I found this today in a notebook from January of 2007--eleven years and one month ago. I greatly enjoyed reading it and revisiting that time in my life, seeing how God was at work. I'm going to type it, verbatim. Anything in parentheses ( ) was in the original. Anything in brackets [ ] is added now to explain and aid in understanding. I was six days shy of my 25th birthday when I wrote this, serving full-time with Child Evangelism Fellowship in Riverside County, California. Without further ado...
Lessons from La Senda
By Janelle Heiden [my maiden name], January 29, 2007
La Senda Christian Child Care Center is located in the city of Corona. Sadly, this will only be true for two more weeks, until February 14.
I've been doing evangelistic discipleship ministry at La Senda since the fall of 2004, and I have learned many lessons. In order to capture the full impact of it, though, I must go back further, to 1999...I will be sharing some of the greatest lessons I have learned in my life, all from LaSenda Day Care.
In 1999, I felt led to pursue day care work. I was a high school senior, and I took the ROP program, which would require me to do observations and an internship. One observation was at a place called Corona Community Christian Child Care Center. The director was a friendly woman named Mrs. B. I really felt drawn to this place in West Corona...however--God ended up leading me elsewhere for my internship, to Church on the Hill Christian Child Care Center in Norco. The two day cares were sister schools. God did many amazing things, and continues to do amazing things to this day, at Church on the Hill, but that is not what this story is about, so I will refrain from telling about the adventures there...[but you can read about that in my 10/25/16 post Crisis of Conscience.]
Corona Community Christian Child Care Center was so named because it was a ministry of Corona Community Church. This day care had opened in 1980, and mostly reached the children who attended Coronita Elementary School.
After my internship at Church on the Hill, I got my child development units. I put my resume out to a few day cares, one of them Corona Community. Since I already had my foot in the door at Church on the Hill, they hired me right away. That was God's plan. However, God also had a plan for that resume I had given to Corona Community.
Sometime around 2001, Corona Community Church closed down, sadly. Interestingly, though, the day care stayed open. I didn't give them all that much thought.
In the fall of 2004, I came home to find a message on my home answering machine from a woman named Marie. She told me she was the director of Love 2 Learn Christian School of the Arts and Child Care Center. She had called my parents, who had given her my home number. She offered me a job, sight unseen. I knew this was Providential, though I was confused about who this woman was, or where Love 2 Learn, etc. was, and how she had gotten in touch with my parents.
The next morning, I returned Marie's call, and in the course of it, I was told this story: Love 2 Learn was the new name of Corona Community. Marie was the new director, and they were starting a whole new program. My resume had been discovered one day when the drawer in the administrative office wouldn't close. Upon taking the drawer out, Marie had discovered my old resume catching in the back. She was impressed with my credentials and wanted me to come work for her. To this day, I believe that was set up by the Lord. She had called the number included, which was my parent's home phone number (which had also been mine at the time I had given the resume to Corona Community). My parents, in turn, had given Marie my current home phone number. There is no other way to account for this than saying it was the Lord. And that's the first lesson. God kept that resume in His care all those years, making sure it was found. What that taught me about God was that He keeps all things in His hands. He perfectly orchestrates every detail in history, and in my life.
The scriptural references I use are: Second Chronicles 36, Daniel 1:1-2, Daniel 5, and Ezra 1:9-11. The first passage describes the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians. Though many men were killed and the city destroyed, verse 18 says that the Babylonians took the treasures of the Temple back to Babylon. Daniel 1:1-2 further describes this. Later, in Daniel chapter five, it describes the drunken party of Belshazzar, the last king of Babylon. It was the very night of the fall of Babylon, the famous writing on the wall. The final thing they did at their party before the hand appeared and wrote was the get out the vessels that had long ago been brought from the Temple in Jerusalem. Eventually, these precious vessels were returned to Jerusalem. Ezra speaks of how these beautiful vessels were brought back--restored! The Lord did not allow His vessels to be taken for good; just preserved. Had they been left in Jerusalem, these vessels would have surely been destroyed, but because they were taken as plunder, they were kept safe for the future!
In the same way, I knew the Lord preserved that resume in the back of that drawer for the future time when Marie would find it! The Lord didn't merely close that door to ministry in West Corona by having Church on the Hill hire me first: He preserved the opportunity, even though it was the last thing I was thinking of all that time. I never guessed it would be found!
He did it--set all this in motion--to further His kingdom. I was needed at Church on the Hill at the time, and by 2004, I was in CEF ,doing ministry not only in Norco, but in many places around Riverside County. It was now God's time for me to reach the kids of Corona Community--now Love 2 Learn.
That in itself was lesson number two: The Lord has His own time for things to happen, and it is often different than our time...and unexpected when He does initiate things. I knew this call from Marie was Providential.
