El Gusto Es Mio

Papa Seals, Chris’ dad, flew down to Santiago to spend a week with us before continuing on his business travels. What a great blessing that was! He was a huge help with all of the activities, and having someone from home share in our experience was very encouraging to us and the local church members. In addition to helping with the work that needed to be done, he also treated us and the de Leon family to a couple of dinners and a night in the local Marriot (thank God for reward points!). This was just as important for the de Leon family, if not more important, than the work he did for the church. Being a pastor or members of a pastor’s family often times leaves little or no time for leisure, so it was a much NEEDED treat for Nati, Jacquelin, Estiven, and Yanalin. They enjoyed and appreciated it greatly!

Construction
The Viga has been poured! You know… that thing that joins the top layer of cinderblock to the columns and serves as the top border of the window holes. We’ve been talking about it all this time and now you have some pictures to see what it is! Half of it has been poured, and construction will continue today and tomorrow until the viga is finished. Also, refill material has been bought (i.e. dirt) and the guys are raising the floor level approximately 2 feet, which is a big task. Papa Seals and Chris had the opportunity to help with filling wheel barrels in that process.

Ladies’ Tea
Wednesday afternoon, Katie coordinated a Ladies’ Tea complete with fancy finger foods, games, and prizes. Along with Katie, Chris and Papa Seals helped make the Iced Tea (hot tea would be ridiculous in the 90 degree + humidity weather), sandwiches, appetizers, and dessert. The majority of the women in the community are stuck in the house all day, cooking and cleaning up after everyone, so, an activity that honored THEM and pampered THEM was a big treat. The ladies started their time socializing and eating the appetizers (veggies and olives with dip and peanut butter) beautifully prepared by Katie. Then they were served cucumber & cream cheese, tomato, green olive & cheese, and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. PB & J is not a common dish here, so it was a delicacy for them. Then after playing a number of bible quiz, word puzzles, and leg-crossing games, they enjoyed bananas and Nilla Wafers dipped in chocolate. Altogether it was a wonderful time!

Youth Activities
Saturday night youth service started with a high energy crazy time. Given thirty seconds, youth (and a few adults) were blind folded and told to collect cotton balls on the floor with a spoon, and deposit them into a bowl, with no assistance from their other hand. The team who collected the most cotton balls wins. You can imagine the difficulty in attempting that. Afterwards, Chris demonstrated his cottonball-gathering expertise (acquired by playing the game before) and related that to how young people can learn a lot from those who have previous experience. We then moved into a time of answering more questions from the question box about lying. Next Saturday we are going to take the youth to the new location of Teen Challenge where they will soon launch their ministry for women who are trapped in a life of prostitution and drugs in order to show them the freedom they have in Christ. This will be a great opportunity for the youth to learn a lot from people with a lot of life experience.
Also, a great answer to prayer is that three church members have committed to working in leadership over the youth group. Gregory (a recently baptized member in his early twenties), Yelis (a young woman fresh out of her teen years), and Nancy (a mother of one of the youth who has much previous youth ministry experience) are going to take over the current Sunday School curriculum and Saturday night services and hopefully add much more.

All in all, our early 2008 trip is starting to wind down. For the rest of our time here we’re going to continue working on tying up loose ends and finalizing some things for the ministries here before heading back to the U.S. We’re still working on finalizing a date for our return to the Dominican Republic and we’ll keep you all posted as those details develop.

Happy Easter!

Camp… wow

Though we have camped many a time before, in several ways, camp this week was a very new experience. We’ll break it down into three sections for you.

Logistics: Bathrooms, Food, Bathing, Activities.
The thing about the bathrooms was that… there wasn’t any. Well, that’s not entirely true. Nati, Uncle Samuel (Jacquelin’s brother), Jose (a youth from Casa de Dios), some random older guy, and Chris dug a 2’X 2’ X 6’ deep hole for the ladies which was surrounded by a tarp for privacy. After the first couple of people used the bathroom, it was not an attractive alternative to digging one’s own hole in the woods… which we think is what most people chose to do, judging by how the woods looked and smelled. Food was well prepared, always plenty of starches (pumpkin, Rice, Boiled Unripe Bananas, etc.), and successfully satiated the appetites of the 100 campers. Bathing took place in the nearby river that seemed to be running lower than other years, and was full of algae that didn’t seem to bother most but definitely bothered Chris (which may be boiled down to either early childhood experiences, or texture and downright grossness!). Either way, we all had an opportunity to bathe; which is a good thing because we played sports, it was hot, and trees didn’t provide much shade. We are in the Dominican Republic, so clearly the main activity was baseball. One of the players, a 17 year old, was just recently signed to the Atlanta Braves and goes in for spring training in April. Watch for his name in the papers… Wilson Rivera. We also played dominoes, volleyball, and burned trash. Lots of fun!

