Ups and Downs and Side to Sides

Monday night was so awesome! The four of us climbed this hill up to this ridge that we had been to before during the day, and from this ridge you can see for miles. We went up there to stargaze and pray and just be in wonder of God’s creation. I’ve never seen so many stars in one sky before, and I saw several shooting stars. It was amazing. But every time I see some majestic creation of God, be it mountains, ocean, stars, or sunset, I am reminded that those beautiful, breathtaking sights are not his greatest creation. We are. So I am convicted each time I stand in awe of these creations and remember the judgments I have passed on the creations he loves the most. It was a great time of just being silent before God and praying to him. The only bad thing was that it was really cold, and even though I had 7 layers of clothes on (yes, count them, 7), I still got tons of little bitty stickers all in my jacket and I fear I will never get them all out. But it was worth it, and I think we plan to go back pretty soon to build a fire, roast some weenies, and stargaze again. Oh yeah, at lunch on Monday I tried cow stomach, but then I quickly decided that I did not want to order it. It was really chewy and rubbery, and even the sauce that it was in tasted nasty. But I can now say that I have tasted cow stomach. We also bought some honey from a man who comes into Cabana periodically to sell it, and it has to be the sweetest honey I’ve ever tasted. We’ve been putting it on bread and in our tea, and it is wonderful! I experienced for the first time the pain of a freezing cold shower because our electricity and hot water went out. I really needed to shower, though, so I decided to brave it. It wasn’t terrible at first, but by the time I finished I had a brain freeze headache and couldn’t stop shivering. I got over it, but I realized that some teams don’t have hot water at all, so now I have a renewed appreciation for it. I guess I kind of went backwards through my day, but oh well.

Tuesday wasn’t very eventful during the day, we mainly just did laundry (oh yeah, David showered for the first time on Monday and then Shane showered for the first time on Tuesday), prepared for Bible study on Wednesday, and reminded people about it. That evening, however, we invited Wilder over to just play cards and stuff, and so around 7:30 he came with his friend Daniel to our hostel (we had played soccer with Daniel a while back). Wilder did a bunch of card tricks at first, which were pretty cool, and then we played blackjack and taught them Texas Hold’em. Then Wilder taught us all a new game called Nervioso, which was so incredibly fun! I won’t go into details here, but I’m definitely going to teach it to everyone when I get back home. They stayed till about 10, and it was an awesome time to just build relationships with them and have a fun. We’re really excited to keep building those relationships and just share Christ with them.

Most of Wednesday we just prepared some more for the Bible study, but we also did some more exploring of Cabana. We walked out to one of the lagunas, and then took an adventurous short cut back where we hiked up a very steep hill and looked out all around us. It was pretty cool. That evening we went to the store with the community PA system to ask them to announce our Saturday English class on Thursday morning. Afterwards, we went to the municipal building to ask someone to open the auditorium for us, and much to our surprise we were told that another organization was going to have a meeting at 7. We were slightly taken aback, but then they told us it would only take about 20 minutes, so we just decided to wait in the plaza and tell anyone who came for our Bible study that we were going to start late. So we waited. And we played with this huge group of kids, which was fun/exhausting. And we waited and played some more. Finally, at 8:30 we decided to give up, and we found out later that the meeting that was supposed to only last 20 minutes lasted until 10 pm. It was really frustrating not only because the Bible study we had prepared for and anticipated didn’t happen, but also because only 3 people showed up. When we went back to the hostel, we had team time, but hardly any of us even felt like saying a word because we were frozen from the cold, disappointed, frustrated, and discouraged. Finally, we just discussed and reevaluated what we’ve been doing, and we decided to focus more on building relationships and gaining trust. We resolved to not let this keep us down, and we just reminded ourselves that it’s about God and not about us.

So, Thursday morning David, Kelly, and I got up at 6:30 am to listen to our announcement, and then we went back to sleep for like 30 minutes before we went to breakfast. We saw Wilder there, so we ate with him and then tried the internet, but it wasn’t working so we went back to the hostel. After Shane woke up and we did our team time, we tried the internet again, and this time it worked. So we did that for a while, ate lunch, and then siesta-d while the boys went and worked out. Then we went out and talked to some of the people we want to get to know a lot better, and around 5:30 the pastor of the Assemblies of God church came to our hostel to talk to us about what we believe and stuff (we had set up the meeting beforehand). It went really well, and he was very encouraging and kind. A couple hours later, Wilder came over with Daniel and another friend named Anthony, and we all read John 14 together. We discussed what it meant to accept Christ, and we answered some of their questions about Christianity and what we believe. It was so awesome because even though we didn’t get to do our “official” Bible study on Wednesday, we got to have this more intimate, personal Bible study last night. I feel that God really answered our prayers and encouraged us last night. We hope to keep having and taking advantage of those opportunities to share Christ with those 3 as well as many more here in Cabana. After we had talked about God for about 2 hours and prayed with them, we did some more card tricks and then played Nervioso until 11 pm. It was so much fun because we were all crowded into Shane and David’s room but having a great time despite being a little cramped. After they left, the four of us were just still so excited and overjoyed about what had just happened that we stayed up laughing and talking for a while before going to bed.

That’s about it so far, but please keep praying for us!

- Pray for open hearts and minds in Wilder, Daniel, and Anthony and that God will continue to give us boldness and opportunity to share with them
- Pray that we would not get easily discouraged but would just completely rely on God’s provision and plan
- Pray that we would be able to focus on what we’re here for and be intentional in the way we live
- Pray that many people would come to English class tomorrow and that we would use it as a way to get to know more people
- Pray for guidance for us as we decide what to do about Bible studies
- Pray for humility, love, and compassion in all that we say and do
- Pray for team unity
- Pray that I won’t miss home and people so much

Thanks again for your prayers and comments. I love y’all!