Ministry News

In 1954, the United Nations General Assembly instituted Universal Children’s Day in order to encourage all countries to initiate action that benefits and promotes the welfare of the world’s children.  On September 9th, Costa Rica celebrated this special day.  Our kids enjoyed an outing to the Crown Plaza Hotel, where our hosts, Eclipse in Action, treated the kids to a festival of events.  The theme was “Jesus is our Superhero.”  The kids played games, devoured lots of good food, and fellowshipped with kids from other children’s homes.  It was a fun activity for the kids and house parents alike.

Proverbs 22:6 “Train up a child in the way he should to, And when he is old he will not depart from it.”  We take this verse to heart here at the Abraham Project.  The task of discipling the children is the most important thing we do here.  In the day to day devotionals and Bible study periods, the kids are learning to forgive people from their past and trust their Heavenly Father.  Seems like an easy task, but in reality what makes it difficult is that they tend to relate their earthly father to the Heavenly Father.  Unfortunately, their earthly fathers have neglected and abused them giving them bad examples of what a true father should be.  We’re working on changing that mental picture to one of confidence and trust in the One who truly loves them.  In short, we’re raising kids who experience the freedom that comes from passionately pursuing Jesus.

With that said, we’ve had several kids express desires to be pastors or missionaries someday.  We see their giftings and talents in the areas of music, public speaking, and art.  Proverbs 20:11 says, “Even a child is known by his deeds, whether what he does is pure and right.  We love to dream about God’s plan for their lives and look forward to seeing the fruit of all we are sowing right now.

The older kids are now leading their very own devotionals in the homes and the house parents are seeing huge success.  The kids are delving into the scriptures, preparing and participating in the activities.  We’re excited to see such growth in their spiritual lives!

Last newsletter, we mentioned that we had a group of 3 siblings that had been declared abandoned.  We did our part to prepare the psychological reports, health evaluations, and photos.  The local PANI office took over a month to even send anyone out to pick up the reports.  We have called a number of times and they are still sitting on the file.  It hasn’t even been sent it to Adoptions yet.  It’s been two months with no movement, that’s highly frustrating! Please pray that they would move quickly to get their part done and sent to the Office of Adoptions.  These kids are hopeful to have a family soon!

We also shared about our newest kids, Steven and Maria José.  They have had a couple of visitations with their parents.  Unfortunately, the judge has asked for extensive  evaluations to be administered to a family resource that is interested in obtaining custody of the children.  In our experience if a child comes from a highly dysfunctional family, their extended family tends to be dysfunctional as well.  All of this has put the judicial process of declaring the children abandoned on stand-by for now.  We know that the Lord is fully aware of what is going on with this case.  Please pray for God’s will to be done.

First U.S. Adoption ~ Hooray!

On June 20th, the PANI asked if we would receive a sibling set that was up for adoption.  Although, Ruth and Emmanuel were only with us for nine weeks, we were able to help facilitate the bonding process with their new adoptive parents from the States.  At the end of August, their parents arrived in Costa Rica.  Their initial meeting with the kids was touching.  Ruth ran outside, clung to Mommy & Daddy and just cried.  Everyone was moved to tears as they watched the realization of a dream come true!  God’s gifts are perfect!

 

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