we just did some cleaning/packing this evening. after a day of last 'discipleship' hangout times with students... it's just all so surreal! Pray for us as we continue to process and start adjusting to re-entry.
side note - the summer project comes friday and we are STOKED!! woohoo!
2 weeks left!!!! from today. BAHHAhahahahhhhhhheeeeee (just a little giddy freak out cry)"When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command the locust to devour the land, or send pestilence among my people, if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land. Now my eyes will be open and my ear attentive to the prayer that is made in this place. For now I have chosen and consecrated this house that my name may be there forever. My eyes and my heart will be there for all time." 2 Chronicles 7:13-16
if we but humble ourselves...
It’s been way too long since I've posted on here and I keep putting off doing blogs on ministry... well, I will shortly, I promise! but for now, just thought I'd share a bit of my quiet time from today
2 Kings 14
It's about Amaziah, King of Judah... one of the bazillion kings in the Old Testament; He "does what's right in the eyes of the Lord" (these guys are hard to come by at times in this book) but ends up challenging the King of Israel to fight him (v.8) "come, let us look one another in the face." In v.10 we learn that it's from a place of greed, pride, selfishness when the King of Israel answers him "be content in your glory, and stay at home, for why should you provoke trouble so that you fall, you & Judah with you?" He's got some words of wisdom. At times I find myself rooting for people to 'see the light' in the bible. Unsurprisingly, this one's another stubborn fool and goes to war anyways.
It did get me thinking, though, about what I'm going after, where my greed, pride, selfishness isn't satisfied? With just over 3 weeks left, I feel like sometimes I put pressure on myself to return home perfect in all areas. I want to come back to the states and have people see, well, me. It's ugly, I know, but it's true. I want my personality, my experiences, my relationship with the Lord, my future plans... all of it to just look good. And I think these last weeks I could very easily hold on too tightly to relationships with my teammates; expecting too much from them; wanting to be all things to all people. It's so silly really, when I can plainly see how much I fall short, and how beautiful it is when the Lord and the body steps in to take care of all that.
Well, I kept reading and came to a few conclusions about selfishness (and all the ugliness that surrounds it):
- When we go after selfish things, we bring others down with us, whether we see it or not (vs.10 "...you and Judah with you")
- In the pursuit of self, we become blind to truth. We see only our own cravings, lusts, desires, needs, wants - and miss everything else. What God wants. (vs.11 "... but Amaziah would not listen")
- Selfishness is defeating. You're on the brain, and you're all you've got to give. You're bound to lose the battle (vs.12 ...and
In thinking about the chapter as a whole, I was so aware of how these guys are just men. They fail, they make mistakes. Some do good, some evil. But above all, when God is out of the picture, things almost always seem to go awry. It makes sense - we're called to walk with Jesus, to be holy. Our eyes need to be on the Lord for anything to make sense or have purpose. How can we find any value in this life if it doesn't last? If it's not eternal? Don’t' get me wrong - this life is a gift and I'm just as determined as the rest to live it to it's fullest. But I sincerely wonder sometimes why we can't just forget worldly expectations and just be Jesus to people?
I'm praying for that in my life, because I'm human. I fail. I disappoint and sin. But being given grace gives me hope and purpose. I'll keep failing when I do it on my own - so why not just give it all up to the Lord? Let Him take me and use me, wholly surrendered?
It's the basics of Christianity really. But that is my faith. I suppose we all need to go back to the basics sometimes. Refocus our eyes and our lives; make sure we're not just accepting grace but allowing it to transform us as we give everything we are over to the Lord.
"Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen." - Ephesians 3:20-21
My roommate Bean shared a worship song with me the other day by The Glorious Unseen called 'Hear our Prayers'. I've been so blessed by it lately and am listening it to it nonstop. If you have a minute, check them out... let it play while your at work or making dinner. Worship music is one of my favorite ways to meet with the Lord and I pray you'll be blessed by it too!
http://www.myspace.com/thegloriousunseen
Today we had our "Day with the Lord"... Yes. These are scheduled times for our whole team. We do them about once or twice a month. And they're awesome.
This morning was no different. I've been praying through a lot lately - more than I have time to write right now, but this morning before I started a podcast I prayed for a focused heart. For more purpose and goals. To know God deeper and understand him better. For intimacy and a heart for things that He has a heart for.
And, he answered. That and so much more. So many questions I've been challenged with in quiet times and prayers... I flipped back through my journal to see everything flowing together to lead up to listening to this sermon.
