Sunday
Hello from Belize!
I just wanted to send a quick note to let you all know that we're finally all settled in at the resort! All of our travel went very smoothly, and our two nervous flyers had great flights! Once we got to the resort, we had dinner on a dock out on the ocean, and now everyone's getting settled into their rooms and hanging out before we head to bed. Tomorrow we'll have our first full day of work and small groups and everything and I'll have much more to report, but for now I just wanted everyone to know we're safe and happy and sleepy!
Monday
Hello again!
So we've finished our first day of work! Everyone is pretty exhausted and finally making their way to bed now. We started our day off with breakfast at 7:30 on our dock, then had a short time of worship and our first meetings with our small groups. We headed to the school, where we split up into 4 teams. One team of 5 people went to the feeding center to help prepare and serve lunch to malnourished children. One group of 3 nursing students got to work in the small clinic at the school with the nurse. They saw 63 patients today! One group of 11 people worked on the construction site at the school, building an outdoor pavilion where they can have larger groups meet for assemblies and things like that. And everyone else put on the program we designed before coming here. Today we worked in the morning and afternoon with the 5, 6, and 7 year olds. We started off with them by singing some fun, loud songs, then we acted out the story of the Prodigal Son. After that, Jackie Cravello shared her testimony and we practiced our memory verse and split up into smaller groups to try to discuss the story and how it shows God's love for us. The discussion time was a little difficult for everyone today because the kids were so young and still learning english, but we still felt like some great connections were made! Then we just got to have lots of play time, which accounts for a decent amount of our exhaustion! This will basically be the pattern every day, but the groups will change, giving everyone a chance to do everything they're interested in.
Once we made it back to the hotel, we had a couple hours to swim, shower, or rest before another delicious meal on the dock. Then we sang a couple songs and Ben taught from our small group curriculum (which is called The Gospel-Centered Life, and is really amazing). After that, everyone wanted to worship on the beach for a few songs, and we ended up singing for an hour and a half! It's amazing to sing to God in such a beautiful setting and with people who love the Lord so well!
One thing we'll be doing every night while we're here is a time we call Give God the Glory. We spend a few minutes letting people stand up and give God glory for something He did that day. I want to end by sharing what people gave God the glory for tonight:
- for a kid we met at the feeding center who said, completely out of nowhere, "you're my brother because in Jesus we're all family."
- for guiding me today because I literally don't have any experience with kids, but it was fun and awesome and easy
- for the ridiculous cow outfit I wore in the skit that helped me connect with kids
- for making me realize how great I have it
- for showing me how blessed I am to get to be on this trip and for Kalla getting me to come. I wouldn't want to be anywhere else on my spring break.
- for giving us favor in the lives of these kids, who welcomed us so immediately with huge hugs
- for the kid who looked at a picture of Christ and said, "Wow, He died for me."
That's all for today! I know I promised pictures, but I'm pretty sleepy, so I'm going to send an email tomorrow during our afternoon break before dinner with just a bunch of pictures from today.
Thanks for praying for us!
PS - A few of you emailed me back about where we're staying. I'm sorry I forgot to mention that last night! It's a beautiful place called The Placencia. You can check out their website and find contact info at http://www.theplacencia.com/.
Tuesday
Hey everyone!
Okay, first of all, apparently there was some kind of disaster with the picture emails I sent out today and only a few of you got any of them. I sent two emails of pictures and almost all of them came back to me. I think what happened was that I attached too many pictures to the first email. So I'll attach just a few to this one and then send a few more emails following this with the rest of the pictures. Sorry if you get the same pictures multiple times!
Anyway, today has been amazing again! A bunch of us have been saying we can't believe it's only Tuesday because we have been so focused on being here and serving here and it feels like we've already been here for at least a week. Different groups went to the same 4 places today - the school, the clinic, the feeding center, and the construction site. The girls at the clinic told me it's been really fun to see some things they've been learning about in school and get to put it into action! The prodigal son skit was great, too; it's been funny to see people use acting skills I never knew they had!
In our small groups tonight, our lesson focused on the differences between false and true repentance. We split up into even smaller groups of guys and girls to spend some time being open and sharing about things we need to be repenting of in our lives right now and ways we've been avoiding that. I can't speak for the guy groups, but from my group and hearing from the other girls, I can say that it was definitely a great time of growing closer together and encouraging each other!
I think that's all for today! I'll send some more pictures following this email, and I'll write again tomorrow night!
Wednesday
(from Ben)
Hey Friends and Family,
I gave Kristin the night off from writing the update email…it's pretty late and has been a gloriously exhausting day. We are really settling in to the pattern of the work day but the relationships that we are building with the kids and each other are getting deeper and deeper. I'll keep this update short because my eyes are closing on me, but a quick story about what God is doing in our group:
Every night we have been on the beach worshiping together after dinner and it has been a sweet time! However, one of the trip organizers (from the ministry we are with here in Belize) planned a special pool party at our hotel for us to enjoy after dinner. The students all wanted to continue to worship so we turned the pool party into a two hour long worship service that was a beautiful time!
