Casa Shalom - Jessica Hanson

Thank you for listening to this message from

Lifehouse Church. All right, well, good morning,

Lifehouse. Hasn't God been good? All right, well,

it's good to have each one of you here. This

is a special day. I'm going to ask Jessica to

come out. She's here. Jessica Hansen's with her.

Would you give her a hand as she comes out? We

got chatting back there, and I missed my cue

to come out, so that's why I was late to the

party here. But we're so glad to have Jessica,

her husband, back home in Minnesota, where it

gets slightly cooler than it does here in Pennsylvania.

But we love this couple. We know their family.

They're an amazing couple who have done a work

for a long time, 18 years now. I said they look

way too young to be in Guatemala for 18 years.

But I'm sure she'll give you a little bit of

the history. And we want you just to listen and

open your hearts and your minds to the work that

God's doing across this globe and particularly

in Guatemala. Thank you, Pastor. Good morning,

church. What a blessing it is to gather here

together on a beautiful Sunday morning in this

beautiful congregation. It's my first time getting

to be with you and I walked into this building

this morning and I was absolutely blown away

by the beauty of this place. I'm blessed to speak

in churches all around the United States and

I can say... Without a doubt, this is the prettiest

sanctuary I've ever been privileged to speak

in. So you all are very blessed with this space.

Praise the Lord. Amen. Like Pastor said, my name

is Jessica Hansen. My husband, Josh, and I are

the directors of Casa Shalom Orphanage in San

Lucas, Guatemala. We have been missionaries with

Church of God World Missions for 18 years. I've

been on the field, mission field for 18 years.

And this photo that you see behind me is a family

portrait. Now, all of us have gone and gotten

our family pictures taken. You know, we used

to do it at like the JCPenney's or the Sears.

And now you do it outside in the matching outfit.

But this is our family picture, and it looks

a little different than other people's family

pictures. This is our big, beautiful family at

Casa Shalom. Our 65 children that call Casa Shalom

home, as well as our two children that look just

like us, our two biological children. Sophie

is 15, and Judah is 12 years old. And the family

of Casa Shalom sends their greetings. They are

worshiping right now as we speak at the orphanage.

in our on -site chapel there, and they have been

praying for you. They know that I am here, that

I am speaking, and they have been praying in

advance for this Sunday, for this congregation,

for your pastors. And so I just share the love

and the greetings of everyone at Casa Shalom.

And on the next slide, I'll tell you just a little

bit about the orphanage, a little bit of the

history of Casa Shalom. So the orphanage was

started in 1986 by a pair of North American missionaries

that went from Tennessee to Guatemala. And they

didn't go to Guatemala to start an orphanage.

They went as church planters. But they ended

up in Guatemala in the middle of Guatemala's

civil war. I don't know if there's any students

of history here, but Guatemala had a 36 -year

-long, very violent civil war. And our founders,

these missionaries, began to notice children

in the streets of Guatemala, and they seemed

to be living on the streets on their own. And

so they would ask, who are these boys and girls,

and what are they doing here? And they were told,

these children have been orphaned by the war,

and they have no place to go. Their family has

been killed. They have no one to take them in.

And so our founders took in a sibling group of

three kids, three war orphans, off of the street,

and then a couple more, and a couple more. And

so we started with three boys and girls. and

now we're home to 65 boys and girls from all

over the country of Guatemala, all ages, from

babies all the way up through young adults. And

Casa Shalom was actually the very first Church

of God orphanage started outside of the United

States, which I think is an interesting little

piece of history there. But you can see the picture

there of our entryway there in Guatemala, the

beautiful orphanage property. We've got 12 acres

of just beautiful terrain that the children are

all blessed to call home. And on the next slide

I'll tell you just a little bit about how kids

come to Casa Shalom. We have legal custody of

all of our children who come to the orphanage.

They come to us through the Guatemalan government.

So my husband and I, legally, we are the parents

of 67 children. The Bible says that children

are a gift from the Lord. Well, we have been

extra blessed. My husband calls me the old woman

in the shoe because I have children everywhere,

boys and girls everywhere. But Guatemala doesn't

have a foster care system. So for the same reasons

you would end up in foster care here in the States,

in Guatemala, you end up in an orphanage. So

we have many children who come to us who have

been orphaned. Their parents have passed away.

