Hello from andreagburgess@Hotmail.com 

Casa de Nueva Esperanza, Los Cedros, Nicaragua.

May/June 2008

James 1:27: “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.”

My dear and precious family and friends:

I have found A quiet moment in between hospital visits and dressing changes. Please forgive my tardiness in reporting to you these past couple of months. There have been many changes, and the challenges that come with it. Every picture tells a story, so I have included a slideshow so you can see what has been happening here lately.

The rainy season began with tropical storm Alma, on May 29th, bringing power outages and road blocks with it. However, the landscape is now a lush green once again, and the evenings are a little cooler, (Thank you Lord!)

Xochilt was transferred up to our home in Jinotega to be with the 6 – 12 year olds. She is doing well, but we miss her and hope to see her soon for a visit. We are working with her 3 year old brother, Jose, who is still with us here at Los Cedros.

Celeste and Juanita are making amazing progress. Celeste copies almost everything you say and do, she is a very quick learner. She is already using some English words with a perfect accent! Cute! Juanita is so different from the fragile, sick, 9lb, 3 month old baby she was when she first arrived. She is now a chunky monkey at a little over 15 lbs at 5 months! A picture of health! When the local authorities came to visit they did not recognize her and could not believe it was the same baby! Thank you Father! They both have such sweet spirits and are usually smiling and happy.

We haven’t been able to start our teacher training classes yet, but hope to begin in the fall. Of course we meet regularly to discuss what is best for our babies, and train daily, moment by moment. We have fun learning together as a team.

Joseling is potty trained, hooray!!! One less in diapers!! Well done Joseling!!!

Mother’s Day is always on May 30th here in Nicaragua, different to the States, and in England it is in March! So I get to celebrate it 3 times.

18 month old Pedro was brought to us in the afternoon of June 2nd, with a doctors’ appointment for the next day at 7 am. Little did we know he was scheduled for surgery that day, and has had to go to the hospital almost every day since. He was badly burned when his crib caught fire at his home in March. He is so brave and such a trooper, he is my little Super Hero!  Taking care of him and his special needs has been one of the hardest things I have had to face, both physically and emotionally. I have learned a lot about humility, patience and perseverance. Thank you Lord for walking me through those days (and nights!!) and for promising to be there right by our side in the days to come.

Hebrews 13:5b: “Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you.”

I would like to share an excerpt from an email sent by a dear sister in Christ:

“I believe the Lord’s intentions in these times is to “conform us to the image of His son” (Romans 8:29) for His glory and our good.  When you emerge on the other side of this, you will have yielded yourself to a place in the Lord that comes only through this type of emotionally, physically and spiritually exhausting trial.  Remember that “You can do all things through Christ who strengthens you.” (Phil 4:13)  It will be His love, His strength, His good intentions for you and Pedro that will bring the victory in whatever form it comes.”

Thank you my dear friend for your prayers and words of encouragement, I pass them on to encourage others also.

Pedro will need many more surgeries and has an extensive physical therapy program for recovery ahead of him. Please lift Pedrito up in prayer, along with our other children and workers

Again, I cannot thank you all enough for your continued support and encouragement, I honestly could not do this without you. Thank you for holding up my arms when I get tired. (Exodus 17) Thank you for your faithfulness, you are always there for me, even when you don’t hear from me in a while. Thank you for that! With more frequent power cuts and long days at the hospital, it has been hard to keep in touch, I will try to write more often, and I thank you for your patience.

With so much love in Christ, blessings and smiles,

Andrea JJJ XXXX

Please remember that I love hearing all your news too! Do write to me at andreagburgess@hotmail.com

Awesome April 2008
AndreaGBurgess@Hotmail.com

Deuteronomy 15 v.11: “There will always be poor people in the land. Therefore I command you to be openhanded toward your brothers and toward the poor and needy in your land.”

What a wonderful month April was! I was thrilled to have my youngest Granddaughter, Faith with me for 6 weeks, which was a rich gift to my heart. And if that wasn’t blessings enough, the Lord sent Kathy Bolton to visit for 2 weeks to share her talents and smiles. I wrote this at the airport in Ft Lauderdale waiting for my flight back to Managua, Nicaragua. Many thanks to Kathy and Faith for the impact you had on our ministry. I am grateful for the time we had together, and will miss you tons. I could write a book about Faith and her time in Los Cedros, (not now of course!) and Kathy, may God richly bless you as you continue to be such an inspiration to me and others in many ways.

