Monday at Manuelito

Monday: Celebrating Michelle’s Birthday

So we didn’t get to have our Christmas today with the kids…we have learned that in this we must be flexible.  We are going to have it on Thursday night.  So instead I will tell you about our day celebrating Michelle’s birthday. I will tell you the best I can about Michelle’s story.  There can be a lot of information lost in translation, so I’ll tell you the best I could understand.  Michelle has been with the project since she was two years old.  She and her sisters were some of the first to come to Manuelito.  Her mother was trying to raise her children on her own with no job, no money, and no husband.  She would sometimes have enough money to rent a room for a night but most of the time they slept on the streets, using trash bags as covers.  They went to the restaurants and begged for leftover scraps and had to beg for money from strangers.  The project found them and asked their mother if they could come live with them.  She said no for the first several invitations but eventually let them go. (There is so much more to the process of how they have helped these children and this mother but we couldn’t get it all with the language barrier.)  There are 6 girls and 1 boy in this family…I hope I got that correct.  So now, this family that had no hope and these children who slept on the streets are now becoming young adults and the ministry is beginning to see the fruit of their labor as one is in college, one will be a teacher here at the school and the others are still here in the project.  So today was Michelle’s birthday.  She is a beautiful young lady and she says she knows the Lord has a plan for her life.  Thankfully Michelle probably doesn’t remember her days of living on the streets.  While these siblings were not without family they still were with great need.  Praise the Lord that Michelle and her siblings have been rescued, given a chance in life and have learned of the love that Jesus has for them.  Praise the Lord that today Michelle could celebrate her birthday with hope and that her days of sleeping in garbage bags are over.  Michelle probably doesn’t remember her days of living on the streets but her older sisters remember all too well those days.  The flow of tears she had when sharing their story tell me she’ll never forget.  The memory of her life on the streets is surely what has motivated her other older sister to come back, to give back and teach in the school.  She will bring the love of Jesus to the children who have the same need as she did.  What a celebration and a great moment for this ministry to see the fruit beyond the life that was changed and to the life that was changed and is now changing lives as well!

                                                           This is Michele and Bryan

Tonight we will be going to Telanga to help with the children who are still living on the streets.  Manuelito can only help so many and there are still so many who need rescued.  Without enough help and enough funds they are just waiting to rescue more.