Children's Hospital

The past few days here were completely amazing. I have been blessed to see God work in ways that I never imagined. There are so many stories that I could tell from this powerful week that I could write a novel, but I don't like to read novels, I would much rather read a story. There is one event that stands out very strong in my mind, and that is the story of Ingrid.

Wednesday we went to visit an AIDS hospital outside of the city. We played with the children, and then had VBS with them. We shared the story of Esther and her crown. So for craft, all the children colored crowns then we placed them on their heads. During this time, I had been wondering around through everything and watching. I became tired of watching and wanted to help, so I began help this young girl color. Her name is Ingrid and is eight years old. She colored half of the crown and I colored half of the crown. She loved to draw hearts and so she began to fill her half up with hearts, so I did the same and drew my half with hearts too. She loved this and was smiling and laughing. We came to the middle of where we were coloring, and I drew half a heart. She paused for a second, looked, smiled, and drew the other half of the heart. Her face lit up and was grinning from ear to ear. It took every bit of strength to keep from crying like a baby right then. She then thought it was the funniest thing in the world to cover my face in little tiny ladybug stickers. Once my entire face was covered she took me by the hand and walked me around to show all the workers, children, and Lakewood crew how "good" I looked. Saying goodbye was very hard for me. I left feeling broken.

I had so many questions, and was praying about it. Like why could such a precious eight year old girl, have such a terrible thing as AIDS, and that she probably wasn't going to live to the age I am at now. I also felt very frustrated because I felt as though it was a waste of beautiful life. All of this brokenness kept stirring in my heart until group prayer and worship that night. We began to sing about God's love and sovereignty, and I had this great peace, and the Lord placed a defining thought on my heart, that her life is only wasted if we allow it to be.

I honestly expected to go there and minister to the children, but never expected me to be ministered to by them. The Lord used these young children, to make an impact on my life that they could never begin to comprehend. Through all of this I can honestly say that my greatest human hero isn't a great pastor, author, or well known saint of God, but rather an eight year old girl living in an AIDS hospital outside of Guatemala.

Zach Johnson