Previous Challenge Entry (Level 1 – Beginner)
Topic: Walk (07/20/06)
-
TITLE: Walk with Me | Previous Challenge Entry
By
07/24/06 -
LEAVE COMMENT ON ARTICLE
SEND A PRIVATE COMMENT
ADD TO MY FAVORITES
Welcome to ‘The Dump’, a poor community in Mexico.
It’s called The Dump because that’s what it is (a garbage dump), but many families also call it home. Children run barefoot down streets of dirt, dogs lounge about, and people call to one another as they walk by, dogging the lumbering buses. And it’s hot.
Moving along from station to station, sometimes breaking up the cement of the old floor, sometimes helping to mix what would be the new floor, spreading dirt in the house and sidestepping the yarn that is marking off dimensions, and most of all playing out in the dirt with the children, I find my heart being captured by the people with whom we are working. Especially those kids! I speak only a smattering of Spanish, and they know little to no English, but that doesn’t matter. We hold hands and spin around in circles, making silly faces and falling over when we became dizzy. We stick our fingers in a wheelbarrow of dirt, making piles as high as we can until they begin to fall, and then we giggle as we destroy them. When I sit down for a break, a little girl climbs onto my lap and takes my sunglasses off, sticking them on her own face upside down. “Bonita!” I tell her, and she just smiles and continues to play with them.
Some folks from our mission team and the family and friends begin to bring buckets of water from the end of the street, struggling under the heavy weight. I grab a bucket and begin walking down the dusty street to the spigot at the corner, thinking of nothing in particular as I swing my bucket. Suddenly I hear the slap-slap of small feet running after me, and little Ezekiel slips his hand into mind, grinning up into my face. My heart melted at that voluntary show of affection from a child I barely knew and whose language I couldn’t really speak. We walk down the road together, and that small, dirty brown hand in my larger, dirty white one makes the dusty road beneath my feet disappear and clouds of jubilation take up the burden of my steps.
When I look back on that small but priceless moment out of a life-changing week in Mexico, I wonder…when I take the time to run after my Heavenly Father and slip my small, dirty hand in His holy, nail-pierced one, does His heart rejoice? I can’t wait until the time when we can walk with Him and never have to fall again.
The opinions expressed by authors may not necessarily reflect the opinion of FaithWriters.com.
If you died today, are you absolutely certain that you would go to heaven? You can be right now. CLICK HERE
JOIN US at FaithWriters for Free. Grow as a Writer and Spread the Gospel.
