june 25

June 25

As the stores reopened and life began to return to normal in Latvia, we were awoken with a beautiful sunrise.  The Lord has been able to shine His glory through the sun’s rays so often on this trip. In the morning we headed to Riga 1^st to join a small celebration for Inga, one of the young adult members of the church and a friend of ours.  Small snacks and tea aided much conversation and joy in the fellowship room.  After we had enjoyed our fair share of cake, we headed home to grab our stuff and enjoy a small lunch of rice and beans to fill the space that the sweets did not satisfy.  Courtney and I headed to the train station, while Dan and Brandon headed to a coffee shop to read and discuss.  As I am writing this, we are on the train back to Riga from Liepa, so I am unsure of the details of the guys’ day, however when we talked to them last night they were watching the soccer match and had had a great day discussing theological matters and relaxing in town and at home.

The train ride to Liepa was so peaceful and simply beautiful.  The setup of the cars reminded me much of public trams in the states, with seats facing both forwards and backwards in small clusters of four. However the ride was far from anything to be deemed normal.  The serenity of the lush greenery slowly passing by the windows just captivated me.  Everyone on the train appeared so differently, each one carrying a silent story that explained their purpose.  As I looked around, pondering each of these stories and trying to guess the reason for their journey, I wondered if they were doing the same to us. 

We arrived in Liepa to the Hope Center to find out that we would be joining the girls for dinner to celebrate two birthdays.  One was for Liga, whose birthday was yesterday, and the other for Sabine, one of the girl’s daughters, whose one year birthday was today.  We decorated cards for them and joined the grilling outside to celebrate.  The Hope Center is supported by the Methodist church and is a place where girls can go who are pregnant to be supported, or if they have had their child they can go and stay as they search for a job and stable life.  Right now there are five girls living there, all of which have had their babies except for one, who was due at just about any moment.  Most of the girls who come through the Hope Center are young, some under 18, and most have not had such favorable past experiences.  The small amount of their stories that I know are incredible.  The pain and the hurt that these girls have been through just breaks my heart.

Grilling sausage outside, we played with some of kids and just had a good time talking and laughing.  We took some pictures, and have hopes to make baby books in the future for the young mothers so they can have photos of their children when they are young.  The girls were very excited about this luxury we tend to take for granted nowadays.  We watched Princess Diaries 2 with the girls and shared a lot of laughter which was so wonderful to hear and share in with these young women.  After a short intermission, the girls wanted to watch another movie so we watched The Incredibles.  We said goodnight to an amazing group of young women, and headed to bed to catch the 5:30am train home.

When we get back to Riga, we will pack up the remainder of our stuff and catch the 10:15 bus to Liepaja to go back to Camp Wesley.  We will be there until July 5^th, having the youth leadership seminar this weekend and then Wesley Day beginning at the start of next week.  We may be away from the internet for more than a few days during this time, however, I will still write and update when I can, so be prepared for multiple posts in one day :)   As the youth are preparing for camp, we ask that you would pray for them that they would come with open hearts prepared for truth to be spoken to them throughout the week.  We ask that you pray for the leaders, that they would exemplify Christ in their words and their actions and that the Lord will provide them with guidance and patience during camp.  As we still don’t know what our role will be, we ask that you pray comfort and patience over us and that our hearts would be those of servants, ready and willing for whatever our task may be.  Your prayers are so important and your support means so much to us; we are so blessed to have such loving family and friends.  Know you are much appreciated and much loved!