The first week of classes we had was on the Father heart of God and our speaker was Mitch. It was such an amazing week. God really spoke through him and really revealed new things to us. We focused on the way Satan uses our insecurities to take over the things that God has given us for good. We talked about how there is nothing in the world that could ever separate us from His love and how important forgiveness is. He said, "Bitterness and unforgiveness is a poison that you drink hoping it will hurt the other person." and that really spoke to me. God doesn't call us to live by feelings, we live by right choices. God's protection comes in at times when we need it. He's not a God who is interested in our comfort zone. He wants to comfort us, but in order to do that we need to be in a place of needing His incredible comfort. This video is neat: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=koutUz0Im48. God is so neat :)
On Wednesday nights we have a ministry called Malecon where we go into San Pedro with a bunch of food, gather up the street kids, tell them about Jesus and give them food. It's so much fun sharing with them and being blessed by their beautiful smiles! On Friday nights we do "Lemonade and Love" where we go into a park in San Pedro and spend time handing out lemonade, praying for people, and just lovin' them like Jesus would.
We spent this past week in Santo Domingo at the YWAM base there. We shared the speakers with the Arts DTS that is running there and the topic was Communication and Relationships. It was really interesting and especially useful and applicable because we talked a lot about how our interpretations do not always line up with the truth. Living in multicultural community can lead to quite a bit of miscommunication! We talked about how life is a team sport and we were made to work together. Unity is so important. The base there is very, very different from here but so cool. They do some really cool ministries! For example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BnYcSZFYDXc :) On Wednesday afternoon we learned a drama and then Wednesday night we were able to go with them for their street ministry and do the drama in a church. Supah cool. Being there was a huge blessing.
We also got the opportunity to visit an orphanage for special needs children called Casa de Luz. So impacting and eye opening for lots of our group. One guy in our group, Caleb, was here in the DR three years ago. The group he was with visited an orphanage and met a child named Alexander. He was born deaf, blind, mute, and crippled. His name was Alexander.They said he would never walk. When they met this kid, God told Caleb "Leave your shoes behind and see what I can do." He forgot about this experience. When we go to the orphanage he felt like he had been there before. He walked into one of the rooms at this orphanage and saw this very same kid, Alexander. He was standing. God is so good. We witnessed a miracle. Of all the places we could have gone, God took us there to show us just how cool he is. There is no coincidence here. God is the best!
Our DTS got so much closer as a group and we feel even more like a family than we did before. It felt incredibly good to be come home and see everyone here. On our way home there was a strike so there was fires in the middle of the street and people protesting. We had to go through a town instead of the highway which made our drive slightly slower. Kinda scary but an adventure- yahknow. It was an awesome week, but feels good to be back. Home sweet home :)
This is our DTS plus the Santo Domingo group with the nation directors of YWAM Dominican Republic!
This is my bro Juan. He's super.
On Anna's (our beautiful kitchen lady's) birthday we went out for pizza and celebrated. Fun night.
you are so much better at blogging than I am..
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