18 Apr Vallado Project Spring Trip Recap
Divine Timing
Our annual Spring trip to Casa Vallado is always one of the highlights of the year. Over the last decade we have seen God continue to connect our hearts with the Casa Vallado family, use our team to impact the lives of those children, and provide the help we need from local churches in San Luis Potosi. How all of those things came together in our 2018 Spring trip, however, was something that caught even me off guard.
Typically, we have 10-12 people participate in our Spring trip. However, this trip, we had just 4 people on the team. Thankfully, the Vallado Directors had told us that the house projects they needed us to accomplish were few and relatively simple, so with only 4 people I was still confident we could serve Casa Vallado well with what we had planned between those projects, helping the kids with their school work, and the mini-VBS we had planned. I could not have been more wrong. What we were told was needed (cover for a water heater and some painting) ended up being just a fraction of what actually need to get done.
In addition to the water heater and paint Casa Vallado also had two leaking water cisterns that needed repairing, some roof extensions to cover areas where laundry is done behind the homes, and another roof extension off the kitchen of another home. This was work that would have taken the 4 of us a week of 8 hour days to do, and we definitely did not have 40 hours that week to devote to those projects. We needed help, but where would we find the number of people needed with the right kind of expertise to help execute these projects on such short notice? Well, it turns out we didn’t have to find them because God sent them to us.
That Sunday, prior to us beginning the projects on Monday, our team had joined our friends at Semilla De Vida for their worship gathering. The music was amazing, I preached the message, and the Spirit of God was touching people’s hearts, including our own. One heart in particular that was touched was that of Juan Paublo. Juan Pablo came to faith and to Semilla De Vida through some extraordinary circumstances. His 16 year old daughter had come to faith through the youth ministry at Semilla De Vida. She had pleaded with her father to come to church with her, but to no avail. Jaun Paublo wanted nothing to do with God. Since losing his wife, Jaun Paublo had blamed God and was angry with God to say the least. He was happy his little girl had found something to make her happy, but that whole Jesus thing just wasn’t for him.
Not long after his daughter came to faith, Jaun Pablo was confronted with his anger towards God again as his daughter contracted a rare disease that would take her from a healthy teenage girl to her death bed in a matter of months. Again, Juan Paublo was unconsolable and sunk into depression and rage towards this Jesus his daughter claimed. However, one night, while sitting in his daughter’s room trying to hold onto one last shred of her familiar presence in the home, Juan Paublo noticed an unfinished, hand written letter sitting on his daughter’s desk. Drawn to this letter, Juan Paublo picked it up and read one of the last lines written prior to his daughter having to be taken to the hospital to live out the remaining days of her life. The line simply said, “Daddy, my only wish is that you will come to church with me at least once before I die.”
That wish was never fulfilled, but upon reading that line Juan Paublo felt convicted. He decided that he would honor his daughter’s last wish and go to church that next Sunday. A few days later Juan Paublo strolled into the sanctuary of Semilla De Vida. That afternoon he would walk out a changed man. That morning Juan Puablo wrestled with God in his seat during the preaching of the sermon and God had won the match. Juan Puablo had surrendered his life to Jesus during the sermon and, from his own admission, “felt the peace of God cover him like a warm blanket.” A few months later, in 2016, I met Juan Puablo after preaching another message at Semilla De Vida.
So, during this most recent trip, Juan Puablo came to me after the worship gathering and asked if we needed help. See, Juan Puablo owns his own A/C company and has crews routinely installing and repairing large scale HVAC systems in warehouses and office buildings. I explained what the needs were and two days later Juan Puablo and his work crew showed up to “help.” Not only did his crew of 5 men complete every project Casa Vallado needed, but they then also helped us get a large chunk of the painting done as well. Oh, and Juan Puablo paid for it all out of his own pocket. This allowed us to focus our energy and time on tutoring the Vallado children, taking them to the park, and preparing for our one day VBS.
I was reminded on this trip that no matter how much I think I may have things planned and figured out, God always has a better plan and a better timing behind it all. Juan Puablo would have never planned his life to go the way it has. I had no idea that I needed to plan for the projects that were going to need to get done. I certainly did not plan on our team having the extra budget space on our trip to pay for the projects I had no idea needed to get done. But, before we ever arrived in San Luis Potosi God already knew it all. He knew what was going on in Juan Puablo’s heart and what his daughter’s death would mean to him. He knew what Juan Puablo needed more than Juan Puablo knew it himself. And God orchestrated it all to not only save Juan Puablo, but to then use Juan Puablo to rescue us from a potential failure regarding our ability to serve the Vallado children and house parents. I’m so glad we serve a God who stands above it all and who loves us regardless of our attempts to keep Him in the margins of our lives.