Teary Good Byes

The day we were dreading, the last day at the orphanage. We stayed up late last night after the movie, talking and preparing ourselves for the inevitable. How can with language barriers, cultural differences, age differences, and in such a short time frame go from strangers to family. The closeness we found with these kids can only be described as God's love. There is no other way to explain it. We each have our special friend(s), who we have a special bond with, but all 10 of us leave with 39 new little brothers and sisters in Christ.

We left the hotel and got to the orphanage to find, as usual, all the kids lined up waiting for us, ready to cheer our arrival (what did we do to deserve this). In all of the trees are intricately folded construction paper, oragomied (word?) into animals and flowers with notes in English for us. They had stayed up into the wee hours of the night doing that for us. They read "I Love You", "I Will Miss You", "God Bless You", and "Come Back Soon". We walked through this paradise and into the classroom building. When we got there, we had a surprise for them. We had practiced, kind of, a couple songs for them, since they had blessed us so much with their worship. The first song was a joyful noise, and man was it noisy. We hesitated for a millisecond, then went on to sing "Mighty to Save" for them, and the presence of the Lord was there. The song may not have sounded good, but the kids liked it, and got into it, and finished to great applause. They then, of course, began to sing for us. There is something about the loud and beautiful voices of these children that puts us in a place where our hearts fill with love for these kids and God. They sing as loud as they possibly can with no hesitation of the sound of their voice, who is watching, who is listening, they just lift of their voices to the Risen Lord. Amazing. They finish with a song called "Goodbye My Friends". Needless to say, this took all of our emotions to a new high. After cleaning the tears away, we had a great chance to thank and pray for the Ophanage and New Life Orphanage as a ministry.

If things had ended there today at the orphanage, I don't think any of us would have been recovered yet. Luckily, we had time to play more. We did another rousing game of steal the bacon, which we will post video of upon our arrival home, and then just played with the Weeble Wobbles and balls, made more oragomy, and just loved on the kids. They are such a giving and wonderful group of kids, they just kept filling our bags with more and more and more of what they made for us. The evidence of our impact was cemented by the stack of letters they gave me to take back to team members from past teams.

Then I had my low for the trip. I had to start the process of saying final good byes. Through many tears, hugs, words or love, tears, high fives, fist bumps, final oragomy hand offs, and tears, we were in the van, not ready to leave, but having to leave. As we drove off, the kids stood at the fence and waved, just the final icing on the cake of a beautiful week. We spent the ride home consoling each other, praying for the kids, the leadership of the orphanage and church, and Cambodia, and talking ourselves out of going back right then. The impact these children made in our lives will be permanent.

After a not so quick lunch, we packed up and headed for Siem Reap. The details of that seem insignificant in comparison, so I will just say we had a safe trip, checking into our hotel, which is very nice, and went to a nice dinner at the Blue Pumpkin.

Our debrief tonight was very touching. I will go back to how I started this blog. How can 10 people who have only met 6 or 7 times come to a country on the other side of the world, coming from different backgrounds and leave as family, willing to do anything for each other? Again, only by the divine intervention of God. We talked everything out and just talked about how much moments other people had with the kids affected us. We too have a bond that will be permanent. I am so proud of the job each of them have done, and know God was working through me when I got all the trip applications to put this group together.

Tomorrow will be a day of fun and excitement as we see the sites of Siem Reap and take a little down time. Please pray for health, rest, and rejuvination of our spirits, as we miss the children already. Thanks for following, we love and miss you all.