There's no grandmother, no aunt, no uncle, no

one to care for them. We have children who come

from cases of abandonment. Their parents have

simply walked out on them. We take in a lot of

abandoned babies who were born unwanted and found

somewhere on the side of the road. We take in

children from cases of severe neglect. The parents

did not provide, could not provide what the children

needed. And unfortunately, many cases of abuse

as well. Many of our children have been abused

in really horrible ways. most of the young ladies

have been taken advantage of by a family member.

And so all of these children come to us to find

refuge and safety and love. And this picture

that I have behind me is the largest sibling

group that we have ever taken in in the history

of Casa Shalom. So there's eight siblings there.

That is the Mejia Lush family. The Mahia Lush

parents had these eight children, and after the

youngest were born, they were twins. the twin

girls, after they had those children, they decided

that they simply did not want to be parents anymore.

And so they walked out on all of their eight

children and left. The oldest girl there in that

photo, her name is Maria. She was 12 years old

when they came to us. And Maria was trying to

keep the family together all on her own at 12

years old. And the boys in the picture were six,

seven, and eight. And they were working in local

coffee fields for a dollar a day each, trying

to get enough food to feed their family. And

when the social workers found them, the children

were sick and they were starving. And they were

living in a one -room tin shack with dirt floors,

no running water, no electricity. And it was

desperate. It was hopeless. But God. And I think

if we had a theme at Casa Shalom, it would be,

but God. Because God's plan for the Mahia Lush

siblings was not... hopelessness and starvation

and never getting to attend school and being

sick. And so these children were rescued out

of that situation and brought to Casa Shalom,

and God just worked a miracle in them. Physically,

he healed their bodies. We put them in school,

and they all began to learn to read and write,

and they thrived, and they accepted Jesus as

their Lord and Savior. And I'll never forget

the first time I heard Maria, who when we got

her, she was the oldest girl, 12 years old. She

had never been to school a day in her life, couldn't

identify any letters, couldn't read, couldn't

write. And I'll never forget about six months

after they had come to us, she stood up in our

youth group service on a Wednesday night and

picked up her very own copy of her Bible and

began to read that week's verse out loud. And

it was just such an amazing moment that will

stick with me my whole life of an example of

the future that God had for these children. And

it wasn't for Maria to be all alone taking care

of her siblings. It was hope and a future. And

God used these siblings. He worked a miracle.

We saw an actual miracle. You know, one of the

praise and worship songs that we sang this morning

talked about a God who heals, how he did heal,

and he does heal. And I'm here to tell you that

that is true. Some believers will tell you, no,

that's just something from Bible times. God doesn't

heal anymore. He doesn't do miracles anymore.

But church, how many of us know that that is

wrong? God still works today. Amen? Yes. And

that same God who parted the Red Sea, that same

God who turned water into wine, that same God

who healed the lepers, the same God who brought

Jesus back out of that grave after he should

not have walked out of that grave, that power

is available to us today. And God still works

miracles today. And we saw it in this family.

There was one night at the orphanage. We were

in our house there on the orphanage property,

and we heard a knock. on our door late at night

as we were getting ready to go to bed. And we

opened the door, and it was one of the housemothers

for the babies and the toddlers. And she had

in her arms one of the twin girls, actually the

one that you see in that picture, the one that's

in my arms. Magdalena is her name. And she had

this little girl in her arms, and she said Magdalena,

who had been toilet training at the time, potty

training, had gotten up to use the bathroom and

had accidentally... closed her finger in the

bathroom door. And at that point, she pulled

the blanket back off of Magdalena, and we saw

that Magdalena was covered in blood. And we looked

at Magdalena, and her thumb on one of her hands

had been almost entirely severed by the door

hinge. It was... held on by just a little teeny

piece of skin. And so we wrapped up Magdalena

and we jumped in the car. And I don't know if

you know much about Guatemala, but it's not known

for its medical care. The medical care is not

excellent. So we drove to the closest hospital.

