Getting ready for Christmas with the Manna Bus!

Merry Christmas —  Season! I pray that you all are abounding in joy –even in your difficulties! So much happens each week and I get so excited by the wonderful things God does for all of us involved with Josie’s Kitchen. This is Junie… If you have ever been to or lived in Punta Gorda Town, you have seen Junie on the streets. When we moved here in 1973, Junie was a young man. (Well, er we were young too!) I would guess that Junie is about 60 now.  He has lived on the streets most all of his life. He can’t talk but he can make noises and gestures to communicate what he wants. He avoids all eye contact. In this picture I was trying to show him the following picture of he and our youngest grand daughter from about 7 years ago. He wouldn’t look at me or the picture.  He has always behaved like a frightened animal in some ways, he doesn’t trust most people any longer and that is getting worse as he ages and as more mean people are out on the streets. For so many years everyone fed him and treated him kindly. I’m not so sure that is the situation any longer.  He will come for food most days and sits right on the steps (where he sat for many years when our daughter, Aprill had her business there and fed him).   He scarfs his food down and puts his plate up on the counter and scurries off. Junie’s soft spot is that he loves babies!

Here he is 7 years ago when Kairra was a baby. You can see he is looking right into her eyes. He feels safe with babies. He and Kairra would “talk “ every morning while he had his coffee! He did this with all 3 of our grandchildren when they were small.   I love the trust on Kairra’s face, the, acceptance, she doesn’t know or care that Junie is “different,” she adores him. (A powerful lesson for us in becoming like a little child!)

Here is Larry presenting “Cato” with his new push cart so that he can make a living! This is a wonderful story, Cato is the one who was on crack for 27 years and accepted the Lord a year or 2 ago, he has been growing in his faith and his personality is becoming softer and kinder (he was very belligerent before). A friend & supporter gave Larry some money to see if he could figure out a way for Cato to make a living. Larry came up with the idea of the cart for moving groceries etc. around town and the joy it gave Cato was almost annoying! Ha! He was so proud of his “new wheels”, he paraded up and down the street with them. He immediately ran out and made around $15.BZ ($7.50US) and was excited. Since he is homeless, Larry bought a long bicycle chain so that he can chain it up at night or when he needs to leave it for a time. Cato is so excited about his faith that we are constantly trying to ease him a little bit from trying to force people to accept Jesus! What a great problem!     

This is Larry and S. P. actually having a conversation! This man was like a zombie when he first started eating at Josie’s Kitchen. I firmly believe the good food, vitamins, the love and acceptance and God’s Word is healing his mind. I have mentioned before that I read the Bible to the guys every Thursday.  This past week was incredible! We waited until around 7 or 8 were gathered and then I read about Moses.. It was not just me reading to a few bored men, it was a Bible study with hungry men sucking down every word! The Lord gave me some words to say about the story of Moses crossing the Red Sea. At the end of the story, Moses and the people are thanking God for His goodness. I explained that we should be like that and thank God for the good things that He blesses us with.  They were all nodding and agreeing so I said, “let’s just pray and thank God now”, they all agreed and I prayed.  They asked questions and made comments as I was reading , they are starving for the Word of God, like little birds with their mouths open.  One of the guys who was “too cool” to stay and listen a month ago told me how much he enjoyed the story. I think I was floating on air when I left there last week! Please pray that their minds will continue to be healed and their hearts open towards the Lord. Some are not able to mentally understand the Gospel but that is the beautiful thing, we don’t have to understand it, only believe it like a little child!

In October, we were blessed to have the man responsible for getting us the container of food and the bus come. He brought along the youth minister his church who wants to bring a work crew early next year! Also along, was the man and his wife who actually put the bus together making it into a beautiful, functional kitchen.  They all worked for months converting the old 1980 bus into a modern kitchen! We packed up a boat with ~32 boxes of food (thousands of meals) and went across to Guatemala to deliver 12 boxes to the beautiful people from the church who feed the people living or scavenging in the dump about an hour from their church. These hard working, filled with joy women were cooking for 150 people (more or less), twice a month. Then they load the food into their vehicle and hand it out to the people in the dump.  Since we brought them the boxes of food they are now able to feed the people much more often! And much more nutritionally! They had driven an hour to see us with ~6 of them packed into this small SUV, on the way back, they were packed in tighter as the boxes filled the whole back of the vehicle. This is the pastor and his wife (in the coral blouse) and a few of the ladies who cook so lovingly. What a joy it was to spend an hour or so hearing about their work and love for the people at the dump. They told us about how horrible the flies are there and the stench is nauseating… and yet, they are eager, happy, even thrilled to go and feed these folks! Wow!

Here is our group at the children’s home where we delivered 20 more boxes of food for the children. Beto (our son in law), Matt and Debra, Josh, Larry and I, Heather (director at children’s home), and Michael (president of Amigos Internationales”!

