Staff Blog

Kind of a weird title for a blog I know, but it is something that I have been thinking about lately. 

We had one of our CSC KIDS return for a visit last week.  He is now 19 years old; he left CSC when he was about 19 months old.  When we told his house parents and his caretakers that he was coming back to visit they all were excited to see him of course…no one is forgotten at CSC.  One of the first things they talked about was his birthmark; he had a birthmark on one of his legs below the knee.  They remembered him of course, but his birthmark was something that was special to him. 

When he arrived we were all excited to see him, we recognized his smile and could see that little baby face that we remembered in the face of the young man with a mustache before us.  We all glanced at his leg and did not see the birthmark we remembered so well…was this really our little guy?  Finally, someone could not hold it in any longer; they asked him where his birthmark was.  I wondered how he would handle that question; but he stood up, put his foot up on the chair, and pointed out a barely discernible scar right where we knew his birth mark should be.  He explained that he had his birthmark removed when he was young because he did not like that people always noticed it.  He thought it was wonderful that we remembered though, it brought a big smile to his face that we remembered something that was specific and individual to him.  It gave him something positive out of something that he thought was negative.  He almost seemed proud to show us the scar, he knew it was part of his identity, and the fact that we remembered proved to him that we DID remember him as an individual.  

This little event made me think  about  the” birthmark”  that many of us  have, one  that should be obvious for one and all to see.  Do we let people see the “birthmark” that we have from our second birth; our birth into God’s family?  This “birthmark” would be visible in our actions, our words, even our thoughts.  I wonder if some of us would like to hide it and remove it.  I wonder if some of us are embarrassed about it.  I am sure that I have thought of doing all those things at different points in my life.  Nevertheless, in the end, we know that this “birthmark” is the best thing we have ever been given.  We can be proud of it and we need to show it to the world.  I love birthmarks.  

Actually these are not visitors, but family members coming back home.  We have a fairly constant flow of visitors coming to CSC,  we have people who find us online and want to visit to see if we are who we say we are,  we have supporters who make a once in a life time journey to see where their money has been going all these years,  we have adoptive families coming to claim their long awaited son and/or daughters from us, many other mission groups in Cebu enjoy bringing their visitors to see us,  we have our own biological family members come to visit…the list goes on and on.

The best kind of visitors for all of us is when our own CSC KIDS come back home to CSC.  This has been happening a lot and is always a wonderful time.   

Siblings Joe, Roxanne and Carlo are here with us now!  They left us for adoption 11 years ago and are back to visit us as well as their birth family.   We also have Erna, another one of our own CSC kids back here working in our school for a couple of months. We all love seeing our kids come back, but it is an extra special blessing for all the CSC aunties and uncles to see the kids return.  I get to see many of our CSC kids when I am in the States,  but our Filipino aunties and uncles only get to see the kids if they return here.  It is so fun to see their faces when they see the kids that they cared for many years ago back in the home that they lived in while at CSC.  It was hard for them to say goodbye many years ago.  These kids return visit helps our aunties and uncles  to be able to continue caring for the kids here now, and to keep saying goodbye…we need our CSC kids to keep coming back!

We have had lots of kids come back, some of the things that they remember are precious, some are embarrassing and some are just plain funny. I only recently learned that Joemar (who has lived with us almost 30 years) was the willing recipient of quite a few of the kid’s vegetables; no wonder everyone loved Joemar; he was eating their vegetables for them! We have certainly noticed common reactions and comments for kids coming back; we hear many things like  ”I remember the playground being bigger than this!” and “I am taller than the aunties, did they shrink?”

What a blessing our CSC kids are…we hope they keep coming back home to visit!

Today we had a few Staff  members  from the LOGOS HOPE ship visit us here at CSC. Their ship is docked here in Cebu City for the month of May. It was fun for our kids to interact with young Christians from all over the world,  We had people from Europe, from South America and one young lady from Florida.  It was good for our kids to hear the accents and to learn a few words of other languages, but most important it was good for our kids to see the light of the Lord shining it the eyes and beaming from the hearts of each of these young people. One of our kids was surprised to learn that someone from another country already knew about God....he thought that CSC was the only place that told people about God. That conversation that I overheard really brought home to me the staggering responsibility that we have, we are telling kids about THE GOD, the creator of the universe, their creator.  WOW, what a blessing and what a responsibility we have! All I could think of was the children's song;  "He's Got the Whole World in his Hands".  That HE does,  and I am thankful for that fact.  We all need to be reminded of these simple truths from time to time. Thank you to the amazing young people of the Logos Hope for helping to bring this simple truth home to me today!

