Be Still and Know That I Am God

Update for July 4

The Pancake breakfast on the 4^th of July was a welcome surprise. I guess pancakes are so good that no culture can resist them. Shortly after breakfast, we left for Buenos Aires. There we helped out with a Sunday school type program (on a Monday) and taught the kids the story of Jonah. They got a chance to draw the story on paper and then tell it to the class on a felt board. We also played lots of outdoor games with the kids, and never saw a limit to their energy. During these activities, Erin was able to bring a young girl to Christ! I haven't had a chance to talk to her yet, but from what I've heard it was an awesome God moment and Daniel (a youth from Jarabacoa translating this week for us)  got to help translate the conversation. After returning to La Salle for a while, we left for the river. We didn't take any Dominicans with us and didn't plan on ministering to anyone really. Darin said our plan was to "do nothing in order to do something better." We all split up on the river and had some alone time on the rocks around a waterfall. Well more accurately, we prayed for a full hour. It was an awesome experience, just letting God have an hour of our lives to tell us what He has to say and allow us to come clean with Him about, well, everything. The hour "felt more like 20 minutes" according to Ben Mannenbach and I agree completely. Some of us worshipped, some read the bible, some basked in the beauty of God's creation, and others just stayed in the quiet presence of God. That evening Rick challenged us that if we are to take anything from this trip, we should try to integrate this kind of slow-down-and-pray session into our schedules back home. Pray that we can pull that off and that we don't become too distracted when we come home.

We also had Dominican guests at Camp La Salle. These guests work with a program that combines medical practice with evangelism. Vanessa and Fernando shared how God has lead them through their lives, even when they didn't know what they were supposed to do. Their stories are inspirational, and their love for God is intense. Pray for their organization, as well as Vanessa's baby that is due this week.

Tomorrow (likely today by the time you read this) we take on a mountain. Pray that the expedition goes smoothly and that the Dominicans we take with us will be receptive to God's call.  This is being used as an outreach to the local teens and last we heard there were nearly 25 (or more) coming with us.  This is a first for this area and we hope to model it to be a lasting idea, investing in the youth.

 

--John