A little Guatemalan boy gave me the best gift

If I told you about this boy, I couldn’t help but feel a loss of some sorts.

A loss of innocence. He’s not a child though he’s a child.

There’s a tangible weight and stronghold, something not fit for a child he wears all over.

He spends his day selling goods, coming close to tourists opening his backpack without joy. Enslaved to his allotment in life. No other choice, a kid that doesn’t have choice.

 His eyes are bloodshot, and I wonder if his heart is too.

And all we did was talk to him, see him, try to bring a smile to his face. We got to pray for him and tell him he can go to Jesus Christ for help, there was a hidden eagerness for it.

 In our prayer, I just wanted to cry for him though I knew none of his exact situation. I imagined chains falling off and him walking into the freedom Christ purchased for him. 

I’m thankful my God is with those such as him. That whatever you did for the least of these you did for Jesus himself (Matthew 25:40). 

I didn’t understand.

Like, Aleysia, someone on my new squad said we go and reach out for those we meet but in reality they end up reaching back to us. 

I didn’t understand.

I refused; I thought this is what the adults over him demanded of him as a trick to get money from us. The boy says “un regalo” over and over again. And now I wear it on my wrist.

I tried to pay numerous times for it, but he wouldn’t take it.

It’s as if this young boy could recognize a genuine act of compassion and didn’t want to give into the corrupt systems of the world that he has been enslaved into.

He wanted to bless us, though he was working on someone’s clock and with someone else’s agenda. 

It was his act of resistance, and for some reason he wanted to show us love. And I’ve never received a more pure, extravagant gift in my life. 

“Jesus sat down opposite the treasury, and began watching how the people were putting money into the treasury; and many rich people were putting in large amounts. And a poor widow came and put in two lepta coins, which amount to a quadrans. Calling His disciples to Him, He said to them, ‘Truly I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all the contributors to the treasury; for they all put in out of their surplus, but she, out of her poverty, put in all she owned’^“– Mark 12:41-44

So I wear it. I wear a bracelet of Grace of favor, and I don’t forget his eyes that in faith, will taste and see goodness in the land of the living (Psalm 27:13).

I remember why I am I here. For humans like him. They move our hearts, and we can’t help but feel every part of every beautiful encounter. 

Join in serving faces like these! I cannot continue without you,

THANK YOU SO MUCH!

Grace and Peace