay where you're at." While I decided to take this in a physical sense this summer, I also love what this quote is saying about our spiritual lives. When you give your life to Christ, your life shouldn't stay the way it is. If nothing in you is changing, something isn't right. God does not call us to stay. He may call you to physically stay where you are, but we should be growing in Him everyday. You are call to go out into your community and move as the Holy Spirit is moving in people around you.
The Holy spirit is constantly moving.
He is moving in our hearts, in our homes, in our communities, and around the world - Go with God.
I had a really hard time adjusting to life in the United States after spending my teen years in China. The excess and consumerism that I saw when I first moved back shocked me. My younger sister dealt with the same thing when she moved back. Reverse culture shock is a real thing. It's been 10 years since I moved back to the States and yet I still don't take hot showers for granted. :)
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