It was about 45 minutes away. And we got to the

ER and they triaged Magdalena, looked at her

and said, there's nothing we can do for that.

Here in the States, there probably would have

been some sort of a surgeon who could have, you

know, connected everything back together and,

you know, performed all of these special procedures.

And they said, we don't have anything like that.

We're going to have to snip the skin, and she's

going to lose her thumb. And we said, well, that

can't be the answer. So we bundled her back up,

got back in the car with her house mother, and

we drove to the next furthest hospital about

30 minutes away, went into the ER. And they said,

well, we also don't think there's anything we

can do about that. We don't have a surgeon that

can address that sort of problem. He said, well,

what we can do is we can put her thumb back where

it should be and we'll stitch the skin together

all the way around the thumb. He said, but we

can't do anything about the blood vessels. So

what's going to happen is in a couple of days,

that tissue is just going to die and we'll have

to cut the dead tissue off and she'll lose her

thumb. We said, well, that's still better than

the first hospital gave us that option. We checked

her into the hospital. They stitched her thumb

back on. We left her there in the hospital overnight

in the care of the doctors and her house mother.

And we drove back to the orphanage. And that's

when we began to call the U .S. and call our

prayer partners and the people that we knew we

had in our corner and say, please pray. Pray

for Magdalena. We need the Lord to work. And

we'll never forget this. My husband made a call

to a good friend of his who has since gone on

to be with the Lord. man named Jay. And Josh

told him the situation and Jay said, well, we're

going to pray and we believe that the Lord can

heal Magdalena. And we're going to pray and we're

going to ask the Lord to heal Magdalena and believe

in faith that he can and he will. And Josh replied,

well, but the doctor says she's going to lose

her thumb. And Jay replied, it doesn't matter

what that doctor says. It matters what the Lord

says. And that has stuck with us ever since that

night. It doesn't matter what the doctor says.

It matters what the Lord says. And we said, yeah,

that's right. And so we spent the night in prayer.

And the next morning we got up, we drove down

to the hospital and we went on visitation hours.

And Magdalena had her arm all wrapped up and

basically like equivalent of an ace bandage.

And we asked her doctor there, we said, can we

see her thumb? And he said, that's going to be

pretty gross. I don't think you want to see that.

And we said, no, we want to see it. And so he

started to unwrap this bandage off of her little

arm. And when he got down to her thumb, there

was not a single mark on that little girl's thumb.

The Lord supernaturally healed that little girl's

thumb, reattached it. She had no scar, no mark.

And that ER doctor's jaw just, it dropped. He

said, I don't know how that happened. And we

said, we know how that happened. Like, let us

tell you about our God who heals. And so I just

want to share with you church today that the

Lord is powerful and he is bigger than whatever

it is that we are facing today. Maybe the doctor

has given you news or the lawyer or the accountant

or your teacher, but I'm here to tell you that

they do not have the final word over the situation.

Young people to you, especially your friends

do not have the final word over the situation

or even your family who has the final word over

the situation is our heavenly father. And he

is the one who decides. So that is why we put

our faith and our trust in our heavenly father.

and we lean on him, and we believe his word over

us. Amen? Amen. All right, on the next slide,

I'll tell you a little bit about our goals of

Casa Shalom. Our very first goal is to provide

for the educational needs of the kids. Guatemala

has one of the highest rates of illiteracy. I'm

sorry, I skipped a slide, so I apologize. That'll

be in a minute. First goal is to provide for

the basic needs, food. So Guatemala has the fourth

highest rate of chronic malnutrition in the whole

world. So out of all of the countries of the

world, Guatemala is the fourth highest. So we

take in children, and many times they are literally

starving. They've been surviving on just tortillas.

