God is Good!

A few weeks ago in devotional with my second graders we were talking about the story in Luke chapter 7 where Jesus is at the house of a Pharisee for dinner and a woman who is sinful hears of this and comes to Jesus. It says in Luke 7:38 “She brought an alabaster jar of perfume, and as she stood behind him at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them and poured perfume on them.” Then when Simon, the Pharisee who had invited Jesus to dinner, saw what was happening he said to Jesus, if you were a prophet you would know who this woman is that is touching you – she is a sinner. And I love Jesus’ response to Simon. He says to him, “Do you see this woman? I came into your house. You didn’t give me any water for my feet, but she wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You did not give me a kiss, but this woman, from the time I entered, has not stopped kissing my feet. You did not put oil on my head, but she has poured perfume on my feet. Therefore I tell you her many sins have been forgiven – for she loved much. But he who has forgiven little loves little.” This is one of my favorite stories in the bible and so I loved sharing it with my second graders. The one thing that I was trying to get across to my kids was that this jar of perfume that this woman had was probably one of the nicest and most expensive things that she owned. And because she knew who Jesus was and recognized that she was a sinner in need of his love, she wanted to sacrifice the one thing she had probably worked so hard for. So I asked my kids the question: What is something you hold onto that you would want to give to Jesus? A few of them gave the response: my toys, my house, etc. And then one little girl, Keyrol, raised her hand and said, “Miss Meredith, I want to give Jesus my heart.” Oh how that melted my heart. So as a class we talked about what it means to give Jesus our heart. And that our heart is the one thing that he really wants. Not just our toys, our house, our good deeds, our alabaster jar of perfume, but he really wants our hearts. And that is what the woman in the story was doing. She was giving Jesus her heart. After we finished talking about that I had several kids raise their hands and tell me that they wanted Jesus to have their heart too! So at the end of devotionals we prayed that Jesus would come into our hearts. It has been such a sweet joy to be able to teach in a school where Christ comes first. God is moving in the lives of kids at Doulos.

Also, as most of you know, I was a Young Life leader while I was in college and for most of my time in Colorado. After working for Young Life at Frontier Ranch and volunteering as a leader for so many years – the ministry of Young Life is in my blood. Well, when I found out they were hoping to start Young Life here in Jarabacoa I knew I had to jump in. I love this ministry for several reasons. I firmly believe that Young Life leaders have the most incredible opportunity to share life and Christ with high school kids. I love the way that this ministry meets kids where they are and allows them to figure out who this Jesus guy is and why he is so crazy about them. And that he not only is crazy about them, but that he wants a relationship with them. This ministry also has been a huge part of molding me into the person I am today. So I have decided to be a Young Life leader here in Jarabacoa. I am so excited to get to know the high school kids at Doulos and to live life with them. They have had Vida Joven (young life for Dominican kids that speak Spanish) here in Jarabacoa for several years, but I think this will be the first time to have Young Life (for Dominican and American kids that speak English either as a first or second language). So we are starting things off by taking almost 27 kids from two of the private English speaking schools here in Jarabacoa to a weekend camp at Young Life’s Pico Escondido this weekend. You can pray for our time there and for the girls that I will be in a cabin with. You can pray that this will be the start of a great relationship with them and that we would be able to talk about what it means to live a life with Christ. Because they go to a private Christian school many of them “know” about Jesus and all the bible stories, but they don’t know what it means to really have a relationship with Him. This weekend will be the best weekend of their lives!