Wrecked ... Mexico City

As my plane is banking into its finale approach into Denver, my stomach had been sour the whole flight; Not because of my finale street-vender-taco count of 26, not cause of air sick (I don't get that). It had been that way all day. Nothing in me wanted to step foot off that plane. Yesterday I got to hang with the most amazing group of girls!!! Each one is a story of beauty from the heaviest ashes. My head and my heart are going to be unpacking this for months, perhaps years. But so you can see a shadow of what I mean...

...see me at dinner, a nice mexican restaurant (not unlike many I've been too in the States) My table is packed, 9 people in fact... and less that half of us even speak the same language, but conversation was never a problem. I'm sitting next to the most adorable 4 year old this world has ever seen. She stole my heart and held my hand most of the day, and ended our evening asleep in my arms. You'd never know her past by her sweet deposition... never know that she was the child of a slave, who's uncle sold her for sex as a teenager. Who's father falls on the indistinguishable line of possibility between her mothers pimp or a number of "John's." ... And I got to dance with her! As a mariachi band comes into our dinning room an impromptu dance party was like fire that spread through the room. before the first song was over she dawning an oversized sombrero on her tiny lil head. I don't think there was a step of our dance where she wasn't in spirit with her 4 year-old contagious gut-laugh. And although the two of us stole the show (at least in my head) the dance was annotated not by us but by a 12 year old who was rescued from a brothel house only a year ago by the Mexican Police. She also had so much life in her eyes... especially when she tried to throw me into a pool and even legitimately beat me in a water fight (after we had both climbed to the top of the fountain that is)

I could go on and on and on but I just wanted to paint a picture of the woman these girls have chosen to be. Many of whom ware bracelets that tell their story, not of their past... but of why they have so much life now after having so much stolen from them. The bracelets tell the story of the man who loved them the best. The Christ who showed them freedom and love. These girls knowing better than any, what slavery is. Having now showed me what freedom looks like. They walk in it, chasing the shadows and choosing to hope, learning to dream again, every smile showing a vibrant life that cant be fabricated, cannot be forced or painted on. I may tell a small part of their story, but I didn't write it.

"Therefore this is what the Sovereign LORD says: I am against your magic charms with which you ensnare people like birds and I will tear them from your arms; I will set free the people that you ensnare like birds." (Ezekiel 13:20)

"Set me free from my prison, that I may praise your name. Then the righteous will gather about me because of your goodness to me." (ps 142:7)

"I run in the path of your commands, for you have set my heart free" (Ps 119:32)