We did not know what to expect as we drove over the mountain on Thursday morning to Matagalpa. July 19^th is Liberation day in Nicaragua.  The government sponsored a huge gala in Managua and paid for transportation for all who wanted to attend.  We had been told that many businesses would be closed and everyone would go to the celebration.  One gentleman went so far as to say we should cancel classes!  As we were leaving Jinotega there were many buses and trucks filled with people heading to the celebration.  Driving into Matagalpa the city was very quiet.  Even so, we continued with our course trusting God for the outcome.

We had a great day, the weather was perfect with a nice breeze all day to keep us cool.  The children arrived eager to learn and attentive.  Millie, Chilly and Willy were on their best behavior and Michelle and the gang did an awesome job.  Moving into the afternoon the city remained quiet but God was faith in drawing people into his presence.   All of our teachers had the opportunity in multiple sessions to share their stories of how Christ has and is continuing to transform their lives.  Mike shared in the closing assemble that as a teenager he had to choose to follow Christ not merely participant in his families religion.  Catholicism is the predominant religion in Nicaragua.  The majority of the people know about God, but do not know that they can have a relationship with God.  As we were leaving after the last session a young man who is attending the classes told Mike that Bill had given him something to think about tonight.  Mike asked what he would be thinking about?  He replied religion verses relationship.  Most people here know religion, pray that God will continue to use us today to help them understand the truth about a relationship with Jesus Christ.

As you think about it today pray for us as we continue to share the gift of English and most importantly the gift of Christ Love with our students here in Matagalpa.  Pastor Javier will be sharing the gospel in the closing assemblies through out the day today.  We are praying and hopeful of a plentiful harvest for the kingdom!

Wednesday

Our first two days of class have gone very smoothly.  God has blessed us with a good number of students who are enthusiastic about learning English.  We are averaging close to 400 students.  July is anniversary month for the Sandinista Liberation.  The government is hosting a big countrywide celebration this week with rallies and parades, so there is a lot happening around Matagalpa.  Even with the distractions our classes are going well.  God is so faithful to honor those committed to him.  

We have a wonderful group of teachers who are working together pouring themselves out for these students.  It has been amazing to watch them.  Lissa, April, Janet, Bob, and Amanda have jumped in like old pros.   They have overcome their fears and anxieties and allowed the Lord to use them.  April has provided the comic relief as she has coached Greg Lightsey on how to eat for his blood type.  Pray for receptivity for Greg.

Mike an I have had several opportunities to talk with Pastor Javier about how best to help Him as he and his church minister to the city of Matagalpa.  He has had a full week already, preaching on Sunday, assisting our English ministry, working with a German team on Tuesday, and caring for his church family in the death of a church member.  Pray for Pastor Javier and his family as they serve so selflessly.

Michelle has been AWESOME!  Her hard work and preparation have been a HUGE benefit to the team.  It is a pleasure to serve with such a gracious and humble servant leader.

Continue to pray for our ESL team.  Pray for strength and endurance. We leave the house every morning @ 8 am and return in the evenings around 10 pm.  The day is long but the people are so warm and gracious.  Pray for the Holy Spirit to move in the hearts of the students drawing them into a saving relationship with Jesus.

ESL language course In Matagalpa

Our team arrived safely on Saturday afternoon.  After getting settled, Michelle put us right to work preparing our materials for the language course.  Prepped and fed we headed over to the orphanage.  One of our team members brought the kids a new xbox and  TV.  The kids had a good time with dance party while we were there.  The T shirt dresses were a hit with the girls.  Thank you Gail Walston and Heather Kendrick.  The children was very gracious and thankful for the gifts.  Joy and her staff have done an awesome job with the kids.

Sunday morning we enjoy our worship time together.  Mike challenged us to be open and allow God to speak to us through the week as we serve the students.  It is easy to get caught up in the processes of teaching and never talking time to spend with God listening.

After worship we headed out to Matagalpa.  Registration went really smooth as compared to January.  We had a steady stream of students all afternoon which allowed us to take our time and not feel over whelmed.  We registered 400 students today!  We are expecting 100 plus to be added tomorrow.  God is so faithful to us.  We were concerned that we may be overwhelmed with students but God knew what was best.  Our numbers through registration fit our team perfectly.  The new guys get to team teach and then later in the day they have their own classes.  Everyone is excited and working together.  We are looking forward to a great week.

