We were sad to leave Chicago Hope Academy because of the friendships that were made. What our team realized was that we are all the same everywhere: we all want love: we all want to be in relationship with loving people and we all need Jesus!

We finished our work projects for the academy: cleaning out a garden area and planting plants, painting firescapes, baseball fences and touch ups, working on the rugby and soccor fields and office help. We tutored the kids during summer school and had alot of great laughs at mealtime with them. Pictured above is Bob and Tina Muzikowsky, the founders of CHA. Their love for inner city kids is contagious. The picture of one of the team members, Caitlin Ruff, is a favorite because she is pictured with Tony, the CHA staff member that took us everywhere. He is an ex-cop and loves these kids and works for Bob and Tina. Caitlin has been a Heal Ministries intern for the past two years and it was a blessing to see her in relationship with the girls that she had so much in common with in a totally different environment. The entire team from Nashville bonded with the students. I am looking forward to being a part of CHA for years to come.

We took the kids to two museums and out to eat at Navy Pier. The gratitude and thanks from the kids was overwhelming. Several of the students came up to me after Navy Pier and said that it was one of the most magical nights they have ever had. The 150 foot ferris wheel overlooks the beautiful city of Chicago and made me think about how HUGE God is. When we were at the highest point and I could hear the screams and laughter of everyone around: I thanked God for allowing me the blessing of becoming a part of the Chicago Hope Academy family. The ferris wheel at its highest point was so symbolic of the CHA kids: they have been given a great opportunity at this school and can be anything they want or dream of. They can reach for the sky!

This has been an awesome week at Chicago Hope Academy. We have enjoyed getting to know the kids one on one. We work during the days, painting, cleaning, gardening, and tutoring the students. At night, we hang out with the kids and get to know their personal stories. It was so much fun to take them to the Museum of Contemporary Art and then out to eat at the Grand Lux Cafe on Michigan Avenue.

One of boys asked me if he could call me "mom" and I said yes. He told me that he loved his mom but she would never be able to afford to take him to a restaurant like that one. It was one of those moments that God was smiling down saying............."these kids are worth the very best". They have risen above adversities in a world that has not always been kind to them. They have found Chicago Hope Academy, been given hope in a hurting world and now will be able to bless others with the light that shines through them. I have never been around a group of kids that love so well. A table next to ours at the restaurant told one of the waiters that they were impressed with the manners of the kids. They didn't even realize that what was impressive is the truth and HOPE that outshines all situations and cirmcumstances!

Our team arrived in Chicago Saturday and had an evening of bonding time in the city. There is nothing like Uno's Pizza to start off a mission trip! Sunday morning we visited the New Life Church inside Chicago Hope Academy and had an amazing worship experience.

The pastor was teaching on the book of James which is what every mission trip with Heal Ministries starts on. James 1:27 is the scripture that Heal Ministries is founded on. How does Chicago Hope Academy fit in? The majority of the families are single parent homes and some of the kids do not live with either parent. Most every student here has experience some type of abandonment: divorce, killings, gangs, poverty, etc. Our mission teams goals are to serve humbly, be strengthened in Christ and to build relationships.

Today, we worked along with students that attend CHA. We scraped rust, painted a fire escape and cleaned out a garden area. The truth is, CHA would be just fine if we did not show up and the work would be done......maybe even better! We are here for the experience and the pure joy of spending time with the students. We always think that an American mission trip is so different than a mission trip out of the country. That is not true.

A hurting heart is the same all around the world. Abandonment feels the same whether you are playing basketball in a city like Chicago or playing marbles in Africa. Poverty evokes the same feelings in any location. The one thing that is different here at Chicago Hope Academy is that these kids have been taught that they can make a difference. They can be lights in a hurting world and be a mentor to all who are lucky enough to be in their presence.

Today, we spent time with a student that just graduated. He has never known his dad and his mother is a drug addict. He lives with his aunt who is in her early twenties and has 4 children of her own. He would rather spend time at Chicago Hope after school than go back to the projects that have become his home. He is a fighter. He believes that God is in control and he will succeed in college because he has been given HOPE. This is why we are here: to love and encourage the students and the staff for the excellence they have achieved.

Tonight we went to a little league baseball game which is how Chicago Hope Academy started. Bob Muzikowsky was given community service and started a little league many years ago. God has used Bob to change the course of many students and the students were chosen to change his course as well. The student that we got to know today that will be going to a college in August is because of a man that desired to give that little league baseball player an opportunity. To be given an opportunity to better yourself is priceless. We have learned so much in the two days that we have been here. We have learned that Christ is real at Chicago Hope and that we have been blessed to receive an opportunity to serve. We have already experienced Jesus from the students and the staff. We have painted and cleared a garden but God planted lifetime memories in the smiles of a student that is going to college because of Chicago Hope Academy.

"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." James 1:27

Thanks for the prayers for the benefits. The Mad Hatters Tea Party was a HUGE success and we are going to make it an annual event. It is a great way to raise money for the summer mission projects abroad AND locally. I am so pleased that we are able to help the local flood relief families that have abandoned women trying to make ends meet.