We have some plans to make Christmas more fun for a few families and those at Josie’s Kitchen! We are ever thankful for your generosity and know that the Lord Himself will reward you! Thank you for praying!!! God bless you all and have a wonderful Christmas filled with the love and joy of the revelation of God coming in ‘the flesh’! Emmanuel/God with us.

Karol

We have finally gotten moved into our new and final location! 
The Manna bus is set up and eager to start cooking– next week! The location is secure, the shed is moved, the electricity is hooked up to the Wata Fountin AND the Manna Bus, the water is hooked up at both locations, many of the “construction projects are completed, the fence is up, and even a side walk has been poured, children are being fed, adults are being fed!!! More Lord, we need more children and more adults to bless! To feed physical food, to offer spiritual feasts, to help ease and change lives! 
What an incredible team we all are!!!  Together, shoulder to shoulder, working as one, united in our Lord and Saviour Jesus the Christ we are touching lives, filling empty bellies and offering His love to His hungry ones.

Our move was delayed for a few months as Aprill’s move was delayed, it was a bit trying for everyone but she cooked for our kids during the time we were without our own place until we moved in.   So many people helped; a few here, a few there but what was an insurmountable task is now almost totally completed.  
Little by little we moved a mountain! We were granted permission to take down the fence at the police station to drive the bus in and then put it back up. We then had to lift the HEAVY furniture and all of the boxes of books, kitchen ware etc. out of the old building, down the one way street (the wrong way/with permission) and then OVER the fence into the yard and up the stairs of the new place! 
3 different small teams of men spread out over a couple of months, helped get the new shed built over the bus.  
As I move back through my memory of these past few months, I realize just how many people were involved in helping. My heart feels so full when I think of the blood, sweat, and tears it took to make this happen.

On moving in day, there were only a few women and 4 children but God sent ‘back up help’ a quick few minutes here and there and we eventually managed to grunt everything into place!
I am most grateful to my wonderful husband who many days, stopped his work projects, brought his Mayan workers, and even his tractor for one day and made it all happen. Without his help we could not have accomplished all that we did. Thank you Mr Larry!
All of this was done in the intense heat of dry season. 

We still have no one to run the bus and cook for the adults. After Josie died, we fed them at a local cafe for many months. The price of the plates was cheap but the cost  still added up and I realized that we could hire a cook for the amount that we were paying the cafe.  So we have temporarily been able to take that same amount of money and hire a cook! What a relief this is off of us few women! So many of our members have moved or have had to leave the group for family reasons that the few who are left were really struggling to cook 5 meals a week for the children. This way our cook can make one big meal so that we can feed the children at noon, and the adults come to eat at one pm after the children go back to school. 

We are presently feeding 6-8 children (we are trying to find a few more children to round our group out to 10). The children have changed dramatically (for the better!). One day, it was my turn to cook for them and as I sat down to eat with them I realized what horrible table manners they had (or rather didn’t have!), They were talking with their mouths crammed full of food, it was falling out, I was grossed out so I picked up a carrot stick and began to eat just like them! I asked them, “why do we use table manners?” They gave some insightful answers but I answered and said, “it is for the person across the table from us” (as half chewed carrot was falling out of my wide open mouth!), I explained that no one wants to see what you are eating ! I think I scarred their little minds with that demonstration as they have been chewing with their mouths closed ever since then! Ha! They are so loving and teachable, truly delightful most of the time!    
They are memorizing Bible verses and we are also trying to work with them on their multiplication and addition tables so that they won’t be the “dumb ones” in class. I am convinced that if we can help them to learn even the basic skills for math and English that it will improve their self confidence. These are the kids who are left behind in class, imagine if they could raise their hand to answer these math skills. They are certainly not dumb children, they have little or no home support, some are bullied at school so the Wata Fountin is a safe place for them.
 We invited ten adults to eat, (some of Josie’s original ones), but several have not joined us yet. We will invite them again and if they still don’t come, we will round up enough to be feeding ten adults for now. 
Ten children, ten adults and we also still sponsor the ten children at Bethel School. We are still able to share some vegetables for the cook at Bethel School to incorporate into the children’s lunches. This is such a big blessing.
I was driving past Josie’s old house the other day, (where she and I started the feeding program ~8 years ago), my heart is always sad when I pass there as I miss my dear friend deeply. That day, as I passed by her house, I hollered out to her, “Josie, we are still feeding your hungries”.   It made my heart soar to be able to say that out loud.
I can only say that because of our wonderful supporters. God has taken your little “widow’s mites” and He has multiplies it each month.
Thank you. Thank you for your confidence in this effort.
Thank you for caring about the very least of His brethren.  How wonderful is our Savior!
Much love to each of you, May God richly pour out His love upon you.