Carol - From the streets to a fulfilled life

San Jose, Costa Rica

Carol slept that night in a vacant lot, dressed in a trench coat and expensive high heels. "It was the worst," she recalls. Her addiction began when she was just 13-years-old. At first, it was just cigarettes and liquor, but then it was on to synthetic drugs such as Ecstasy and LSD. At 16, she was out of control. She even slept in the house of her drug dealer.

Her parents knew of her problems, but minimized them. Her mother took her out of high school and put her in night school. When that didn't work, she sent Carol to live with her grandparents in another part of the country. 

Far from improving, Carol fell deeper and deeper into addiction. After a while, she returned to her mother's house, but the constant fighting with her mother sent her to the streets and the vacant lot.

One day, while walking through a park, she was reunited with her mother. Her mom asked her to go into a program where she could get help. Her mother said, "If you're not in a center, you'll be sent to an asylum." Carol went home with her mother where was able to bathe and have a meal. 

Later that day, Carol's mom took her to Renacer - CFCI's therapeutic center for girls in San Jose, Costa Rica. At first, Carol thought she would be there only a few weeks. "When I realized I would be in Renacer for several months, I was very upset." But little by little, the anger gave way to acceptance of her problems.

Thanks to the professional approach and the spiritual renewal, Carol understood the reasons for her addiction and the road to a new life was created. Carol says, "You have thousands of feelings within you. At that time, you learn to appreciate who you are and understand the meaning of love and God." So says this young 22-year-old. 

While at Renacer, Carol took the time and studied to be an administrative assistant. Now, she is married and a mother. She works with her husband in their event production business. 

A life transformed by Christ and the generous CFCI donors who support Renacer! Visit www.cfci.org to learn more and join where God is working through CFCI! 

Pray, Play and a Spark of Hope

by Shannon Jordan, CFCI short-term missionary in Bolivia

Only if my interaction with the kids on the street I have met is a temporary bit of joy, happiness and peace for them then my my mission to Cochabamba is being fulfilled. Do I think they will remember the funny lil white girl that plays, dances, loves on them, prays and at times feeds them? Yes I do. The times they have scurried through the city with me, all of us clinched arm to arm locked together.... the looks from the Bolivians!!! If looks could really kill this gringo along with my lil street kiddos would be laid out on a Bolivian street!

Thank the Good Lord He does not look at our outside appearance! Jesus loves ALL His children .... With all of our flaws. Love is helping any person toward Christ.
The lost, hungry, homeless are not just here they are at your back door and mine wherever we are living right now.

Although.... You don't have to wait for a feeling of "love" in order to share Christ with a stranger. The stranger is created by our Heavenly Father but separated from Him. I personally go out to share about Jesus because I love Him and want to share what has so freely been given to me.

At times, even here, I have found myself complaining.... complaining about the simple things that I take for granted.

Philippians 1:29 reminds me:

I want to love as Jesus did and be willing to suffer for doing as He did. You see as Paul wrote, suffering is a gift of God. 

Editor's Note:  This story is written by and about Paul Cheeseman. Paul is the father of one of our mission workers. Prayers of the faithful at work!

I had been fighting God for 30 years and as little as 4 months ago probably had one of the hardest hearts going. My wife and kids had been praying for me, my faithful loving wife for 22 years, and over the last 3 months I had started to question many things. I was starting to check the boxes. Yes there is a God!  Yes there is an emptiness in my life. Yes my family deserves better. Yes I am sinful and need to be saved! 

My marriage hadn't been going well and there were also some big issues at work. These difficulties however were not as big as the growing dread I was having about getting older, becoming more alone and dying into nothingness or hell.  The  big problem I had  was surrender. How did it make any sense that I could be me and at the same time give up control to God. That is what some people would call pride but for me it was more a case of not wanting to give up my independence.

I am not sure why I had signed up to go on the Guatemala mission trip. Certainly, even now, I wonder why the church would have let me. I was, after all, a declared non-Christian at that time... actually an enemy of God. As you can imagine, you can't go to somewhere like Guatemala without seeing a very different world and being affected but I did not expect that it would be as life-changing as it was. 

Early on during the trip I was challenged regarding the whole surrendering issue, but it was a small girl of eight-years-old, who speaks no English, (and I speak no Spanish) who God chose to help work His miracle in me. 

The day before this miracle I had found myself feeling very useless regarding one of the older kids in the mission who had an accident and now was on crutches with a bar in his leg. What do you say to someone in such a situation? I am used  to solving problems and I could do nothing for him. I knew only God could help him. That night I prayed that God would give me a sign that he was real and that he cared for me.

We were on the bus returning from the amusement park with the kids and I had asked this little girl her name. "Como Te  llama?" She answered Amy and a long sentence in Spanish that was clearly longer than her family name. I asked again and she gave the same answer. I asked the translator (who happened to be sitting next to us) and he told me that her name is Amy Gomez and that she had a picture in her head that she had to tell me. I asked her to tell me and he translated that it was a picture of birds in the sky. I flapped my arms stupidly but she shook her head. He had translated wrong. Looking up the actual word she had used on his phone he correctly translated that the picture she had for me was a kite flying high in the sky.

I clearly knew this was important. People don't normally walk up to you and say that they have a picture for you in their head. Especially when they have never met you, are only eight-years-old and don't speak a word of the same language.

I've flown kites! Two string kites that you can control to do all sorts of incredible things. Kites that fly high in the sky. Kites that ride the wind. Kites that are free and beautiful. Kites that are gently and firmly controlled by the kite master.

It took me the next 18 hours to work out the significance of the picture. We can only live our lives to their full, highest potential if we surrender to the kite master. To the director who has a script for each one of us. Independence at the end of the day is a sad reality tv show, a kite with no strings that will always be destroyed by the winds of the world and is ultimately destined to crash and burn.

I hadn't prayed for over 20 years. I hadn't cried for over 20 years. Over the last week I've started praying again and I've had lots of tears. An eight-year-old Guatemalan girl named Amy, a picture of a kite and a sad, hard-hearted executive came together so that God could work a miracle. I have now submitted to the kite master and look forward to flying high in the sky under his loving  direction.