Please pray for our trips this summer and I'll keep you posted! Heal Ministries will be going to Chicago Hope Academy June 5th. We will send a team to Belize City July 1 and then to Africa July 12th. Please pray for safety, health and for God's clear direction in every step. PRAYERS - the most important piece to every mission trip. May we go forward in full armor and may God be glorified in all that we do. Until next time, prayers please!

blessings!

H.E.A.L. Ministries will be hosting a Mad Hatters Tea Party to benefit our summer mission projects. Follow us down the rabbit hole to 1001 Belle Meade Blvd in Nashville, Tn. on Saturday, May 15th. The Silent Auction is for all ages and will have loads of handbags, watches and more! The door opens at 2 and closes at 4 and at 3:30 there will be bidding no more!

So take out an hour of your day and have some fun! Dress as you desire or wear your favorite hat and tea attire! There's plenty to see and muchness to do so bring your young ones, moms, daughters and girlfriends too!

a sneak preview with a few items in the silent auction is posted for all to see. There's designer bags and regular bags for all ages. A children's corner will have ladybug bags, purses with boas & cookies to decorate.......so

Don't be late for this very important date!

I haven't blogged in a while because the last trip I did not have internet service. I visited Chicago Hope Academy and planned the June mission trip. While I was there, I learned about a gang initiation that had just taken place a few days prior: 17 shots, 17 deaths. This is a reality where some of these kids live. One of the male workers had a son that was shot.

Despite the reality of gangs and tough survival situations, the Chicago Hope Academy has one word that rings true: HOPE. These students have learned to succeed despite the odds against them. They have learned that there is a heavenly father that is always looking out for them. They have learned that God's path for them was planned before they were ever born. They are true survivors and examples of true HOPE.

The sweetest picture that reveals the community, love and relationship among the students was captured during the soccer game. One of the girls did not have shin gaurds or cleats and another team mate gave up hers so that this girl could play. What a story of Jesus in the skin among students.

From June 5th - June 11th I'll return to Chicago with a team that will work daily to improve their grounds. The students that attend Chicago Hope Academy will work alongside us. They will work to give back to the school that gave them so much HOPE. These students, that gave up prom to go on a mission trip, will work to improve their school with our team. Will they learn anything from us? I doubt it........I suspect God has alot in store for those of us blessed enough to go and serve. I suspect that God will teach us all about relationship. I suppose we will all be better off when we return than before the trip because we will all witness true HOPE.

Imagine this face looking at you at 2 years old.......imagine sending teams with Heal Ministries year after year and investing in his life in an orphanage so that he will know the love of God. Imagine him at 25 years of age with a college degree and a business. Imagine him with a family and children and knowing that his Father never abandoned him even though his biological family did. Imagine him returning to the orphanage and passing on the Inheritance of the kingdom through tutoring children as this young boy is doing above.

IMAGINE..........REALLY living out the Word and helping the orphans and widows in their distress.....James 1:27

One of my favorite entrances to the Casa Hogar Orphanage that I visited was at the center where I fell in love with the director, Martha. She is so dedicated and loves the Lord. The entrance shows a mural of children with the names of those chidren that she has served over the past 15 years.

Most of the children in the homes are not adoptable. The homes often serve as what we know in the states as foster care. The sad part is that many of these children will never return to their families permanantly. They come from very poor socioeconomic levels where families earn only about $250 a month. My visit to many of the orphanages gave me the opportunity to ask hundreds of questions and research the reasons the majority of these children are brought to these homes.

They come from extreme poverty. Most of them have a dad in the states working while the mother is forced to take full time work in a home where many times her children are not allowed. Many poverty situations create problems of alcohol, drug abuse and other addictions that make it unsafe for the children to remain with their biological parents. Whatever the reason, it is sad. It is sad that the majority of these children will be forced to leave the homes when they finish middle school and not given the opportunity to attend high school. In the orphanage home where Martha is the director, the children are allowed to stay and complete high school as long as they obey the rules of the house. This is not the norm. They need resources. They need teams, service and help.

We must step in and make a difference in the lives of these innocent children that are being abandoned in Latin America. I cannot go about the daily routines of life and not step in and do what God is calling us all to do: to get involved. Jesus had compassion on the weak, the poor, the fatherless and the widows. I'm amazed when people say we should not help them and I fully believe that people can often do too much but this is not biblical.....to ignore those that cannot help themselves. The type of compassion that Jesus felt for those suffering is not accepted in our world and it is different from what we hear today. I want to be different. The concepts that Jesus taught was about love, compassion and an outstretched hand to those that had fallen. God delights in lifting up the fallen, restoring the brokenhearted and He delights when we feel the love and compassion that Jesus felt.

This final day of Mexico makes me sad to leave but thrilled with what all the Lord has brought to my attention. Just as the chapel on the hill at one orphanage is the center of the property, so should we focus on helping others as the center focus of our lives. Just as each of the hundreds of items of clothing at the orphanage are neatly cleaned, folded and placed on the shelves one at a time, so should we pray, and give hope to these abandoned children, one at a time.......changing the world one heart at a time.

Heal Ministries will be taking a team to serve these orphanages every summer and will be working with MTW to serve the women in the new church plants.

I want to be different. Lord keep me on your path that the world views is crazy. My prayer is that hundreds will jump on board and see the glory of God in full view.......by visiting the orphans and widows in their distress.