Beyond Burdens be........Blessings!

My last blog was almost a year ago as I prepared to lead a team to China.  Today I find myself once again preparing to head off to China to lead another team to the beautiful province of Fujian.  A new team, a new organization sponsoring me but still the same burden to make a difference in the lives of these children from my daughter's province.  A burden that was placed on my heart 4 years ago and weighed so heavily at times that I though my heart would break. Today that burden has brought many blessings in my life; new friendships, sponsorship, education, love, children, etc....A heart that once was so heavy with the emotional and physical hurts of life.   Burdens that I had carried by myself not trusting anyone with them and therefore not allowing them to be exposed to the light so they could be healed.  As I opened up and told my story I found unconditional love and my burdens now became blessings.   A heart that had to walk through the healing process herself so that she could walk others on the path she had traveled and found step by step that God was always there waiting and calling out to me.  Burdens I bore have now become connections in order to help others bear their own.  I rejoice that I have come to a place of healing that allows me to take these orphans of China and their caretakers farther than I could last year.

This year I go with a team that includes a teacher of Tia Chi, massage therapist, art therapist, girl scout leader, a mom of a son with sensory processing disorders that knows how only 18 months in an orphanage can have damaging effects on the brain of a child, a daughter adopted 18 years ago from this province and two males for the large group of teen boys we have in this camp.  I also go being sponsored by a wonderful organization that used Karyn Purvis' book, The Connected Child, as a Bible study to teach healing to grown women who came from hard places.  To me one of the most significant things is that I am allowed to bring my two adopted daughters back to China to help teach English and Christ's love to their age group.  Chloe will also be able to visit her friends, the two boys, we left behind 3 years ago.  God has been so gracious and merciful to me.

What do I go back with personally for the upcoming camp?  Experience and knowledge would be the two things at the top of my list.  Last year we were recruited to teach English first and foremost.  I had a wonderful team to fulfill this task.  We were blessed with a music teacher that also wrote curriculums, four beautiful ladies that had been on many mission trips and a sweet heart of a girl that wanted to learn and have her heart broken for the orphan.  I learned through this first trip and my studies through Texas Christian University that learning English was secondary to what these children needed.  They were not going to be able to learn English, higher learning skills, until we addressed the lower needs.  This is what we will go equipped to do this camp. These children through no fault of their own and unknowingly by the workers that were assigned to them were not given the the neural input they needed to self regulate can be taught this skills months and years later.  We will do this while introducing English words that will help them communicate in Mandarin, English and sign language what they need without acting out to get their basic needs met.

I am so excited to take what I have learned to continue the relationship I have built with the children.  Not only that but I am so excited to return to these children that I served last year to let them know I am committed to them and that I want to pursue a relationship with them.  I have not forgotten them and will seek to be a part of their lives as long as I am allowed.  They are precious and valuable to me just as they are to their Heavenly Father.  However, they can not know how precious they are to a Heavenly Father until they are shown that through us here on earth.  I have been blessed to be able to go back and ask that you go with me.  We are in need of prayer, supplies and funding.  Please consider supporting us by first praying and then through the support of meeting our needs financially.