I had the pleasure of working with a team of nurses who came to stay in Managua from Texas for a week. They initiated 2 feeding programs in an underprivileged neighborhood, Los Braziles, about 20 minutes away from our orphanage. The first time we served over 300 meals of arroz con pollo, typico Nicaraguan cuisine, (chicken and rice). The second time we served over 500 hot dogs, typical USA style! (Without the mayo and mustard!) For the first meal I stayed up late the night before prepping all the veggies, it was a great time to listen to and enjoy praise and worship music! I asked the people which meal they preferred, the general response was the hot dogs, but they were concerned that it cost more to serve, (which it does, but less manual labor!) After serving the meals we visited the local health clinic, and 2 hospitals in town with the team so they could assess the best way they may be able to help them. All the public health facilities are basic and in great need. And as if all that wasn’t enough work for a week, these amazing ladies asked if there was a project at the orphanage they could help with. Since many of our children are celebrating birthdays in April and May, they threw a huge birthday party in our dining room. They went all out with decorations on the walls and ceilings, tables, chairs, balloons, gifts, you name it, they thought of it, complete with piñata!! The children’s expressions as they opened gifts, demolished the cake and joined the fun was priceless, I took lots of photos to keep the children’s personal albums up to date, and hope to be able to share some with you soon. Many thanks to all the hard working nurses on that team, for everything they did, and for all they are going to do. I hope I have the honor of working with them again soon.

Last week we were blessed with 2 new arrivals. We are not sure of their ages, but we believe Juanita is about 8 weeks old, and her big sister, Celeste is about 18 months old. They seem to have settled in extremely well. Juanita gained 2 lbs in her first week and went up from 9 lbs to 11lbs, and Celeste is eating well and seems happy most of the time. She displays a spirit of contentment, and it is a joy to watch her play. So we now have 13 children in our infant orphanage.

We are planning to start teacher training classes soon, to provide all our childcare workers with a basic 40 hour certification. This will be a challenge, but I feel the time is right and it is much needed.

Gabriel passed his medical exam with flying colors and only has to go every 2 months for check ups now. It was decided that no further action should be taken at this time. He will be one on May 9th!! Happy Birthday to you Gabriel!!

I believe most of you already have my letter of intention that I sent out via e-mail a few days ago, so I won’t repeat all that again. I am so grateful to have been presented this opportunity to serve the people of Nicaragua.

Around the middle of April I was called to the school to meet with the teacher of one of our young boys, Jose (3 years old), Xochilt’s brother. It was sad to learn of his serious behavioral problems at school. Apparently, neither his teacher, nor the Directora could keep him under control. After more than 2 hours of discussion, they agreed to allow him to stay in school, and they invited me to work with them to resolve the issues. I was so excited! I had wanted to work with them for a long time, but did not want to butt in and offend anyone. My prayers were answered, to be invited in to the classroom. They asked me if I could go in on a regular basis, so I told them I would go on Fridays. We didn’t agree on a time, but when Kathy and I arrived mid morning the following Friday, we were greeted immediately and taken directly to the classroom. “Do not pass GO, do not collect $200!!!” Boy were they ready for us. Ask Kathy to tell you more about that!!! She has a first hand update for you! Thanks Kathy. I am so thrilled to be invited to work alongside the teachers and share discipline strategies and teaching methods.

Well, I actually drove across town on my own for the first time to meet Kathy at the airport. No big deal you may think, but driving here in Nicaragua is challenging and very dangerous, especially after dark. I wondered why no-one was stopping at red lights, and was quite stubborn to the honking horns, as I exclaimed, “they’re just going to have to wait, the light is red!.” Since then I learned that after dark it is not safe to stop at a red light, you may get hi-jacked and/or robbed. Yikes! So now I know. Since that episode however, I have got braver and driven all over town! Hooray!

Wow, I could go on, and on, so much is happening here, so much progress is being made. All with The Lord’s provision and grace, mercy and love. I see His hand on everything. We have much to be thankful for! And much work left to do, better get back to it! Bye for now…

Feel free to write to me at my e-mail address posted above, I would love to keep in touch and hear what is happening in your life.

Check out the latest slide show (here)

Hot and happy in Nicaragua,
Andrea, Grandma, Mum XXXXXX

Let go and let God.