You may be in a completely different place spiritually, of course! But - I just wanted to share. If you have time... please listen to it! It'll be the best hour you spend this week, I promise! Love you guys...
http://www.cornerstonesimi.com/special/media_player.html
I've been reading (pretty slowly) through 2 Kings... and have been loving what God's been teaching me. Lately I've been thinking about selfishness and greed in my life - and was challenged by these verses:
Gilgal. Literally it's the place where the Israelites camped after they crossed the Jordan (Joshua 4). Right now it's a little wicker basket on our upstairs desk filled with memories of what God's done these past months that we'll read as a team tomorrow at our weekly Sunday afternoon meeting. It's an activity we decided to keep doing after our Midyear with Joe and Allison. (I've still got to write a few more...) So when I hear Gilgal, I think: place of rememberance. It signified us looking back on the first half of our STINT year, and now - the past months of ministry.
About a week ago I was reading in 2 Kings 4, and one of the verses (38) starts off, "Elisha came again to Gilgal when there was a famine in the land." That Elisha - he knew what was up. He knew the Lord's faithfulness. Where Israel had been and how God had worked. And he expected him to work; to give them food in the midst of famine.
And I was suddenly so aware that I need to return to Gilgal; to be in a place of recognizing the Lord. Who he is, what he's done; and have faith - trusting Him to continue to work. And to fill me. I've been feeling pretty empty lately. It's hard to walk through those kinds of valleys, but at the same time I'm thankful that I'm forced to be dependent on the Lord to fill me. For Him to be the only thing I have to offer. How many times God will have to bring this to light before I live it out, I have no clue. Probably a lifetime. But with about 2 monhts of ministry left - we're all fighting indifference and complacency in ministry.
And after just one week on campus - man, has the Lord been working! Through our first (quite successful!) weekly meeting on Tuesday, Family Life seminars on healthy relationships, English club, new students coming to bible study, and our first Student Leader meeting/dinner last night - we can truly see this movement taking shape. It's totally in the Lord's hands, and we're continually on our knees asking Him to work through us. And we definitely won't stop.
I'm excited for tomorrow - to remember together all that God's been doing. And to look ahead to the coming weeks, with renewed joy, energy, excitement, and faith for what He's got planned!
Lord it belongs not to my care
Is it really April already? I've sadly fallen into the evil spiral that starts by falling a little behind in updates and ends up turning into an endless black hole of life happenings that just gets avoided altogether. Now I'm left to pick up my mess and let you in on a glimpse of this past month... Oh how I envy those dedicated daily bloggers right now! But in reality, this month has been one of such change, growth, stretching, and pure reason to worship - and I SO want to share every second of it with you!
A while back us women had a bible study based on prayer. Not just any kind of prayer - but the true, faith stretching, utterly relying on the Lord, I really don't believe that this can happen, life-changing kind of prayer. Now, I'm pretty sure a group of recent college grads starting a completely new ministry in a poverty and violence stricken third world country where they don't really speak the language or understand the culture need a lot of faith. And it's true. Nothing about this year hasn't stretched our faith in substantial ways. But months in, I found myself needing more. My personal faith can seem so weak and my prayers so pitiful. I mean, we DO follow the very God who created this life we call our own. The God who's salvation is the hope of the world... Yet so often I'm content to pray selfishly. We challenged on another to ask what GOD wants us to be praying. Personally it was a breath of fresh air to remember how much God not only can do, but wants to do in my life. Confidently coming before him and asking him to do big things here and in my life is exhilarating and has given me a much needed perspective renewal and excitement for the future.
About that same time, I was listening to a Francis Chan sermon on humility (knowing I definitely needed some truth in that area of my life) and was completely challenged by Philippians 2:3 "...but in humility count others more significant than yourselves." He talked about how as Christians we so often forget that we're supposed to be like Jesus. Lofty shoes to fill... but a holy calling nonetheless. During the sermon Francis allotted time to simply come before the Lord in humility and meditate on his holiness. At once my heart was burdened to make this a daily habit. To start each day on my knees before my creator, giving it all up to him and learning how to be a servant - what it looks like to count others as more significant. The entire process was a great encouragement to myself and my team, and while I'm still learning to discipline myself in it, it has been a haven for my soul in times of desperation and chaos.