And so we provide for all of their needs, three

nutritious meals a day at the orphanage from

a menu designed by a nutritionist. have our medical

care right on site at the orphanage, also dental

care. So dental care is basically nonexistent

in Guatemala. Most of our kids that we take in

have never brushed their teeth. Ever. Now, I

know some of you kids in here, maybe that sounds

good. Like, hey, I don't have to brush my teeth

anymore. That lady from Guatemala said it. That

is not what I'm saying. Brush your teeth. Because

you can imagine if you're 12 years old and you've

never brushed your teeth before, the state that

your poor teeth are in. So we have to do extensive

dental and medical work on all of our kids. We

have all of our clothing provided by short -term

missions teams. And we have a safe family environment.

For many of our children, this is the very first

time that they have ever been safe. We have children

who have come in directly off of the street.

They've been homeless. They've never had electricity.

They've never had hot water. For many of them,

this is the first time they've ever been free

from abuse or the first time they haven't had

to work. I remember we took in two siblings.

Their names were Margarita. She was the older

sister and then Jose was the little brother.

And I took them in and we were... Cleaning them

up, and we picked the lice out of their hair,

and they got showers, and I was going to take

them to get some clean clothes. And Margarita

stopped me, and she said, Sister Jessica, do

you have any work I could do? And I said, Margarita?

This little girl was about nine. I said, Margarita,

why do you want to work? And she said, well,

Jose is hungry, so I need to do some work so

I can earn some food for my little brother because

he's hungry. And I said, Margarita, here, you

don't have to work for your food. You get to

be a kid and you get to go to school. And she

said, I get to go to school? And she was so excited.

And just to see the realization wash over her

that for the first time in her life, she was

going to be given. what she needed. And more

importantly to her, her little brother was going

to be given what he needed. And for most of our

kids, this is the first time that they have ever

been able to really just truly be children. And

on the next slide. This is the educational part,

the school part. So most of our kids before they

come to us have never gone to school, ever. A

lot of them work before they come to us. Our

youngest child that we've ever taken in that

had a job instead of going to school was five

years old. And instead of going to kindergarten,

he was working in the sugar cane fields. And

how you harvest sugar cane is with a machete.

You chop it. So he had his own machete and he

would chop sugar cane. every single day instead

of going to kindergarten. And so we bring the

kids in and we put them in school. We have a

tutor right on site. We help the kids catch up

to grade level. So we send them to school from

kindergarten through high school. And then whenever

possible, we send them to university or trade

school. And I'll talk a little bit more about

that in a minute. But on the next slide, the

third and most important goal of Casa Shalom

is to raise Christ followers. We tell our kids

about Jesus Christ from day one. one. Because

of course we believe it's important to take kids

in off of the street and give them a bed and

warm clothing and food and medical care and school.

All those things are great. But if we're not

teaching them about Jesus Christ, we are doing

them the biggest disservice possible. So Christ

is at the center of everything we do at Casa

Shalom. We have Wednesday night church services.

We have Sunday morning church services. Like

I said, our kids are in church right now. We

have daily devotions in all the kids' houses.

And we also teach our kids to be missional. And

that sounds a little bit funny to some people

of how can orphans in a third world country be

missional? How is that possible? What my husband

and I don't want to do is teach our kids to just

stand there with their hand out, just waiting.

We are a missions project. The kids at the orphanage

know that. So we get no money from the Guatemalan

government. 100 % of the funds needed to run

the orphanage, to feed the kids and clothe them

and send them to school. is all privately donated.

So my husband and I travel around to churches

just like this to raise support. But we don't

want to teach our kids that they have nothing

to contribute to the kingdom of God because they

do. We believe that every believer has something

that they can give to the kingdom of God. So

during our kids' school break every year, we

choose a missions project somewhere all around

the world, and our children raise money for that.

Now, kids in an orphanage in Guatemala maybe

don't have a lot of options for fundraising,

but they get real creative. So if they have...

extra toys. They'll have a garage sale or we

have an on -site bakery at the orphanage and

the kids will bake bread and sell it. Has anybody

here had the blessing of trying a tamale? Anybody?

There's a couple. Yeah. Well, we make the best

tamales in the world at Casa Shalom in giant

pots. So our kids make them and they go door

to door selling tamales. And they take all of

that money that they've raised and put it towards

a missions project. So they raise on average

about $1 ,000 every single year to send to missions.

