Dream big. Fly high.

Dream big. Fly high.

My family and I have been going out on the streets of Santiago  nearly everyday reaching very large crowds. We have had a great opportunity at an area outside the center where the governor of the city organizes an event for us once a week in a large plaza. He pays for chairs to be brought out and publicizes our event to the public. We have had some very long, special, (did I say looong), nights there reaching a lot of people from all over the country. We were also granted a spot right in front of their Grand Central Station which is the only train and bus station in and out of the city. Over 700,000 people walk by this spot a day!  To bring joy to a sad world and hope to those that suffer is a great privilege.

We have been working with a large Catholic foundation that works with the elderly and homeless and have done a number of performances for them. This one elderly man I met lost his leg in 2012 when he was working at a construction site and a heavy crate fell off a semi truck and crushed his leg. He said the pain is so severe sometimes he can hardly stand it because his hip bone is barely covered. He has a beautiful little dog that helps pull him and go up to people with a little basket around her neck to ask for money. 

Another women a met down town who was also in a wheel chair had lost both her legs in a horrible fire when she was a child. She goes so fast in her wheel chair it is amazing. She told me she has done wheel chair marathons before. Her attitude was so cheery you'd think her the luckiest women in the city. 

Another man lost both his legs from polio and lays on his stomach on the busy sidewalk to beg. It is really sad to see mass crowds push their way around him and avoid him. I mean imagine laying on your stomach 10 hours a day and begging to survive! So much suffering, the only hope is the Fathers love. 

It is nearly winter here and snow has fallen on the Andes. It is already very cold especially at night and I am so grateful to the company that donated the aluminum blankets to us so we can give them to those in need. It is truly a blessing to give something so practical and helpful.

We performed at a large all boys school. Lets just say, absolute caos! It was obvious that these boys have had no discipline, and no love from their parents. We saw inside a class before we started and the teacher is obliviously writing on the chalk board as the class is going nuts jumping, yelling, on their phones;. NO one cared. It was a heck of a lot of work to get 400 12 to 15 year olds under control and focusing on what we were saying, but in the end it was well worth it and we were able to plant some seeds and teach them about discipline.   I do not have much time to write at the moment so I leave you with a bunch of pictures and will catch up more later.

Giving wings to the little ones.

Using color and energy to break down walls and reach people.

The place we found to stay here in Chile, we had reserved online at a really good price, but when we arrived, it was nothing like it was shown to be. It was in a really bad part of town (drugs, drunks and gangster part), the people who owned it still had ALL there stuff in it, nothing worked, the doors didn’t close, the ceiling was falling down, and it was absolutely filthy and covered in dust. (Like a really dirty antique store full of stuff from the 16 century that should be thrown away). We tried to find another place but everything was either very far from the center, or literally twice as expensive. My brother has pretty severe allergies so we did not think we would be able to stay besides the fact that its almost winter here and it will flood and be freezing. Anyway, when we came up with no other options, we decided to see if we could make this place work. After scrubbing it literally from top to bottom it was a lot better. We got rid of the smell and my brothers allergies didn’t act up.  The first night it rained hard and I woke up to plaster from the ceiling falling on me (what was bad was that I was so tired I didn't even mind), the next morning I moved my bed. 

 God has opened for us so many opportunities to share His love here that it really has not even mattered where we are staying. 

You really get perspective when you focus on others and put yourself in their shoes. Care about someone else's problems and like magic, yours don't seem so big.