Ministry-wise we started holding a weekly bible study (co-ed) at 12pm on Thursdays. Manuel, a national staff, leads them and the STINTers take turns helping out. We've seen a few consistent faces but each week it seems to grow and interest has been abundantly expressed. Wednesdays we're continuing to hold English club as well and plan to start up a weekly meeting this month. All of these steps are huge for our team and just evidence of how the Lord is working in building this movement on Matias
One Saturday we spent some R&R time with Layo and Luchy at the beach. Layo gave us one of his famous inspirational speaches regarding his and Luchy's call to be missionaries in El Salvador and challenged us to think of doing the same. The week before we had all been praying about re-stinting as we had to report to the Regional offices what our future plans were. My plans are to return to the States at the end of June and start looking for work; really just staying open to wherever the Lord would have me and continue to seek his will for my life. The same is true for most everyone except Jeff and Brandon. Jeff is planning to re-stint for one more year and Brandon has accepted the position of being Layo's personal assistant for the next 2-3 years. Both are excited about their future ministries here and are completely supported by our team and the national staff. Praise God for raising up workers!!
Many of you probably heard about the Presidential elections in the news a couple weeks ago as well. Despite rumors of possibly violence and riots, the election was peaceful. Nonetheless, we hunkered down in our homes for the weekend for safety reasons and watched movies, played games and spent some quality time together as a team. The socialist/marxist party (FMLN) won the presidency for the first time since the opposing party (ARENA) came into office over 20 years ago at the end of the civil war. The party was formed by guerillas at the end of the war and hasn't held much swagger with the people until now when the country is itching, desperate really, for change. They don't come into power until June, so we'll only be here a month to see what happens - but we will definitely be praying for the future of this country.
About a week and half ago Marijke and Kristen took a day off of school to deal with some ongoing personal medical issues Marijke has been dealing with pretty intensely this year. That night we gathered as a team and listened as the two announced that Marijke would be going home for the remainder of the year to get the best medical attention. Less than 12 hours later we said goodbye and drove away from the airport in awe. I could probably write an entire book about our team in those moments and days after. The reality is that this year has brought us all closer than we could have ever imagined. Our circumstances have caused us to rely on one another, to be vulnerable and honest, to care and love for one another, to resolve conflict together, and learn to work as a team. We are a family - the body of Christ, and losing Marijke was like having a part of our body ripped away. We miss her dearly and pray for her all the time - but have also found so much encouragement through it as a team. We were forced to go to scripture and remember who the Lord is. More than ever we were reminded of God's good plan for us and complete sovereignty over this year. I feel like I say this a lot, but we gained such beautiful perspective in our role here, in our role in doing the Lords work and in God's faithfulness to each of us through it all. God met with us and is still healing many of our hearts, but through it all we are praising Him for His goodness and perfect plan.
A few days later Trevor's family came, Brenna got engaged, and the SLO spring break team came for a week. All in all, this month has felt more like a year... Look for details about the Spring break week in my newsletter! I love you all and am sorry for the length of this. I would be so impressed in anyone who spent the time to read it all :) More updates coming soon and thank you for continued prayers and support!
the team sporting our new "el pancho's es bueno" surf shop shirts - thanks joe and allison! this was the last day of midyear... a time of learning, challenge, renewed vision, and just plain fun. it was awesome because we all got to know one another better by just hangin out and having great conversations on the porches, by the pool, in the ocean...you know. Salvadorian style. This week was really good for me personally as I was challenged to share my faith more boldly with students - and to simply have more faith! It also brought some clarity as to why each of us have difficulties on our team... It took some soul searching, self-analyzation, and reality checks, but we came home and worked through our issues to feel more united and joyful about the next four months. (four months! 6 months done. how crazy is that?!) i realize this is a little out of order.. but i just really loved this time. and these pictures!
Kristen and Beany being super excited to pass out Vida Estudiantil stuff the first week of campus!! wooot!
Students stopping by the table... we got a lot of contacts and had some awesome conversations
Our first event was a success! Free pizza lunch and raffle the first Friday of school - tons of students showed up for the food, music, and conversation. We were so encouraged by the turnout and amount of students that expressed interest in wanting to really get involved in the movement! Praise God for his faithfulness ...