We are so blessed with an amazing team and an even more amazing God who chooses to use us on a week like this! Please continue to pray for strength, safety and hearts to be transformed.
Thursday
Hello again!
Today was a mostly normal day, as far as work goes, though it definitely seemed hotter than the last few have been! The construction crew was able to finish the pavilion at the school, which leaves them free tomorrow to focus on finishing some computer desks. If these desks get finished before our day is over tomorrow, then another group has promised to donate 8 computers to the school in April! When you think of us during the day tomorrow, please pray for endurance for the construction crew to get those desks done. No one will want to leave without finishing them, I'm sure. We've also been hearing reports of lots of great conversations with kids at the school about Jesus, so praise God for that! And you'll all be interested to know that after lunch at a pastor's house yesterday and today, many of you now have kids who have tried iguana meat, iguana eggs, and a true delicacy here in Belize, the meat of a giant rat! I can tell you that the first had a pretty great flavor, the second had a weird casing on it but was delicious inside, and the rat tasted a lot like jerky and was quite good! Many of us also got the chance to hold an iguana and a boa constrictor. Needless to say, we've been pretty adventurous this week.
The most exciting thing for me to report today is that at sunset in the ocean, we had baptisms! It's always my favorite part of the trip when students want to declare that they've identified their lives with Christ by being baptized in front of their friends here. The guys and gals who got baptized were Madeleine Rebouche, Madison Tooley, Becca Roth, Kalla Kline, Alexandra Brown, Nicoletta Bradley, Victoria Nachman, Riley Ralmuto, Brett Musslewhite, and Steven Stults. I'm so proud of all of them! Praise God!
And speaking of that, I really have been proud of and impressed by all of your kids this week! They are such hard, joyful workers, and they are so open with each other and excited to talk about Jesus with everyone! The team from International Servants who is working with us here have all been telling me the same things about our group, too. You should all be very proud!
Tomorrow will be our last day of working! Everyone is definitely going to be tired, so pray for strength and stamina (and good sleep tonight, if you happen to read this before morning). Thank you!
Friday
We had our last day of work today! It ran a little longer than usual, but all of the desks got finished and the school will get their computers in April! The clinic was also able to see a total of around 170 (I think) patients this week, with the help of the nursing and pre-med students! And hundreds of children at the school got to hear the gospel! As everyone was loading onto the bus to leave the school, there were tears from both the kids and our group. Many kids brought little presents for us to remember them by and promised to remember us in their hearts forever. It was definitely a special day!
After everyone got back and we had dinner, we had a time for giving God the glory and worshipping on the beach. We've been able to do that a few nights this week, and it's so amazing to worship in the dark under the brilliant stars with the sounds of the ocean next to us and remember how huge and wonderful our God is. Tonight, people gave God the glory for:
- showing each of us different things about Himself and ourselves on this trip
- the fact that we didn't know each other before we came here, but now we are a church body
- the tears that were shed as we left the school and the joy the kids put in our lives
- the guy who brought us fruit today from his own garden
- the kid today who said, "will you promise to be my friend forever?"
- humbling me
- sports and allowing us to connect to the kids through that
- being all-loving all the time
- meeting us where we're at - filling us up and sending us out
- the teachers at the school
- the fact that our mission doesn't stop when we leave here
- my new nicknames from the kids - "sir" and "big gringo"
- the hope we have in Heaven
- theological discussions we've been having and being able to love Him with all of our hearts and our minds
- leaders who have to worry about us and are still excited to see us every day
- walls being torn down and the Holy Spirit being among us
- the strength the children have and Amanda who runs the clinic
- the big ways God uses me
- that we're able to show Christ's love to the children the way He did in the Scriptures
- overwhelming emotions
- walls - the kind that get broken down to connect with each other and also the kind we hit when we're exhausted and show us that we can't do anything on our own
- calling Paul to be here and that he took a leap of faith 21 years ago to move to Belize
- the fact that we can sit on a beach and give Him the glory that we're sitting on a beach and realizing how big He is
- and the fact that the same God made and cares for each one of us
- how each person gave their all this week
As you can see, we spent quite a bit of time on the beach tonight! I know that's a long list, but I just didn't want to leave anything out because everyone here has so much that we're praising God for!
Tomorrow is our free day for shopping and hanging out on the beach and resting! And there is one group taking an excursion to what sounds like a pretty awesome reef for snorkeling. Right now our resort is having karaoke out on the dock where we eat breakfast and dinner, and I'm listening to everyone have a lot of fun with the other guests of the hotel! It really has been a great week and we're grateful for your prayers! One more day and then we'll begin our journey home!
