Andrea…again.

Be strong and of good courage, do not fear nor be afraid of them; for the LORD your God, He is the One who goes with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you. ::. Deuteronomy 31:6

I’ve been thinking about Andrea a lot, and as I’ve gotten to know her better over the past two months, I wanted to revise her description. Andrea is quite possibly the most disturbed and emotionally damaged of our girls. At nine years old, she has the mental capacity of a six or seven year old. She can barely read, she plays with toys more similarly to the younger girls here than the girls her age, and she receives instruction and discipline like a stubborn six year old. Andrea is tormented with demons of her past. I use the word demons carefully because I can’t say that I’ve ever really believed in them until I came here and saw how they can truly posses one’s life. Like I mentioned earlier, Andrea can go from one extreme to another. As sweet and peaceful as can be to a raging, violent storm. She has bitten, strangled (or tried anyway), kicked, hit, screamed uncontrollably and thrown dog shit at us …oh, and one time she pantsed me, underwear and all (the girls later enjoyed telling me how white my butt is. It’s not ugly though, they assured me). Most recently, she has been expelled from school for the rest of the year for pushing a boy… after being suspended for four days for hitting another boy (the school year ends mid-November here). She is, obviously, our biggest challenge.

But in observing Andrea, I’ve realized that the courage I see in her is not to be a brave leader like I suggested in the other post. Andrea’s God-given courage will be used to overcome the demons of her past.   I still don’t know exactly what happened to her, but she has been completely abandoned by her parents which already does significant emotional damage to a child, and who knows what else. The courage and bravery that I believe Andrea has stored deep within her is to overcome the fears of her past and to put her trust in a God who will not abandon her, who will give her the strength to overcome the demons that torment her mind and bring her peace. When Andrea is in a good mood, she is so incredibly sweet, sometimes almost sickeningly so. And it’s not to say that she could never be a leader, but more than anything she needs the strength to become normal and at peace with herself before she can lead anyone else. I’ve seen lately how artistic she is and how she has a huge heart for animals (she helped our pup birth 7, placenta-covered puppies!) I still believe God has the power to change a mind so disturbed as Andrea’s.  I pray that we can help Andrea overcome her fears, find her strengths, and learn to trust us- more importantly learn to trust that God has plan for her to succeed…otherwise, why would He have hand-picked her to live in this house? Please keep praying for Andrea…

**Just seconds after posting this, Andrea came to my door with an envelop wrapped in a purple bow with a jumble of english words written (consisting of “i miss you s much, think abut you eve, pictures, and my dog ther is”), and an adorable picture colored in purple and green, the colors I told her yesterday were my favorite.  I just asked her where she got the words from, and she said her mind. My heart just melted. A lot. God is so good.