Manning the table
We're going on week three now, but the first week was such an awesome way for us to reach out to students, promote our group, get our name out there, and make new friends. Our Spanish improved tons that week just because we were talking to so many students about the ministry. In general, students are Christian and/or Catholic. We really don't hear many other answers. Some students blow us off, some pretend like they don't care, some just stare at us - but there are many students who we've had a chance to get to know better over these past few days and are starting to form relationships with. The Lord is definitely raising up students to help launch this movement on Matias and keep it going after we leave. 4 1/2 months to go... and we are SO excited for all that God has already done!!! Thank you so much for your prayers and support all! God is working here in mighty ways... I love and miss you!!
we met in costa azul one afternoon as i was tromping around the grounds taking pictures... i turned around to see her curiously watching me from a safe distance. i said hello, asked her name, age... all the normal easy beginner spanish sentences, and she instantly started talking.
she introduced me to polly - the neighbor's parakeet, then pancho, her own families parakeet.. and then mentioned the sunset. so we headed to the beach for a stroll on the sand and she told me all about her favorite animals, how the sea snakes in the bay are dangerous, sharks in the distance and even a story of a girl that drowned at the beach. sounds a little morbid, but she lives a hard life and still finds room to marvel at God's creation.
at 9 years old, the girl easily told me about her life, her school, her family... i understood probably 75-80% of what she was saying. everytime we hang out with some locals, i'm reminded of how much i love kids. they're so simple and straight forward. they give you perspective you could never get from someone your own age. they just want to have fun! so... thanks lupito! te quiero mucho chica y espero que nos vemos pronto!
The question seems to be plaguing me these days... what is my desire? Does anything in my life align with it? What did I just live these 24 hours for... or rather, who?
I'm painfully aware of how selfish my desire really is - that it is oftentimes so far from being an abundance of the Lord. Not that I'm desiring material things; I simply compare, count my losses, and try to avoid the lonely bout with self-pity...scheming ways I can be more the person I would love and sometimes long to be.
I'm forced to count my blessings. My team, my job, my provision, my 'circle', the list always goes on...leaving me humbled and on my knees with hands lifted. And so God clears the clouds: Just because I'm not able to check the next life goal off my list right now doesn't mean my life is falling apart. It means I'm living it. Not prophetic, I know. But to come to grips with simply being on a journey - that I am in a so called "in-between" stage of life can be life-altering. It changes my perspective. It leaves me at peace. God doesn't call any of us to be in a place of having it all figured out and under control. I can honestly say that's one of my favorite things about following Christ - being able to rest in the truth that God's got it under control. I have my responsibilities yes, praise God, but I'm not the boss. I'm the one in a spot to minute by minute be desperately depending on the one who knows infinitely more and has a (really much more creative) greater plan than I could ever come up with for my life.
In reality, the questions and the worry, the doubts, fears ... and the life goals will just keep on coming. You check them off and rid yourself of them only to stumble upon the next beast around the closest corner. And living for that - that will leave you confused, frustrated, and plainly bitter. I am called to live in abundance! To trust Him with every crack and crevice. We're not a people meant to be lost... And to truly live like that - how could you keep it to yourself? We're to live the abundant life and bring others along for the ride.
I'll still question, of course. I'll always want to know more, to check off just one more thing from my "life list," it's how God made me. But if I can switch that innate desire to have it all figured out, the constant pressing to arrive at the next big thing - and turn that into desire to simply know God's truths, his promises, his goodness - to just REST in those - what a joyfully abundant life I could live! I would be free to enjoy today for what it is, to live for knowing God more - and desiring Him more.
as I stress about stupid things like not being caught up on Lost and what job I'll have when I get back to the states - all things that I'm looking to the world to fulfill, or can so easily rely on myself and the plans that I don't even have... wanting to know my future or simply have control of my life -I'm blatantly aware of my weaknesses, and strongly reminded of what I read in Kings today. In chapter 9 God pretty much threatens to destroy Israel if they don't follow his commandments - His own people! It struck me that just as God didn't need the Israelites, He doesn't need them... God doesn't NEED me.
BUT, I need God. I need him more than anything this world could ever have to offer...and I was challenged to ask myself if my life reflected that truth - do I live my life in a way that reveals I am desperately dependent upon the God of creation? Or do I still try to do it on my own. And do I really take sin in my life seriously? I think I've come to a point where sin is natural. It's such a part of who I am; it's expected. And it makes me like everyone else. The humans around me sin, so I will too... my view of holiness has totally been distorted! But - God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, I praise Him for that. And I praise Him that He's revealing the junk in my heart.
And ever encouraging verse made it's way onto my journal pages this afternoon: "my grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." 2 Corinthians 12:0
anywho... that didn't come out how I'd imagined. I hope it makes sense. This is a pretty late rambling. I was reminiscing earlier about Costa Rica though and decided to post more pictures. The best ones are on F.book. But here's a couple more from the National Park we visited one day.
