CP Ecuador – May 18 || Hannah

Monday, May 18 – Stretched limits. Extreme improvisation. Learning to trust.On Sunday evening, we were having an incredible devotional where everyone sat in the living room honestly discussing how much we have to learn to trust the Lord. We talked about how quickly we can reach the end of ourselves when we are drawing our energy from ourselves rather than God. We talked about how we have to keep going in the times where we have no idea what we are doing and just learn to trust. Trust.However, little did we know that we would be practicing that very thing to an extreme level the very next morning! We showed up to a brand new school with plans and excitement having planned for 200 kids, all the while knowing we might have to adjust the plans a little bit to adapt to the new atmosphere—we just didn’t realize how much. We ended up with 400 preschool and elementary kids instead! During our very first session, each team felt overwhelmed and all of the plans crashed and burned. Particularly in the craft team, we had to learn to change the craft almost entirely after the first session and do a rather large amount of last minute prep. Each team member felt very stressed and had arguably reached the end of themselves, but the best part of it was that the team didn’t shut down and quit. They trusted God, they made the serious adaptations, and they welcomed the next group with the same good attitude with which they had received the first group. The sessions got progressively smoother and better, and towards the end of the day, we definitely considered it a success.The occurrences of the day were definitely stressful, but they were also encouraging and strengthening because we knew where to find the strength and courage to keep on going when we had no idea what we were doing. Our team grew and was strongly reminded of how God works in each of our lives through this experience, and that He very much desires us to practice what we learn and most importantly what we preach. He stretched us, but He provided as well. Moving on during the day, we started preparing/rewriting the curriculum that night at roughly 10:00pm for teaching teenagers we did not know we were going to be working with until the day before departing for the trip. Yet this time the prep carried a different attitude—we stepped out in courage to do things far out of our comfort zone such as sharing personal testimonies about how Life Purpose has been played out in our lives, and we did it in faith because we knew that we could trust Him to provide and use us to serve His purposes instead of our own. We were not disappointed! God works in every life, and He has clearly worked in each of our lives this week in a strong way to teach us to trust Him in ALL circumstances.- Hannah