Side note - in addition to counting days he's been in the program, he also counts the number of times he has eaten at the Sitio.
Last Saturday the Sitio became a place for our youth group to put the love of Christ into practice. In a caravan of two cars and one VW bus we rolled into the Sitio and the kids took on 3 hours of gardening. Odair spent much of the time with us so our group got to know him and a couple of the other residents as well (who really need the extra attention and friendship). As a group we all got to hear a bit of Odair's story as he went into a spontanious "thank you"speach. The most encouraging part to me has been how many of our kids have come to us since the visit eager to plan another trip out! In fact last night at youth group when we asked what were three great things from the past week they all exclaimed, "Sitio Shalom!" It is wonderful to see Christianity in action as a lifestyle instead of a study!
Please pray for Odair's continued recovery in Sitio Shalom. This has been a very dificult week for him. He was ready to quit and just wanting to go out and get drunk Tuesday night. I drove out to talk with him and we had a long heart-to-heart. One difficulty for him was that he has not had short term goals to celabrate and to feel a sence of success. We are working on that now. The first was, stay clean one more week, and I'll set up with your mom to drive her out here for a visit. It has been seven years since Odair's mom has seen him not living on the street and doing drugs. Thank you for keeping him in your prayers!Okay, sorry for recycling this old picture of us with Odair! I will try to get some of the pics that others took of the service day and add some color to this blog soon!
No comments:
Post a Comment