Last Tuesday our team of 9 (Chepe was in the states - he just got back this morning super early) had the opportunity to serve a small rural community in the barios of El Salvador, Victoria. Layo's uncle, Adonai, is involved in organizing community service events with various members from his church and asked our team if we would be willing to join them for a day of handing out 'mochillas' - backpacks - filled with school supplies to kids at 4 different schools. Our team has been wanting to participate in some kind of community outreach, so we jumped at the chance to serve and see a different part of the country.
Our day started at about 5:30am when we met a small group of adults at a nearby church in Escalon and started the looong trek to Victoria. The city is in the boonies and took us about 2 hours to get to. The group treated us to a tipico Salvadoranian breakfast (eggs, bread, beans, fried platanos con crema, queso fresca, y chocolate). With enough food in us to get us through 2 days of work, we headed to the first school where a younger guy with a tiny red backpack and waterbottle perfomed a short skit that captivated the kids and even scored some laughs... It was a bit hard to hear and all in Spanish, so I can't give an accurate description, but it seemed a better fit than any skit we were thinking of doing.
Okay - back up a step - Adonai called Kristen the night before and asked if we could come up with some kind of skit for the kids to do tomorrow... we had all dispersed for the night and so told him we'd figure something out...probably in the car. So we talked about ideas and came to the conclusion that the easiest one for us to do would be one Kristen thought of... only problem was, all she remembered was there was a chair that said "no tocar" in it. (don't touch). But after we saw this guy do his thing with the kids, we figured we were golden and not going to need to throw something together. 
wrong. of course. so myself and brandon had the performance of our lives with a chair, a cardboard sign that said "no tocar" and Brandon toting a "Jesucristo" nametag. I mean, I'm not one to boast, but I thought it was a pretty compelling performance. Sadly, the kids just did not know what to do with us. Or the skit. Guess skits aren't the Salvadoranian way, but we tried our best given a ten minute warning and lots of confused faces.
The best part of course was being with the kids. I don't know how those little guys capture your heart so quickly and just make you want to spend your whole day just loving on them...We didn't stay long at each school as all of them were pretty far from each other, but Brandon and I did get to teach some english on the fly at one classroom. That was after one of the cars ran out of gas and we went on ahead down a dry riverbed.. Brandon is great with winging it, and I'm always willing to go with the flow - so we ended up jumping and waving flags and running around together. Poor kids probably thought we were insane.
We're back from our amazing vacation in Costa Rica! (and we've already had 2 planning/devo meetings... so we're jumping right in!) Overall the week was amazing and such a blessing to our team. It was great to spend unplanned time together at the beach soaking up the sun and just enjoying the relaxing atmosphere.
For those of you who are wondering what the vacation was all about - let me explain a little. Half way through the year, every STINT team goes to a 'Midyear' where they travel abroad to meet up with other STINT teams to get rejuvenated, work through problems, and gain renewed vision for the second half of the year. Midyear consists of 2 parts: 1 week of conference type trainings/workshops/meetings/speakers/etc. and 1 week of vacationing around the midyear area to see some sights. Because our team is the first to break STINT ground in El Salvador (and there is no established conference in Central America) we were left with the task of figuring it all out on our own. We've connected with a staff couple from SLO who are coming to do the "conference" part with us the second/third week in February, which left us with one week's vacation time and a quickly approaching new school year. After much research, talk, voting, and budgeting, we ended up finding a last minute deal on plane tickets to Costa Rica and discounted bungalows on Hermosa beach. The rest is pretty much history.
Lauren was finally able to surf her heart out while Bean and I rented boards to see if we were prodigals. Alas, we are not. But we still had a ton of fun trying to look the part. We did a lot of reading a BBQing (kabobs were my fav!)...hangin by the pool and watching sunsets. Sunday we were able to visit Manuel Antonio National Park, which is basicallly a sweet rainforest that has short trails to some coved beaches. There were tons of cute little monos (monkeys) hanging out right at the base of the beaches. Other than those, we saw a sloth, a very not wild deer, a couple iguanas, and, well basically a million crabs. I actually got pinched by one. Not cool. And I scraped by foot on some coral while we were snorkeling. Bloody scratch + sea water is not a good mix. All in all though, it was a beautiful day and nice to get to see another area of the country. And can I just say, for ten white people, I was thoroughly impressed at how little sunburns there were! Yay for saying "no" to skin cancer.
