Faith Like A Child

This morning 7 of the boys in the Small Boys House performed a dance to the song "Who Am I" by Casting Crowns. They have been practicing for weeks and most of them were excited all week for this moment. A couple days ago one of the boys backed out, and it took a day or two for the girl in charge of the dance to figure out a way to make the dance work without him. But gracias a Dios, because yesterday he decided to stick to his commitment and be in the dance with the other boys. This morning Melissa and I went down to the house to help them all get ready, and then we all went down to the church early so that they could practice it through once. We were all sitting in a room in the back of the church waiting, when.... se fue la luz.

The power was out. Here in Honduras this is not an uncommon occurrence, but it doesn't make it any less of an inconvenience. Melissa and I gathered the boys in a circle and we began praying, because without power, they could not play the music for their dance. Willians is a 9 year old boy who came to Emmanuel in April with his brothers and sister. When he arrived, he had a hard time adjusting, but when I came back in June I realized how much progress he had made in the month I'd been gone. And let me tell you... the boy can pray. He is this tiny, sweet, soft-spoken little boy with prayers bigger than himself. This morning, his prayer consisted of this:

"Jesus, right now the devil wants the glory. He wants to get the glory for this, and stop us from dancing. But he is not going to. You are going to get the glory for this dance Lord."

To have Faith like a child.  Melissa remembered that another volunteer girl has a wireless bluetooth speaker; we had used it yesterday so the boys could practice at the house. She ran up and grabbed it and we got the boys seated in the church. After talking with some staff members we were not sure that everyone would be able to hear out of this little speaker, but we figured we might as well try it.

And so, the boys did their dance. Praise the Lord, everyone in the church could hear that song. It was beautiful. I have seen it dozens of times and still it made my heart swell watching them perform, and knowing that they were doing it as an act of worship. And just as little Willians prayed, the Lord received all the glory this morning.

"At that time the disciples came to Jesus, saying, 'who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?' And calling to Him a child, He put in the midst of them and said, 'truly I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.'" -Matthew 18:1-3