When Love is in the House....

I've found myself singing that old Toby Mac song recently as I look into my kitchen that is usually full and overflowing with people....

"When love is in the house the house is packed

so much so we leave the back door cracked.  

Mama always said as a matter of fact, 

when love is in the house the house is packed!"

Over the last month we've had the privilege of hosting many many amazing people in our home!  Here are a few of them:

A full table!

Left to right:  Kayla Haines our horse therapy expert,   Hannah Komita one of our awesome interns.  Virginia one of the teen girls living with us as she finishes school.  Her son Erick is in the front row.  Brooke Leaman another one of our awesome interns. And Moses and Isaiah.

Our family with Carla, another teen girl living with us.  We love her dearly.

Meagan Malpass who helped homeschool Isaiah and Moses the beginning of this year and Joanna Brooks another awesome intern! 

Zachary Ranck, another awesome intern!

Jenny, our beloved national Missionary serving with us who lives with us during the week.  She is like one of the family.

It is so amazing and wonderful to be able to work and train and do life with these amazing people.  They are each touching many children's lives in special ways!  It is a deep and profound blessing to see the work of helping children heal be multiplied in the lives of these special people!!

If you want to support our missionary work we would love your help! 

Tax-deductible donations can be mailed to 

 Commission To Every Nation (C.T.E.N.)

 P.O. Box 291307
 Kerrville, TX 78029-1307
 Please include a note saying it is for missionaries Cindy & Drew Metcalf 

Credit card donations can be made over the phone at 1 (800) 872-5404

or online at www.CTEN.org/missionary/DrewMetcalf 

We can't thank you enough. God bless you!

I'm not going to hide it any longer.
I stink at staying connected.
It truly is only the folks in front of my face that get my attention.

Oh, I think often of all my family and friends and all of you who are not living here in this concrete house in the mountains of Guatemala.  

I even offer prayers for you whenever my sweet Jesus drops you in my mind! 

I just stink at letting you know you're there. 
In my mind. 
In my prayers.
In my heart.

So, I'm going to start blogging again.  Just for you.  So you will know that I love you.

Instead of trying to catch you up on the last three years (my last blog post was in 2012).  I will start at present.  I am certain the past will spill out as the stories start to roll. 

3rd Wednesday Worship Night

In the last year we started to gather with sweet friends to worship on the 3rd Wed. of every month.  It has always been a wonderful time, but this last Wednesday blessed me deep.
 
My day started off with running here and there preparing for art/music therapy to be held at our house with around 8 teen girls.  The girls have been coming every Wednesday for over a half year now. However, just recently, I've become aware that our 'honeymoon' phase with the girls is over.  The masks are off.  They are now fully aware of my weaknesses, as I am of theirs.  I had to check pockets, and discovered both lying and stealing at our last meeting.  Oh drat.  Love and confrontation needed.

Michelle, who leads the art side of things so humorously named this new shift the 'DONEymoon'.

The day rushed on with homeschool and worship prep in the afternoon, and preparing for a meeting at 4pm that would include dinner and the worship gang arriving at 6pm.  I was running full throttle.

I managed to be hospitable to our 4o'clock meeting.  They are a wonderful new couple that will be house parents for a home of little boys!  We couldn't be more excited that the boys will have a mom and DAD (so so rare here) in their home to help care for them and teach them how a family should be.  While we chatted at the island in the kitchen I whipped up a big pot of beef stroganoff and a salad with some tangy homemade balsamic vinaigrette.  I am terrible at judging appropriate portions when I cook and nearly every time I cook for guests I overestimate grandly.

We talked, ate, and shared our visions to see children really healed.  Really HEALED!  We cut our meeting short as the evening guests started to arrive.

The dishes were undone. The pots of stroganoff, rice and salad were still scattered across the island. More bodies filled the house bringing bags of chips and dips. I invited them to try the stroganoff and the vinaigrette. 

There were people meeting for the first time, laughs, hugs, a heated Bible trivia game and worship. Worship that shook us and worship that stilled us. 

We sang 'Great is thy Faithfulness'. When the song ended my fingers could not touch another key on the piano. The Holy Spirit was so thick in the room that I wouldn't dare do anything to break the holiness of the moment. We prayed for each other.  We hugged and kissed each other and said good night.

When I went to the kitchen not a drop of stroganoff was left. My heart could not have been fuller. These dear people felt free and loved and safe enough to go to my cupboards and drawers to find bowls and forks to fill their bellies. And free and loved enough to share the presence of the Almighty together.  To sing the words in unison 'All I have needed thy hand has provided' and know it's true..... because they're living it.

My heart is still full from the sweetness of that evening sharing food and Jesus with the ones God put in front of us.  

I pray that you too can love who God puts in front of you today because those bodies are a gift to you.  They may lie to you or steal from you and be all caught up in a 'Doneymoon' phase, but they need you.  God put them there.  And while you're loving them you might as well feed them!

Get your stroganoff cooking friends!

RECIPE FOR BEEF STROGANOFF (by Dorothy Cavalcanti)
 (I, of course, doubled this...always thinking I won't have enough for guests)
Brown 1 small onion in butter, than add 1lb ground beef and brown.
Add:
2TBSP flour
1TSP salt
1/2TSP pepper
mix well, then add:
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1 cup sour cream
Add milk to desired consistency
Serve over rice or noodles

If anyone wants to help us, here is the donation info. Thank you! 

Mail-in Donation

Commission To Every Nation (C.T.E.N.)
P.O. Box 291307
Kerrville, TX 78029-1307
Please include a note saying that your donation is for Cindy & Drew Metcalf

or if you want to Donate Now click here