Arise!

As you can imagine, all of the Rainbow Squadron collapsed into bed after the marathon bus ride to Banteay Meanchey. But we awoke ready to get down to some fun with the kids! Our team is split into two groups - Team A is Candace, Sarah Beth, and myself, and Team Not-A is Mike, David, Shantel, and Maris. Team Not-A kicked things off with the first part of our series on Covenant with the foundation of Relationship. We all wore different colored shirts to represent different needs we all have, like love, acceptance, forgiveness, and encouragement. They used Skittles, a la a recent series at church, to show how the world may leave us without full measure of the things we all need, but God's desire is to fill us to overflowing! You can imagine how important this is to orphans who are missing the family relationships where many of these needs are usually met in part. They have truly experienced the outpouring of God's abundance!

This morning, Shantel and I each woke up feeling rough. Team A was up to lead the lesson, and I didn't want to leave the other teammates hanging! Neither of us was sure if we'd even be able to travel over to the orphanage, and of course it's mildly distressing to have an unidentified ailment in a foreign land - especially since I have already tasted the agony of malaria! But the team gathered around to pray for us, then we returned to our rooms to rest while everyone else got breakfast. I was at first tempted to believe that God had heard our prayer for healing and left us sick, wondering what discomfort might come next. But I fell asleep quickly and awoke just before the team returned from breakfast feeling remarkably better! Shantel had also rested some, and we each ate some toast and bananas the team brought for us. I couldn't believe that, after tossing and turning in discomfort all night, I was feeling so much better in just about an hour, but by lunchtime Shantel and I were both able to eat a decent meal!

I realized that I had expected immediate healing after our prayer, or no healing at all. After waiting an hour, the healing came. What makes my weak faith so shameful is that just last night I was reading the story of Lazarus from the book of John. In that story, Lazarus was dead and buried for four whole days - long enough that his body would have begun to decompose. But Jesus shrugged off the doubts of the witnesses and called Lazarus out of the tomb. I realize how little I was asked to endure - Lazarus had to wait four days for healing, and he was buried in a tomb! Why did I doubt that God would heal me after waiting just one hour?

Anyway, we've had a great morning now and we're heading back to the orphanage in a few minutes. We'll update again later!

-Mark