Changes have happened in our team. Now Lorena, my best friend who is my age, and me are the team leaders! Our original leader, Desteni, got really sick from a misquito transmitted disease and had to return to Medellin. Another one of the students had malaria, and even though she got better it was too high a risk for her to go to the next location that is known for having malaria as well. So now we are a team of 5 people.
Lorena and I are so excited! God must have a lot of faith in us to let us be responsible for three weeks of outreach! It's going to be a good challenge for us. But we also need a lot of prayer so that we make good decisions and pastor our students well.
Last week and this week we have been in the same church. We are working with all age groups, but a lot with the youth. This week we're starting a city-wide youth group that the youth pastors of three different churches want to continue with after we leave. It's really exciting to start something that has so much potential and to get different churches working together!
God has been so faithful with us! Even though we've had some big challenges we've also really seen God do some cool things with us. One night we were suppose to have a church meeting, but we really didn't want to have it because Desteni was leaving and I was suppose to preach but hadn't practiced with the other girl who knows a bit of English. Maybe it wasn't the most missional minded thing to do, but we prayed for rain so that people wouldn't come and we would have more time to prepare. And it started raining, but then stopped and we were all frustrated and scrambling. Then it poured for a good two hours and only about 10 people came to the church, so we had a good time of worship and a devotional and that was all. God has been so good to give us rest when we need rest and strength when we need strength, creativity when we need creativity and always a lot of work for us to do. God is good.
Monday, May 28, 2007
Monday, May 14, 2007
The Middle of Nowhere
First of all, praise God that we have had coffee! It seems funny, but it really was like a gift from heaven these last two weeks. And, Des and I discovered that everyone of our teammates likes coffee... why we we made to work together!
BRIGADE: Our time at the brigade went better than I could have dreamed. We had so much impact in that community the three days we were there, it was so hard to leave. My evangelism team worked with many people in the community and left a lot of youth who had made the decision to live for Christ. There is a young pastor there who is conintuing to disciple them. Members from our team also worked in physical therapy, counseling and worship and all were equally pleased with their results.
Thank you to everyone who prayed for protection for us! We were more than protected, our first day there the military and the police ask how we were doing. The police added a special watch so someone was on duty 24-7 where we were working and they even let us use the police station bathrooms so we could shower. God was really looking out for us!
CHURCH 1: Though the first week was wonderful it was even better to be united working together as our team. The first week we did a "mini-campo escuela" for the youth and the second week we worked with families. Again, there was a community-wide response in both youth and families. Time at this church was also a good stretching for Desteni and I. We were both adjusting to our new positions as leaders after being students the last semester. And we both had more speaking responsibilities than we've ever had before (me with the youth and her with counseling families). But now we can say we've personally seen that God is faithful to do more in us than we can do ourselves.
This place we were in, it really is the middle-of-nowhere, otherwise known as El Palmar in Cordoba,Colombia. In this place they peal their own rice, kill their own meat, and take big homemade hats and machettes with them when walking more than 5 minutes out of town. They have more mangos than you can imagine; there are even different kinds of mangos, if you didn't know: cow mangos, heart mangos, sandle mangos, ect. There is no running water and electricity is sporatic. Where we stayed had a dirt floor and we slept in hammocks. I learned to rope cows (although it's easier to aim at the 8-year-olds teaching us), milk a cow, and ride a horse. I called my mom for mother's day/dad for his birthday from a cell phone hooked up to an antena and repeatedly had to interrupt them to chase the pigs out of the house. It was the experience of a life time! I can't help but smile at the memories and thank God that I get to live a life of adventure, it's the best kind!
Right now we're in a "city" for two weeks. Our first week will be working a lot with youth. The second week we'll be with a church plant that has a lot of new Christians. Please continue to pray for unity in our team and that we will bless the churches and communities.
Everyone who has prayed for us, thank you so much! So far on outreach we have been in awe at how God has been answering our prayers with much more than we even ask. We prayed for protection and we had the military and police as personal body guards. We've even asked God for little things we miss, like coffee and salad, and gotten them not just once, but every day afterwards. Please keep praying because, trust me, God hears!
BRIGADE: Our time at the brigade went better than I could have dreamed. We had so much impact in that community the three days we were there, it was so hard to leave. My evangelism team worked with many people in the community and left a lot of youth who had made the decision to live for Christ. There is a young pastor there who is conintuing to disciple them. Members from our team also worked in physical therapy, counseling and worship and all were equally pleased with their results.
Thank you to everyone who prayed for protection for us! We were more than protected, our first day there the military and the police ask how we were doing. The police added a special watch so someone was on duty 24-7 where we were working and they even let us use the police station bathrooms so we could shower. God was really looking out for us!
CHURCH 1: Though the first week was wonderful it was even better to be united working together as our team. The first week we did a "mini-campo escuela" for the youth and the second week we worked with families. Again, there was a community-wide response in both youth and families. Time at this church was also a good stretching for Desteni and I. We were both adjusting to our new positions as leaders after being students the last semester. And we both had more speaking responsibilities than we've ever had before (me with the youth and her with counseling families). But now we can say we've personally seen that God is faithful to do more in us than we can do ourselves.
This place we were in, it really is the middle-of-nowhere, otherwise known as El Palmar in Cordoba,Colombia. In this place they peal their own rice, kill their own meat, and take big homemade hats and machettes with them when walking more than 5 minutes out of town. They have more mangos than you can imagine; there are even different kinds of mangos, if you didn't know: cow mangos, heart mangos, sandle mangos, ect. There is no running water and electricity is sporatic. Where we stayed had a dirt floor and we slept in hammocks. I learned to rope cows (although it's easier to aim at the 8-year-olds teaching us), milk a cow, and ride a horse. I called my mom for mother's day/dad for his birthday from a cell phone hooked up to an antena and repeatedly had to interrupt them to chase the pigs out of the house. It was the experience of a life time! I can't help but smile at the memories and thank God that I get to live a life of adventure, it's the best kind!
Right now we're in a "city" for two weeks. Our first week will be working a lot with youth. The second week we'll be with a church plant that has a lot of new Christians. Please continue to pray for unity in our team and that we will bless the churches and communities.
Everyone who has prayed for us, thank you so much! So far on outreach we have been in awe at how God has been answering our prayers with much more than we even ask. We prayed for protection and we had the military and police as personal body guards. We've even asked God for little things we miss, like coffee and salad, and gotten them not just once, but every day afterwards. Please keep praying because, trust me, God hears!
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