The Fruit of the Community of Carmen Bajo

You may remember the many conversations had about what it means to have a successful short term experience - the fifth "f": fruit. That when a short term team returns to the states they might bear fruit from the experience they had here in Quito. As we have constantly talked about fruit among groups that have visited, with Quito Quest, we have often left off one very important piece of fruit information. How are the ministry sights bearing fruit in light of their new relationship with the teams that have come?

As this is the first official update from Carmen Bajo, the last seven years will be covered here. Over the years, as teams have come through, and shared a piece of themselves with the community, Carmen Bajo has also felt confident enough, moved enough, and inspired enough to go out into their neighborhoods and literally love their neighbor as themselves - whether through evangelism, clean or build up, etc. Because first God loved them enough, then groups loved them enough, they have, henceforth, been able to love others enough to love others enough, and the cycle continues.

Carmen Bajo, the community and the physical structure, has grown from something that resembled a dinning room table in a house to dirt and rocks to a 4 story building full of class rooms, a room for eating, apartments, a church, and the entirety of the Compassion program. The church is now the biggest building in the neighborhood and can be seen from miles away, therefore people are constantly asking "what is that building?" The Carmen Bajo community says, with pride, that they then have the opportunity to invite them to church and share Christ with them. Currently there are two girls who come from quite far away to go to church, because they saw the building from afar and asked someone that very question. Moreover the very size of the building allows the hermanas (teachers, cooks, and program leaders) to separate the kids to more effectively meet their needs.

The youngest kids can be learning colors in one room, while the oldest kids can talk about division; the kids work better when they get the opportunity to work alongside their peers and in a room solely for learning rather than also for eating and playing.

Sometimes I wonder if relationship - true relationship, of both giving and receiving, of mutual partnership - is really possible. I heard a resounding "yes" by the CB community. Even though many of the groups that come down have more money and maybe a higher education level, the community believes there are no hindrances to grow in the Body of Christ together. They are not held back to learn from and to teach those groups coming through, because there is such commonality in Christ's redeemed. Reuben, a member of the community, told us about how touching it was to hear one of the visiting students' testimonies that involved drugs and alcohol at a very young age; Reuben said that gave him hope. He was hopeful that the maybe the kids on the streets, or in the community, who live like this young man used to, will also have a chance and opportunity like him. My question about mutual relationship is very easily answered here, the Carmen Bajo community said that most of all they love to see people come back, because they honestly consider the incoming groups as a part of their family.

A Story of One of Christ's Redeemed
In conversation, as the question about: "how transforming has the community been?" was proposed, one of the women answered frankly and vulnerably. She said that she hated Afro-Ecuadorians, they were rude to her, mistreated her, and were incredibly unkind to her. After she became a Christian, she knew that she was called to love her enemy and share the gospel with her brothers and sisters, but in her mind that could not include the Afro-Ecuadorians. She was angry and she literally hated them. However, the more she came to church in Carmen Bajo and was presented with the Gospel of Jesus, the kindness and love of her community, and the way that when groups came through they seemed to love unconditionally; she understood there to be something terribly wrong in her heart that was still full of hate towards "the other" - for her that other being the Afro-Ecuadorians. She began to feel the work of God, the work of love, in her heart; every time she encountered her "other" and chose not to love them she could feel God pushing her saying "love them, forgive them, love them". Now, her hatred has left her, she is so relieved. She loves them and sees them as people who need love just like she does. She says it herself, she was given the gift of a great example from the teams that came through and her community alike, both were loving "the others" of their lives. Moreover, she felt loved, even though she had only been known a short time, henceforth she could love others more.