Amen? Yeah. I think that's pretty cool that kids

in an orphanage in Guatemala are passionate about

missions, and we try to choose projects that

are close to their hearts. Like one year we raised

money for beds in a drug rehab center in the

Dominican Republic because a lot of our kids

know what it's like to have parents that struggle

with addiction. One year we raised money to build

a house in Cambodia because a lot of our children

know what it's like to not have a home, a place

to live. And our kids get really excited and

they get on board with these missions projects.

And they love knowing that even though they may

be kids growing up in an orphanage in Guatemala,

that they have something that they can contribute

to the kingdom of God as well. And on the next

slide, I'm going to start telling you just a

couple of stories about some of our children

at Casa Shalom. So this young man, his name is

Tony. And Tony has been with us since he was

a little tiny baby. About 18 years ago, there

was a police officer in a local village who was

walking to work down the cobblestone road. And

he left his house, walked to the police station

nearby, and about halfway there, he heard what

he thought was the sound of a kitten crying.

So he stopped and he listened to see if he could

hear this cat, and he realized that it sounded

a little bit more like a baby. So he went down

and looked down the steep embankment on the side

of the road, and he saw a suitcase. And this

was one of those old -fashioned suitcases that

you had to carry before they had wheels on them.

So it sounded like it was coming from there.

So he crawled down that embankment and unzipped

that suitcase, and inside was baby Tony. Baby

Tony had obviously been recently born, still

had his umbilical cord attached. And we don't

know baby Tony's mother. We don't know what her

circumstances were. We know that she must have

been very desperate to make the choice that she

did. But in that moment, the police officer grabbed

up baby Tony. He unbuttoned his uniform shirt,

took it off, and wrapped baby Tony in it, scooped

him up in his arms, and ran the rest of the way

to his police station where they were able to

warm him up, get a hold of some formula, and

then transfer him to a local hospital. And the

very next day, Tony came to Casa Shalom. And

he grew up with us his entire life. And Tony

is such a joy and such a blessing. And he would

tell... Anybody who would listen his testimony

about how the Lord saved him, about how the Lord

has a plan for his life. And as Tony got to be

a little bit older, he got really interested

in technological things. I don't know if any

of you parents or grandparents, did anybody ever

have one of those kids who liked to take stuff

apart? You know, like they'd find the radio and

take it apart and try to put it back together.

But there was four screws and a clasp at the

end and it didn't work right. Well, it was Tony.

He was always taking electronics and taking them

apart to see what it looked like inside and then

trying to put it back together. So when it came

time to decide what Tony was going to do with

his life, we decided to send Tony to technical

college. So he went to school to become a small

appliance repairman. Because in Guatemala, if

something breaks, you don't have money to buy

a new one. What you do is you take it to a repair

person and they repair it for you. And then you

can continue using that. him so Tony has thrived

in this career and it's a wonderful career for

him where he can make a good living and he uses

that everybody he meets he tells his testimony

and we think it is so awesome that Tony has gone

from a suitcase because that was not the plan

the Lord had for Tony all the way to trade school

and sharing his testimony and on the next slide

I'll tell you the story of a young man named

Marcos Marcos came to us the oldest of three

siblings. Those are his sisters, Salome and Patricia,

that you see in the photo. And their kid's mother

is mentally disabled, and their father is a very

violent alcoholic, a mean, mean man. And he would

abuse the little girls in ways that I can't even

get into. And Marcos would try to protect his

sisters from their father. And then when he would

try to step in and protect them, the father would

physically abuse Marcos. And we took in the children.

And in 18 years of doing this job, I've never

seen a child so closed off as Marcos was. Understandably,

he had been through the worst that life has to

offer. And he was completely shut down. We started

to talk to Marcos about the Lord, about his heavenly

father. And Marcos' response was, don't talk

to me about a father. I don't want to know about

any kind of father because I know what fathers

are. And that was heartbreaking to us to know

that his image of a father was somebody who was

so cruel and heartless and someone who had hurt

his children. But God. But God. And this but

God was not a quick. but God. This was a years

long process, but slowly Marcos began to thaw.