We all take turns being on duty on the evenings when the House Parents in each home have their day off.  It makes our already long day even longer but I have learned that I usually leave the home more refreshed and certainly more blessed than when I walked in a few hours earlier.

It was my night to be on duty at the Duterte Home.  All the little kids had gone upstairs to bed.  I gathered the older kids together to ask for prayer requests and to talk about things that they wanted to talk about.  The conversation quickly became about the recent typhoon.  The kids had heard stories from our workers and from friends at school regarding the death and/or destruction that the typhoon brought,  some of it not very far away.  The kids were unsure about their birth families experience in the typhoon as well.   Everyone just seemed to have a sad story to tell.  Jacob,  who is 27 years old,  wheel chair bound and unable to speak was in our group.  Jacob has Cerebral Palsy.  It was obvious that these stories were hard for Jacob to hear,  he was making sounds indicating distress and was getting more spastic as time went on.   I was afraid he was either going to break the bindings holding him in his wheel chair or break a bone!  I asked one of the workers to take Jacob to another room. I explained that we would ask Jacob to come back for our prayer time.  Jacob agreed.

For our prayer time I asked for volunteers for each of the people, families or circumstances that we had put on our prayer list.  When we got to one family that the kids had told about who had lost their home in the tsunami like storm surge that came with the arrival of the typhoon in a nearby town Jacob shouted and raised his hand in the air, he wanted to pray for that family.  His name went on the list.  We spent time in prayer,  it got quiet and Jacob had not prayed yet.  I looked up at Jacob and he was looking at me,  I just nodded, indicating that it was his time to pray.  He shut his eyes and he prayed.  A more beautiful prayer I have never heard.  As I watched and listened to Jacob pray I looked around at the other kids,  many of them were looking at Jacob too.  I was not the only one with tears in my eyes.  We could not understand one word that Jacob prayed,  we did did understand his emotion and we did understand "amen!"

Later, when all the kids were in their bedrooms I went to Jacob's room.  I thanked him for his prayer for the family and told him that I knew that God heard and understood every word he said.   I told Jacob that I thought that God was comforting the family right then because of Jacob's prayer.  Jacob got his big "Jacob smile" that takes up his whole face and even tends to make his body spastic...but he worked hard and brought his arm up in the air, got his pointer finger extended and with joy pointed straight up.  Yes Jacob,  God in Heaven heard and understood every word of your prayer!  I knew that is what  he was telling me, and I agreed.   I left for home with a smile on my face and an extra blessing in my heart.  

I didn't have my camera with me that night.  This photo is a re-enactment of Jacob telling me exactly where his prayers go! 

This has not been a normal week.  I am not at all sure what a "normal" week is,  but I know this is not one.

On Tuesday morning we experienced an earthquake.  I have always wondered what an earthquake would feel like, and now I know.   We have had hundreds of aftershocks in the four days since the initial earthquake.   Praise God the buildings the kids are in stood up well to the shaking.  A few of us staff members  have some rather scary cracks in the walls of our personal homes though. 

The kids were shaken up of course (literally and figuratively), but they did amazingly well.   They are now old pros at meeting in the middle of the playground after each major aftershock...just to make sure all is well before they run back to whatever they were doing.   The first night all the kids slept downstairs with their mattresses on the floor.  They felt safer being on the ground floor and enjoyed being all together.  But everyone has moved back upstairs now.  We know that we will be talking about this for a long time,  as it was a very scary experience for the kids and for all of us.  We praise God for the protection we were given. We do not take that for granted.   There are many that suffered devastation and death because of this earthquake.

But we are not here to worry about cracks in our walls and aftershocks.  We are here to take care of kids that need us.  So that is what we are doing.  Today we admitted a new baby!  This little guy has just  joined the Duterte Home. He has some medical concerns, but we feel like we are back to business as usual. So here is our newest family member!