Alright, well, I'll stop making everyone jealous with this vacation in January talk. Here are a couple pictures from the trip. I posted more on Facebook and should upload the rest to Flickr soon!
I realized way too long ago that I have tons of pictures. And most people probably aren't going to check them out at Flickr - which is totally fine. I personally don't love Flickr. You have to scroll through pictures slowly one-by-one and can't easily download them in their original sizes... but none of that really matters. I decided I'll try to post pictures more regularly on here. I've got plenty to spare - and that way you can hopefully better understand my life and the people in it! Okay. So first off - meet Gaby (above). She's probably the cutest thing to hit this country since her sweet Panamanian mom. Her family is good family friends of Eli, one of our beloved students from Evangelica. Eli is our lifeline here. She's always inviting us to fun events and introducing us to her friends.. taking us new places. And little Gaby is kind of like her extended family. We all spent a day together in Costa Del Sol a while ago... this is her playing with remnants of somebody's lunch :)
And this (above and below) is Costa Del Sol. It's the one beach we've been to that's been the most like Southern California beaches, in my opinion. Lots of white sand... and lots of houses. Here they don't really have public beach access. Of course much of the beaches are public, but you can't really just hang out on the sand without a place to house your things. You generally have to eat at a restaurant or rent a house. This day - they got a house. It was wonderful!!
me, dan, and greg at a coffee garden in Juayua
we have arrived!
Lago de Coatepeque - it's a lake inside of a huge volcano crater
Family and Dan at La Libertad Beach where the whole team spent a day in the sun
Read more...
Feliz Navidad y Prospero Ano Nuevo a todos!!! I hope you all had a blessed and joyful holiday season with friends and family. It's been a whirlwind month...months? Really? 2009? We're all in the "I still write 2008 on all my papers" mode.. I'm sure you are too.
December was quite the month of extravaganzas. Families, boyfriends and friends flew in one after another to celebrate the holidays with us - Salvadorian style. We spent a week with Kristen's friend Ryan before the families came for Christmas, taking him to most of the local sights and a beach house at Costa del Sol - thanks to our friends from UTEC. A few families flew in Christmas Eve and we had a fantastic lasagna and eggplant Parmesan dinner, watched "Elf", and rang in the 25th with more fire works than the 4th of July on crack. Literally - it's out of control. They're legal basically everywhere here. We live at the base of a volcano, so around midnight we all climbed on the roof and watched El Salvador light up. It was quite a sight to behold. Probably one of my favorite memories...New Years gave us a similar experience - though I'd venture to say that the celebration lasted about an hour longer.
My parents and brother flew in the morning of the 25th and stayed until the 31st. My boyfriend, Dan, also came down to spend the holidays with us. We spent a day at the beach (thank you beautiful Salvadorian weather), adventured out to Lago de Coatepeque where we had lunch at a restaurant on stilts (literally), road tripped to Juayua and a coffee garden in the mountains, ate lunch on the side of a volcano, and of course, hit up the local malls and Pupusaria. All in all, it was a blast. I loved seeing my family and was relieved that it felt like I was on vacation.
Chepe had quite the time with his family - healing from a surgery that resulted from kidney stones. Poor guy. He's doing well now, just trying to take it easy until he leaves to go back to the states on the 19th for an additional surgery. I'm sure he'll eat his fair share of in-n-out and come back stronger than ever. He would totally appreciate your prayers though!
Now that families have been gone for about a week, we've all been slowly adjusting back to normal life and getting ready for the new school year in a couple weeks. Most of our days are spent learning Spanish, having prayer and planning meetings, brainstorming outreach ideas, and planning midyear. Midyear is generally a week long conference for the team followed by a week long mini-vacation. Since we're the first STINT team in El Salvador, we get to plan our own midyear. Believe us, it's not as great as it sounds. Our budget is obviously limited, and we're on a time crunch. By the grace of God - we're going to board a plane to Costa Rica this coming Wednesday the 14th. Needless to say we're all pretty stoked to spend a week in the sun bonding as a team before the work piles on for the next 6 months. We get back the 20th and will have about a week before school starts. Sometime in February a staff couple will come spend a week with us to do some training and preparation for part 2 of the year.
So - that's the low down on what's been going on these past weeks. Now that you're more or less caught up, I'll be sure to update you soon with musings on how I'M doing and what the Lord has been teaching me. For now, HAPPY 2009! Love and miss you all!! And thank you for your thoughts and prayers during the season <3
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