And we noticed that during the devotions in his

house, after six months, he was sitting a little

bit closer. And then a couple months later, his

back wasn't turned anymore. And then the next

year, he actually brought his Bible with him.

And eventually, Marcos accepted Jesus as his

Lord and Savior. And we just praise the Lord

for working that miracle in Marcos' heart and

his life. And Marcos is a brilliant, warm, kind

-hearted young man. And it's something that only

the Lord can accomplish. Man cannot do what the

Lord has done in Marcos' life. life and on the

next slide I'll show you so Marcos was recently

valedictorian of his school before us he never

went to school before and now he's valedictorian

and he loves the Lord and he's such an awesome

and warm young person and that's something only

our heavenly father can accomplish and on the

next slide I'll tell you Dominica's story Dominica,

she lived in a one -room shack with her mom who

would work entertaining various men in her house.

And it was understood that Dominica was going

to go into her line of work. And her mom would

tell her, Dominica, you're next. This is what

you're going to do too. And that was the future

that this little girl had ahead of her. But God,

because that wasn't God's plan for Dominica.

Dominica's mother got herself a steady boyfriend.

And the boyfriend... told her, you need to pick

between me and your daughter because I'm not

raising somebody else's kid. And so her mother

made the unimaginable choice. to choose the boyfriend.

She kicked Dominica at six years old out onto

the street where she was living all on her own.

Dominica got picked up by social services and

brought to us. And this little girl's faith,

this picture with her praying, that was a couple

of days after she came to Casa Shalom. And her

faith, it's just like she embraced the Lord wholeheartedly.

She's like, this God, I love this God. And it

was amazing to see her faith just absolutely

blossom. And this little girl, is a prayer warrior.

Well, now she's a young lady, not a little girl,

but she's been a prayer warrior her whole life.

And as Dominica began to grow up, she began to

talk about what she wanted to do. And she said,

I feel called to go to nursing school. She said,

I never had anybody to take care of me. I never

got to go to the doctor. I never got to, when

I was sick, I was just on my own. And so she

feels called to be a pediatric nurse. And so

Dominica is in nursing school and she loves using

her gift that the Lord has given her for medicine

to minister to others and to share her testimony

while she does it. And on the next slide is the

story of a young man named Javier. Javier came

to Casa Shalom, the oldest of four siblings.

And Javier and his siblings came from a village

pretty far away. Both of their parents had struggled

with addiction, and they passed away. And after

they passed away, the siblings were sent to us.

And Javier and his siblings had never heard of

Jesus before they came to Casa Shalom. They had

never heard of the Bible. No one had told them

about Christ. Because Javier and his siblings

come from a Mayan village, so they are Mayan

people. And in many of these remote Mayan villages,

they still practice their traditional Mayan religion,

which... Some people here in the U .S. think

this may not exist, but I'm here to tell you

it very much does. That traditional religion

is idol worship. So they have a plethora, many,

many gods, and they are made out of wood or stone

or it's a drawing. And people will come and leave

offerings, and they will worship these idols.

And so that's what Javier and his family grew

up doing. He came to Casa Shalom, started going

to school, heard about Jesus Christ for the very

first time, accepted him as his Lord and Savior,

and he decided he wanted to be an electrician.

Fantastic career. So we enrolled Javier in electrician

school. But then he came to us. He said, Brother

Josh, Sister Jessica, I think I feel called to

do something else. I said, well, what do you

feel called to do, Javier? He said, I think I'm

supposed to go into ministry. I said, okay, well,

this is new. Like, what kind of ministry are

you thinking? He said, I think I'm supposed to

be a church planter. He said, I think the Lord

is calling me to plant a church in my village.

And we were blown away by that because my husband

and I would not be welcome in Javier's village

to bring the gospel. They would not welcome our

presence. They would not want to hear about Jesus

Christ from us. But you know who can bring Jesus

to them? Javier. They will listen to Javier.

