Tuesday, November 16, 2010

My beautiful friend!

Psalm 45:11 "The King is enthralled by Your beauty; honor Him, for He is Your Lord." This verse came to mind when sitting in the dentist's office yesterday with Zeneyda as she received her long-awaited new teeth. You see, Zeneyda, who helps us a few days a week at the house, is a 28 year old Nicaraguan girl who has come here in search for work to send back to her mother who is raising her 3 children. We met her through a good friend and the Lord opened doors for her to begin helping us out about 6 months ago or more. She has been a real blessing to our family and she is just so beautiful inside and out. Her mother is a Christian and she walked with the Lord as a young person but has since strayed for one reason or another. When she was helping us one day she was complaining about pain in her teeth. Her jaw and right side of her mouth were inflamed and she was suffering from regular headaches. We began talking and she explained to me how her teeth have been rotten for many years due to malnutrition as a child and have caused her much illness. It was so hard for me to imagine how much she has suffered for so long for something that is so rare in The States. Daniel and I began praying about how to help her and decided to first take her to a dentist. He proceeded to tell her that she needed all of her teeth pulled but 3 and that he would replace them with dentures. She was too young to keep the rotten teeth because she would continue to suffer and it would increase in time. The Lord really impressed upon our hearts to help her in whatever way we could and over a two month period the Lord provided the money THROUGH ALL OF OUR FAITHFUL SUPPORTERS to pay for her to have all of the necessary work done. She was without teeth for a month and it has been an emotional ride for her but I can't even begin to describe the joy in her eyes first when we told her the Lord wants us to help and second when she smiled for the first time with her new teeth. I even think the dentist was a little teary as were the 2 nurses helping us. It has been such a wonderful testimony of God's faithfulness and provision and we are really praying and have already seen the fruit of God using us to help her out. We are praying that she will fall in love with her Savior as she was before and that she would give Him all the glory for what He has done. We KNOW that the Lord has used us as a tool to reach her and we are so humbled and grateful that He would allow us the privilege of being a part of His work here. The following are a before and after picture. I have to say the pictures don't fully do justice to the beautiful girl that Zeneyda is...we are so excited for her!!!! THANK YOU TO ALL WHO SUPPORT US IN MAKING THIS POSSIBLE!!!
before

after

2 comments:

Allison Curti said...

WOW!!! Simply Gorgeous!

Unknown said...

Truly God's light is reflected by her beautiful smile. What a wonderful testimony to the Lord!