Prayers Answered [Deanna]

So Missions is over and I am typing in Kenting where I had to ride on arthur's back on a moped...in typhoon rain weather. the SCARIER part is that calvin drove ellie and almost crashed into a car in typhoon rain weather. The man in the car also yelled at him and it was very scary. Praise God we're all alive =)

Anyways, here are the highlights:
we went to go pass out tracks in front of the world games. The initial plan was htat we'd do the body worship but we didn't have portable speakers that run by batteries so we decided to not do it. Then, Priscilla and Ellie started doing street evangalism. Priscilla would speak and ellie would translate and they got a little crowd together. This was when we were done passing out tracks. Then I met up with Arthur who said he had the song on his phone. Then I started gathering a small group together and Arthur played the song and we did it. Then we used Emily's phone that was louder and did it again with a bit more people. And then, we did it a final time in a different area with a full explanation because priscilla and ellie were done. We had a little crowd watching us and videoing us through the phone so hopefully God will use it later on.

For hte last week of missions, we went to samuel's mom's school: Little Prince. I really wanted God to use me thru the kids because honestly, I felt liek I hadn't been used by Him for the kids in tien liao and the other school the first week. So I had fervently been praying but the first day, i tried hugging one of my girls (10 years old) and then another girl in my group yelled at me for hugging her because she had a heart condition and had just had surgery so I was thrown off by that. And then, when we got into groups, I didn't have my nametag so none of hte kids knew my name and all thought my chinese accent was weird because I had really lost my voice that first day. Then we had the afternoon kids and they were like 5-7 years old, REALLY shy, and I just didn't know how to control them. They're so young that it's really hard to talk seriously to them AND to talk to them for a long time because of how short their attention spans are. So i was pretty exasperated the first day.

Then, after the second day, they remembered my name after i told them one last time and then after class they like wouldn't want me to leave and whenever they saw me from their classroom, they'd scream out my name. I think them finding out i was ticklish also helped them to like me more. After I knew they liked me, i started being more bold on what to share with them and being a little more personal. I think because they're starting to understand a little more, they didn't share very personally. But I was very surprised by my afternoon young group because they shared very openly and a lot of them had fathers who drank and smoke all hte time and would hit them or their mother. It was hten that I started really having a heart to pray for all the father's in Taiwan because I think very few understand their true role in guiding a family. I see it in tw drama's too. All the male leads have bad relationships with their father while the female leads have the best relationship w/their father. I think they think too much of hteir responsibility of bringing home the money and leading in that way and not actually caring for their family in a loving way where their kids can actually experience love.

The girl with the heart condition ended up being the one i had the biggest heart for because everyone else in my group had gone to church before and so they could all memorize the verses easily because they had before at some time whereas isabelle would give up and not even try the first day. Then the 2nd day, she seemed more open to God and started participating more in answering questions and she became really attached to me. The 3rd day she wanted to be the first to recite the verse. It really touched me. On the 4th day, when I played with the kids, they all wanted me to sing the 2 songs to them, Alleluia and Deep Down. I didn't think they'd answer the question when i say Do you love your Jesus because they had just learned it but after i reminded them of the harder words, they SCREAMED it and loved that song more than the Alleluia (i think they only wanted that one to tickle me).

The last day was craaaaazy. For our closing we prayed for all the kids individually. All the girls in my older group started crying and I had never seen or felt the Holy Spirit move in such a powerful way, especially with an age group VERY diverse and VERY young. I knew that A LOT A LOT of us were praying for the kids and God really answered our prayers by being present and stirring in their hearts. Even though the girls wouldn't tell us why they're crying besides the fact that they didn't want us to leave/they'd miss us. I know something triggered their crying before they thought of us teachers and I KNOW God was with them. I just pray that theyw ill continue to seek after You, evne if they're not allowed to. Especially isabelle, since her family doesn't believe in anything and she started to understand God's love more and more everyday. 2 of my girls wrote me a card/got me a phone chain and one of those girls also made her sister write me a card in the youngest group. I had no clue who she was either but she for some reason knew me and my name and gave me a card. I felt like God had really answered my prayer by asking to be used by the kids because I had never felt that loved by that many little kids before. I don't interact with little kids that much in the states so all of this was a real blessing and something where we all knew ONLY Christ could have done it.

I also gave my cheese away to James and Chris's sister. I saw how much they loved it and how much james and samuel wanted to steal it before the girls saw it and now it is with them. Hopefully i can come back next year (PLEAAAAASE GOD MAKE A WAY) and HOPEFULLY they take REALLY good care of it and take many many pictures with it =)
I really better get this one back some time, not like my OTHER pillow...