And so Javier will, in January, he's going to

be starting a seminary. The Church of God has

a wonderful seminary right there in Guatemala,

a couple hours from us. And Javier is going to

be starting seminary to get his degree as a church

planter. In the meantime, he's finishing electrician

school, but he's going to go be a church planter

and bring the gospel of Jesus Christ. back to

his own people for the very first time. And we

praise the Lord for that, that he is raising

up this generation of children from Casa Shalom

to go out and reach their own people for Jesus

Christ and change their country. This last testimony

that I'm going to share is different, but I think

it's really cool. It's really special. It's a

young man named Edwin. And Edwin came to us when

he was four years old. He's from a village about

four hours north in Guatemala. And when Edwin

was four, his dad put him on a bus, a public

bus to Guatemala City, which is a city of about...

5 million people, put him on the bus alone and

said, go to Guatemala City. Your uncle is going

to be waiting for you there at the bus station.

Well, four -year -old Edwin takes that long bus

ride on his own. gets off the bus, and there

is no uncle. Well, there never was any uncle.

It was Edwin's father's way of getting rid of

him because he didn't want to take care of Edwin.

So Edwin stayed in that bus terminal in Guatemala

City for three days by himself as a four -year

-old, sleeping under benches and digging through

the garbage to try to get food and try to survive.

He was picked up and brought to Casa Shalom,

and he grew up with us, just the best older brother

possible to everyone at the orphanage. Somebody

on a missions team had... brought one of those

real nice fancy cameras and he introduced Edwin

to photography. And Edwin was able to save up

a little money from his job and bought a very

basic digital camera. And when it came time for

Edwin to go to college, we sat down with him

and said, Edwin, what is it that you want to

do with your life? What are you interested in?

And he looked me dead in the eyes and said, Sister

Jessica, I want to be a DJ. And I looked back

at him, and I said, no. I was like, that is not

a practical career, young man. But what we did

find was a local university that had a communications

degree. It had a radio component, a video component,

a photography component. So we sent Edwin to

school for communications, and he graduated with

his degree and started his own photography company.

And he started again just... a little bit of

notoriety in our area. He took this picture of

this elderly woman in a local village, and I

think it's a really cool shot. He started to

get, you know, just a little bit of a name for

himself in our area. Well, right around that

same time, there was a pop star here in the United

States, and this pop star did what pop stars

do, and he got himself into a little bit of trouble,

did some things he wasn't supposed to do. did

some drugs, some various things, and his reputation

wasn't as good as it had once been. So this pop

star decided that to try to rehabilitate his

image, he needed to do a goodwill tour. So he

decided to go to Guatemala to do a goodwill tour,

and he was going to go around and pass out food

and do a free concert and visit a hospital and

some schools. But in order to do that, he needed

a photographer and videographer to follow him

around and document all these good works that

he was doing so he could publish it and get his

good image back. So this pop star said to his

manager, find me a local photographer and videographer

in Guatemala who can follow me around and record

all of this and then I can publish it and people

can see what a good person I am. So the manager

started looking around in Guatemala in our area

and found Edwin. And that is how Edwin became

Justin Bieber's photographer and videographer

for his Guatemala Goodwill Tour. If any of you

young people don't know who that is, ask your

parents. He was pretty famous when I was young.

But God. Because man cannot orchestrate that.

There is no reason that a child from a Guatemalan

orphanage should rise to that sort of level.

So he followed Justin Bieber all around Guatemala,

did his videos, his pictures. And once that was

done, Edwin's business exploded. He was able

to take that notoriety that he got from being

Justin Bieber's photographer and expand his business

tenfold. And now Edwin travels all over Latin

America, primarily working with nonprofits. He

works with Christian nonprofits doing their videography,

their promotions, their marketing, their photos,

their social media, and helping them spread the

word about what Jesus Christ is doing in their

ministry. That is just the coolest testimony.

And that is just a huge but God moment because

man cannot orchestrate that scenario. In a million

years, I could not have dreamt up that scenario.

But that is what God does with the children of

Casa Shalom. And on the next slide, this little

girl that you're going to see, her name is Eleni.

