Birthday!!

I'm 22 now!!!!

My birthday was incredible and full of lots of fun and love! In the morning I awoke to breakfast in bed! It was very sweet and I felt loved right away! Then we got ready and went to the mall to meet up with our Indo team members. Natalie bought me starbucks as you can see....a lovely treat for another HOT day! Then we headed off to the garbage dump! haha What a birthday plan eh? Ususally we ride in tiny buses without air conditioning but this day, God filled the bus so there was no room for me and I got to take an air conditioned taxi instead! Yay!! haha

At the slum we were doing mini.stry and also gathering photographs for a promotional video we are making to promote slum adoption in local churches. When we leave, we want to see J-akart-a continue to transform! You would not believe the conditons in this area. The burning garbage, flies and ash in the air was enough to make us want to leave instantly.....but this is their life. Their job is to go through the trash to find things to sell or recycle for money. Can you imagine??
After walking around in that area, we walked through the nearby homes and met this little boy. His name is Marlan. He was cutting out temporary tatoos and I saw him and told him it was my birthday. I had been joking that I wanted a tatoo for my birthday so I told him that it's perfect that I met him. He cut me out a sweet Italian Soccer player tatoo and helped me put it on. After telling his mom it was my birthday she looked surprised and then started kissing him all over his face. We were a bit confused until she said "oh my goodness, I forgot, it's his birthday too!" Oh my. haha We couldn't believe it!! It was special to be able to sing him happy birthday and share that moment. We asked what his favorite candy was so we could pick some up but he said that all he wanted was prayer! Can you believe it??? I ten year old wanting prayer instead of candy?? He was amazing. They happened to actually be a Christian family and we were able to pray for blessings over Marlan and his family. We also prayed for his cousin who is a little girl who is deaf and mute. We asked him if he believed that Jesus could heal his cousin and he said yes. So we asked him to pray with us and it was an amzing time of crying out to God for healing! What a blessing on my birthday. Later that night we got to clean up a bit and have dinner at the mall. Becca and I had a nice time together. Later that night we went to the water slum to teach english. A mu.slim lady my team and I had met and prayed for said that after we had prayed, her stomach problems had been healed! Awesome. Then when we were leaving the slum, all of the translators, who have become good friends, and my team mates surprised me with fireworks!! They had sparklers and all sang me happy birthday right in the slum! haha it was so much fun!! Then they prayed blessings over me. It was very special. We all headed to tea at this very cute tea place where we played Scrabble and Mancala unitl about midnight. It was a good day!
On Saturday we got up way too early :0) and went into the slums again for more min.istry time with new groups of young people. I was able to meet up again with the Mus.lim lady that I had shown the Je-sus video to. We shared the full gos.pel with her and even though she did not accept Je-sus, I know that what we have shared has touched her heart and I believe God will continue to work with her. Later that night we had some free time before my official Birthday dinner so Kim and I went to a Loreal stand where they were doing free makeovers. I got my hair and make up done for free! It was so fun! Then we had awesome Sushi!!

After sushi we went to do Karaoke!!!

Oh my gosh can you say fun?? We had our own room and we crammed in about 25 of us! There were 3 mics and two TV screen to pick songs and we sang for three hours. The background behind the songs was really cheesy 80's videos and some were so hilarious we almost peed our pants. Seriously, Natalie had to stop a song for me because I was dying. There was one of a woman dancing with a seal!! I'm serious! It also was translated wrong sometimes and said very funny things!! It could not have been more fun....(accept maybe if I had friends from home :0) )

This is Mark

Jungtina

One of our translators and friend Devin---I call him brother bear hehe
This is Andy--- he is so sweet
This is Bene our amazing coordinator and friend




Hans----soooooo funny
This is Richard---He has come out of some really hard things but has been with us so much for min.stry and is really going for it with God




I felt so blessed to speak with friends and family back home and I was so taken care of here as well. God is amazing. And I am not the same as I was last year. Amen!!