Ecuador is Burning

Well, not the whole country. Just the 1/2 acre hillside beside the building we are living in for the week. We came "home" from our Vacation Bible School yesterday to find it charred and smoking. And Dan Malloy with Extreme Response (the ministry that manages our building), who, amazingly enough, is from Akron, OH, told the story. He arrived in the afternoon to find the whole hillside in flames. And no one was putting it out. So Dan called the fire department and then went on the roof with his daughter, got a hose hooked up, and started dousing the flames. When the fire departement arrived 30 minutes later...............yes I wrote 30 MINUTES LATER..............Dan, his daughter, and a neighbor had the fire mostly out. But check this out: the fire department was 2 dudes on motorcycles with water filled backpacks! That's crazy and cool all at once. So these guys really took over once they arrived (sarcasm intended). They went up on our roof and used the hoses Dan and his daughter had used and made sure the fire was out.

So either all the buildings in Quito, Ecuador are concrete because they don't have a fire department, or there's not much of a fire department in Quito, Ecuador because all the buildings are concrete. Or both.

But what is really burning in Ecuador is the hearts of my mission team for these people and these children, and God inside them. I am so proud of how they came here open and ready to experience everything and soaked it all in. Yesterday's VBS/Carnival was a blast with 166 kids from the La Comuna neighborhood. We had about a dozen game stations and smiles were to be had all around. The sister's Finley wrote an incredible skit (performed mimed) and recruited some of the team members to act it out. It was about a girl who kept trading her heart for the the things of this world and the deceitfullness of wealth. She ended up with it torn in pieces. Jesus (aka Tom Valentine) came and blew away her broken heart and gave her a new one. I really enjoyed watching from the back as all the kids got silent and stood on their chairs to see. A sacred moment for me for sure. Video on youtube to follow.