And Eleni's story is not written yet. I don't

have a cool testimony. to share about her. She

is relatively new with us. She's only been with

us about a year and a half. She's still just

a little one. Her story isn't done. But Eleni,

before she came to us, she was living with her

mother on the streets of Guatemala City, and

her mother struggles with addiction. And when

she was found, I don't know if you can see it

in this picture here on this side, on your left,

Eleni... was found in a dumpster with her mother.

Her mother, in that photo, is there laying down

in the dumpster next to her, passed out, drunk.

And in the photo, Eleni is doing what little

girls like to do with their mom's hair, just

playing with her hair. And Eleni literally was

scooped up out of the trash and brought to Casa

Shalom. But what we teach Eleni is what we teach

all of the kids at the orphanage. That may have

been your past. But that is not what the Lord

has for you. Because these children are not trash.

They are gifts from God. And we teach Eleni that

she is a daughter of the Most High King. That

she is not trash. So every child that walks through

our doors, they all go to Christ -centered therapy.

And we work with them through their trauma. But

we teach them. That the abuse, the neglect, the

abandonment, the literal dumpster, that's their

past, but it's not their future. That's not what

the Lord has for them. He has hope and a future

for them. And I just want to encourage anybody

here today that may be struggling, things from

their past, abuse, abandonment. Someone took

advantage of you. You were neglected. You were

beat down. That may be your past, but it is not

the future that the Lord has for you. You are

not trash. You are a son and a daughter of the

Most High King. And so that is the mentality

we foster at Casa Shalom, and that is what the

Lord does in all of these children. He does a

work in them. And those of you who have been

to the orphanage can testify. I'm not saying

these children don't have problems. They absolutely

do. But the Lord does a miracle in them. And

he transforms them. And people who visit, they

say. I expected the children to be closed off

and bitter and maybe a little angry, but they're

not. They're warm and they're welcoming and they're

funny and they're open. And that's something

that only the Lord and his Holy Spirit can accomplish

in these kids. And on the very last slide, how

can you help? Well, we have options. The first

thing is we need prayer. Like our brother said

at the beginning, parenting is one of the greatest

gifts and greatest challenges. Please pray. I

have 67 kids to parent. A third of them are teenagers,

so pray extra. No, please pray for all of our

children. They all need a touch from the Lord.

Some of them, it's physical. All of them, it's

mental and spiritual. Pray for our staff as well,

our Guatemalan staff, house parents, cooks, security,

drivers. They are all absolute heroes, and they

need prayer as well. Consider giving the Casa

Shalom financially. I know the church is impressed.

progress of raising funds for a new roof for

some buildings at Casa Shalom and that is a massive

massive blessing for the orphanage consider coming

on a missions trip I see many faces who've already

been to visit us and I hope to see more Come

to the meeting after church. This is not a commitment.

You are not signing on the dotted line. But if

the Lord has spoken to your heart at all, I would

love to just chat with you and answer any questions

you may have. You may say, well, I don't speak

Spanish. That does not matter. First of all,

my husband and I speak Spanish, and we'll be

happy to interpret for you. Second of all, the

kids don't care. What they know is somebody has

come. all the way from the United States to play

a soccer game with them or to color in a coloring

page or for the toddlers to get down on the floor

and do some Legos, to love on them, to pray for

them, to sing worship songs with them. And you

do not have to speak Spanish to do that. So just

come, pray about it. If the Lord is putting something,

a little something in your heart. Come to the

meeting and find out more. You can also follow

us on social media. If you've got your phone,

you can just take a picture of that page. Follow

us on Facebook and Instagram. I try to update

those frequently. You can see what the Lord is

doing at the orphanage. And come talk to me.

I will be out in the foyer after service. Come

talk to me. Find out more. I have some info cards.

I also have a little plug here. I have some Casa

Shalom cookbooks for sale. They are $20 each.

to cook come get one of these cookbooks we do

cash card venmo got lots of options but it's

full of authentic very accessible guatemalan

recipes that you can make right at home and that's

a great way to support the orphanage as well

so i just want to thank you guys so much for

listening thank you so much to your pastors for

this opportunity to be here with you all god

bless you in to this message from Lifehouse Church.

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