                                     

                                         

This evening we went to Primera Baptist Church In Matagalpa.  Pastor Javier and his church family welcomed us and prayed for our efforts this week as we partner together to share the good news of Christ in the city.

Pray for us as we build relationships and share our stories of the hope we have in Christ.

Scouting out the land!

       
Teach me to do your will, for you are my God.  May your gracious Spirit lead me forward on a firm footing, for the glory of your name, O Lord, preserve my life.  Because of your faithfulness, bring me out of this distress.  In your unfailing love, silence all my enemies and destroy all my foes, 
 for I am your servant.

                                                                                                                             Psalm 143:10-12

We have had a wonderful time the past two plus weeks in Jinotega.  We saw God’s presence in the joy and excitement on the faces of the children at the orphanage as the basketball court repairs neared completion and again in the laughter of the organized chaos that is the sports camp.  What great joy to be apart of what God is doing in reaching the people of Nicaragua.  I am so thankful for the small part God is allowing us to play in His Kingdom work here.

This week has been a challenging week as God again has revealed a glimpse of what can be as we seek out the next steps for our ministry. In our meeting with Pastor Higinio, God seems to have brought like-minded hearts and passions together.  Join us as we pray for wisdom and discernment in forming a partnership for training young men and women for ministry.  Teaching and pastoral training has always been a part of our vision.  This week God has redirected the intensity and scope of our focus on training.  As we seek to minister to the rural poor communities in the highlands, pastors and lay leaders will be needed to disciple those that come to Christ.  Pray that God will raise and up leaders in these communities.  

Villages with a mission presence:        Planned missions

Pantasma                                                 El Cua 

La Rica                                                   Yali

Bocay                                                      La Concordia

Malaconsito                                            Asturia

San Rafael del Norte                               Las Loma del Nance

Puerta Azules

Pray also for our association with Pastor Javier Moranga, the pastor of Primera Baptist In Matagalpa.  His church is the mother church to the mission in Santa Emilia where we have done a water project and Medical mission.  The church supports three mission congregations from their body in Matagalpa.  God is using them to reach into the city of Matagalpa and the outlying areas.  This coming week we will be doing an intensive ESL language course in one of the schools in the heart of the city.  In less than an hour of the invitation banners going up and youth form Primera Church passing out flyers, more than 30 people had called the preregistration telephone number!   We are excited about what God has planned.  Pray for our team.  Half of our team is veteran of at least one previous language course, with the remainder being first timers.  It is going to be an exciting week together.  We are looking for 250students per session.

Reflections

Commit everything you do to the Lord.  Trust him, and he will help you.

He will make your innocence radiate like the dawn, and the justice of your cause will shine like the noonday sun.

Be still in the presence of the Lord, and wait patiently for him to act…

                                                                                                                              Psalm 37:5-7a

How wonderful are God’s promises to those who commit their way unto the Lord and trust in Him!

Such simple promises but such hard living. I don’t know about you be I am a “fixer.” I don’t do waiting very well.  If there is a problem, determine the best course of action and move forward. 

God has been doing some chipping and polishing on me this week.  In His wisdom He created obstacles for us this week that required patience and waiting.  Often He thwarted my plans of action so that His glory would be revealed.  His plans always require faith, “being still in the presence of the Lord and waiting patiently for Him to act.  On Friday, just as we were about to leave the house for a morning of ministry at one of the local schools, a young man on a bike rode up with our FEDEX package that enabled us to go to the Embassy to replace some of the guys passports.  But first we had to “commit everything to Lord, surrender to His sovereignty over our lives, and trust Him to help us.  I had planned that we would receive the package on Thursday evening as the tracking site had estimated and we would leave early Friday morning for the embassy.

While at the embassy God reminded me that His words are to be lived not merely read or taught.  As I was impatiently waiting for our turn in line, fuming inside because things were not going as I wanted them to go, God simple said, just because these people in line in front of you don’t look like you doesn’t mean they are not US citizens.  You see I had assumed in that moment that all US citizens were white Anglo Saxon be cause I was and the youth in my care were.  God then brought to mind Philippians 2:3&4 “Be humble, consider others as better than yourself.  Don’t look out only for your own interest, but take an interest in others too.”  NLT.  I still have the lump on my head!  God ‘s glory was revealed as He acted on our behalf and we were on our way in a couple of hours with 4 new passports.  God is still working on our behalf with the final passport.  It will be ready for pick up next week.