Marie and I talked. Initially, I had thought perhaps I could accept her offer as a part-time job in addition to my work with CEF. However, she was looking for a full-time employee. So, I told her I couldn't take the job, but that I was interested in doing ministry for her students in chapels. She was interested, and we decided to have a monthly program that I would do.
As our conversation ended, Marie told me something that confused me. "I want to make sure that you're not going to be putting down other religions to the kids."
This puzzled me. Marie went on. "I want to have a Christian program, but I want other religions to feel comfortable here too."
I wasn't sure what to say, but I told her that I never even mentioned religions or any one church. I just told the kids about Jesus and how He died for our sins. I taught Bible lessons. Marie seemed satisfied with that.
Mr. Dunkerley [my ministry director in CEF] and I did the monthly Bible club together the first few times. After the first time, I decided in my mind that perhaps Marie had used the word "religion" in place of "denomination" when she voiced her concern. This place didn't seem to have other religions represented. Several children prayed to receive Christ every time we went, and I knew the Lord was using us. Yet somewhere deep inside, I always felt that if Marie, director, heard the whole program all the way through, she would not like it, and would ask us not to come back. But God kept her away. I didn't see it as God at the time. She was just busy, always making phone calls, or picking up pizzas for lunches, or getting things ready for the next activity. That's the third lesson: God protects His message when He has a future plan for its audience. I did much more ministry there over the next two and a half years, and God did not want that ministry prevented by it being uprooted early. It went beyond just the current audience (though, of course, they were precious to the Lord too, and their salvation alone is priceless).
Toward the end of the 2004-05 school year, Marie disappeared, and a new woman named Yvonne was introduced to me as the new director. She was a pretty African-American woman, cheerful and pleasant. She had a very different spirit about her than Marie. She seemed like someone who would like the Bible lessons we taught. I found out she (Yvonne) went to Harvest [evangelistic church in Riverside, CA] and had gone to a Christian school as a child. Later, a former employee of Love 2 Learn, Lisa, began working at Church on the Hill where I was (and still am [in 2007]) deeply involved. Lisa told me Marie had been a member of a cult, and had been taking the Christian heritage of Corona Community Christian Child Care and disposing of it. She had gotten rid of the pledge to the Christian flag, and basically anything that was decidedly evangelical. Lisa had been at Love 2 Learn the first time Mr. Dunkerley and I had come, and had been pleased with what we taught, but shocked that Marie had allowed us to come. That confirmed my suspicions that Marie would not have allowed our Bible club to continue had she been totally aware of what we taught...though I hadn't made any effort to hide it.
Lisa's revelation to me was lesson number 4: My gut instincts and intuitions will be confirmed in time, even if I don't know everything right away. Though this sounds humanistic to say it, I realized I could trust my intuitions. I believe in women's intuition, but more importantly, as a Christian indwelt by the Holy Spirit, I can trust His voice most of all. It's about discernment.
Yvonne's leadership started a new phase in this day care's history. She took a new name for it--the third and final name it was to have. La Senda. This was because a Spanish church had moved into the old Corona Community Church, a church called La Senda. The pastor spoke English too, and had decided to keep the day care open. The day are was related to this new church in name only, though. It was a continuation of Corona Community more than anything else. A few of the Love 2 Learn teachers stayed at La Senda, but in time, there was a new group, mostly. Peggy and Sandra stayed, and are still there today. The Christian school part of Love 2 learn closed, expect the preschool and kindergarten. Beyond that, it was a day care center for off track elementary students [off track refers to year-round school], and before-and-after-school elementary care. As always, this day care catered to the Coronita Elementary School crowd.
I didn't feel the need to conceal as much as I did with Marie--although I never intentionally did hide it from her. Now, there was a freedom in the place. However, I felt a spiritual deadness among the leadership I knew the children were not getting spiritual training form them. Not seriously anyway.
I had an entirely new job now. I was to reach a group of kids who would otherwise fall through the cracks. Over the next year and a half, many children accepted Christ, and many grew in the Lord. I remember clearly Miss Kerry's kindergarten class all learning "Jesus will never leave me!" on their fingers. One girl, Jasmine, especially seemed to have spiritual depth for a five-or-six-year-old. I met her father at one point, and told me, "Jasmine is so quick to talk about the Lord since she began coming here. She's always reminding me about God and Jesus." That was lesson number five. Regeneration produces results that can be seen by others.
Enrollment dropped, and the La Senda staff decided to close down, effective Valentine's Day (February 14, 2007). All I can think of when I ponder my time serving at La Senda (Corona Community, Love 2 Learn...whichever title you prefer), I think of God's Sovereignty, timing, power, precision, and perfect plans. I know that, while I hurt at the idea of La Senda closing for good, God's attributes are still there. He has not ceased to be Sovereign, powerful, precise or attentive. I can only assume this is His leading, and that He has other purposes, even though I don't understand.
I will never forget the lessons I learned!