For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him. Do everything without complaining and arguing, so that no one can criticize you. Live clean, innocent lives as children of God, shining like bright lights in a world full of crooked and perverse people.    Philippians 2:13-15 NLT

THRILLER THURSDAY

Today presented us with so many great opportunities to share the gospel. We spent our morning at a local school, about 10 minutes from where we are staying. The school's student population is about two-thousand. We were able to go into seven classrooms teaching songs in Spanish and English, acting in a skit that used no words to get over the language barrier, and sharing testimonies. The kids love it! I don't know if it is because we are a bunch of "gringos" singing in Spanish or because they truly love being loved on by our students. I think it's the latter. At one point when we were playing outside with the kids, the ratio between the them and our students was 15 to 1. It was so much fun seeing the kids interact with our students. We could only ask basic questions, like what their names were or what was their favorite sport to play, but even after those questions the kids would hug us and say they loved us.
The students that we have brought down here really have started to settle in here and I know that when we leave on Saturday, it is going to be tough to put them on the plane to get home.

This afternoon, we spent our time doing the sports camp at the orphanage. we had over a hundred kids that we moved from soccer, to crafts, to volleyball, to basketball, and to relays. Today was a great day because of a couple of things. One, was because of God's grace and mercy, allowing us to build relationships with these kids. Two, because our student's energy was incredible! They were focused 100% on loving on the kids. It was such a blessing to watch.  Ashley and I, and I'm sure I can speak for Dan and Rod, feel so blessed to be here with this group. I am just so thankful for this opportunity to serve here with this group.

Yes, we are here to serve and to share the gospel with the people here in Jinotega, and we have seen God move in amazing ways. We have also seen him move in our own group as well. One of our students we brought down accepted Christ last night. I had the opportunity to talk to Jackson Forrestall about what it meant to accept Christ and that this was a life-changing decision. He understood and was ready to live the rest of his life following God and His will for him. It has been such a great trip. God has blessed us in so many ways. Yes, we hit some obstacles on our way but of course God prevails.
Can't wait for tomorrow! It will be bitter-sweet, but I know God is going to do some awesome things!

From the fields

      The simplest things we take for granted can make such a huge impact on another person’s life.  Every day a parent, a friend, or co-worker will greet us warmly.  Often some one will affectionately place a hand on our arm or offer a smile or a warm embrace.  In the community where we interact we feel comfortable and loved.  We have our faith family to turn to in time of need.  Now imagine yourself in a culture or community devoid of such simple acts of acceptance and affection.

       I have had the opportunity this week to watch and participate as our youth have interacted with children and teens here in Jinotega.  Teen to teen is pretty normal, meeting new acquaintances, getting to know things about one another, finding common ground.  Sports and laughter are big this week between our youth and the youth in the schools at the camp this week.  Laughter is contagious and needs no translation.  But what I am struck by the most is the longing from the young ones for affection from our teens and adults.  I sat down on the gym floor and began to interact with a group of 4 or 5 girls and boys from 3 to 6 years old.  I used what Spanish I have and it was enough.  Soon they were just talking and I am nodding and they were loving the attention.  As our guys would play with the younger ones, soon Brandon and Stephen would have a pack chasing them around the schoolyard or the sport field.  I would then turn the other way and Dayse has Orrin by the hand leading him over to the side to play or Jackson stooping down focused only on the child clamoring for his attention at the moment.

     All of this seems very normal to us, but the thing that caught my attention was the impact that something as simple as unhurried attention was having on the children.  For whatever reason, in this culture, this type of attention is seldom seen.  One reason may be that older siblings become responsible for their younger siblings as young as 6 or 7 while mom and dad are out working.   “Children” parented many of these children and innocence was lost at an early age. 

     Pray for us this week that we will not grow tired of giving of ourselves, that we will be as Paul said, “poured out as a drink offering” upon these children who are thirsty for love and affection.  As pathfinders this week we are carriers of the banner of love and hope into a dark world.  Let us shine the light of hope through Jesus Chris to brighten the path for those Christ has given us.

“You are the light of the world. A city on a hill can not be hidden.”