Spiritual Activities: Morning Prayer and Devotional, Charlas, and Cultos.
Every morning we were woken up at 6am by a loud whistle and the night watchman yelling “Matutino! Ponte a Orar!” or in English “Morning Prayer! Pray!” The members of each tent then prayed together for the first hour of the day. At 8am we had the morning devotional which was some worship songs and a short exhortation. After breakfast we would have a Charla (or discussion) at 10am in which we would discuss the theme of the camp, “Renovando Nuestra Fe en Dios” or “Renewing Our Faith in God.” Friday, we gave the Charla about faith and works, and Saturday, Dr. Melido Zorrilla gave the Charla on a lot of topics from Moses crossing the Red Sea to sex and dating. The rest of the day until the night time was spent eating lunch and dinner, and playing games and sports. At night time there was a culto (Spanish for “Worship Service”) in which there would be a lot of singing, dancing, clapping, and preaching.

Extras: Other Activities.
One night we had a Bible knowledge competition… Guys vs. Girls. That proved to be fun. In the night times, small groups of men/boys thought it would be funny to serenade people tent by tent from 2am to 4am waking them prematurely from their slumber. Katie (and Chris, since we slept in the same tent…obviously) was the first victim.
The last night there was a singing competition. Katie was asked to enter in the competition and tied for first place which resulted in a final round sing-off where she ended up placing second and cousin Juanairis won first place (Katie forgot the words in the first verse). For the intermissions between singers in the competition, a reggaetonero (Carribean Style Rapper) from one of the churches entertained the crowd. After the competition we had “Noti-Noti-tiempo: Noticias del Campamento” (ne-ne-time: news of the camp) in which two leaders from one of the churches recapped the activities of the camp in a very funny manner, including stupid things people did and said, and who ended up dating who.

The pictures are chronologically ordered: top to bottom, left to right. We also included a picture of Katie's crazy bug-bitten ankle.

All in all, it was a good experience. Before camp we spent the night with our friends from Teen Challenge and they showed us their planned projects for working with the prostitutes of Santiago. There's a huge need there and we're very glad that they're stepping up to work with them. We spent yesterday (Sun) winding down, and allowing our bodies to recuperate before another busy week. Talk to you next week!

Tranquilo Bobby, Tranquilo

Thursday night of this week we had an official Church meeting in which all of the members came to put their ideas together for future projects. The main topic of the night was fundraising for the continuing of the construction of the new Church building. Members put their heads together and have planned a number of fundraising activities including food sales, appliance & electronic sales, donation activities, and a raffle for a motorcycle (the most common form of transportation around here), washing machine, and fan (much needed in this country). Also, last week we sent in the appropriate paperwork for Mile Deep International to receive tax-exempt status. We will return from our initial trip here in April and upon arrival will begin setting up a Mile Deep International corporate bank account so that any who want to continue supporting this ministry can make a donation which they can write-off in their federal and state taxes. Another issue talked about in the meeting was that of the youth programs we have helped establish. The adults expressed interest in the youth and many volunteered to continue teaching the Sunday School curriculum that we are writing and to continue discussion with the youth concerning their questions deposited in the question box.

During this week’s Saturday night youth service we had our first discussion/message about the questions deposited in the question box by the youth. There was a definite difference in the attitude of the youth. Almost everyone in attendance engaged in the topics with much interest and the night was filled with laughter, serious moments, sincere advice from adults, and good questions from the youth. Now that we can address the topics that are important to the youth, hopefully there will be many more Saturday nights with the youth that are like this.

This Sunday in between the two church services, there was a baptism service. Two young people from Casa de Dios Puerta del Cielo were baptized along with one teenager and two adults from Centro Cristiano. It was a powerful service with good time of talking and snacking afterward.

This coming Wednesday we leave to set up for the Easter-week youth camp that takes place from Thursday to Sunday. We have been given the responsibility of working with the older youth, late teens to early twenties, and we will be conducting a discussion about renovation our faith. We have heard many stories about these camps (including the pranks committed by these young ones!) and we’re sure that we will have plenty to tell when we come back! Pray for our safety. PLEASE.

Self-Sustainability and Future Planning

Construction has still been at a stand-still but this week work will re-commence. A couple of generous souls decided to contribute which has provided the funds for the building of the viga (concrete union piece at top). Now the big job of saving, working, and fundraising to put on a roof will begin.

One of our main responsibilities during our stay has been to work on developing the youth group program at Casa de Dios, Puerta del Cielo. Other than a poorly attended Saturday night service, the youth in the past has had nothing to call their own. Through working on relationships with the youth during “non-church” hours, we have been able to begin a Sunday School class and have helped give the Saturday night youth service more formation. Another element we’ve added to the youth ministry here is a Question Box (See Pictures). The purpose for this “Question Box” is to allow the youth to ask questions that may be on their hearts, but they are too embarrassed to ask and we want to be able to address the things that are important to them. During the week they might think of a question they have or an issue they want to know more about and they can write it down on a piece of paper and drop that in to the Question Box when they come to the service. We ask them to deposit their questions anonymously so that they feel no pressure that others may know which question was theirs. Later the youth leader(s), currently us, reads those questions and prepares to address them in the service either by giving the questions to other members of the church or by answering it themselves. Also, the older members of the church have an opportunity to answer their questions and engage in dialogue about issues brought up by their teenaged counterparts. More teenagers from the community are getting plugged into the faith community at Casa de Dios, Puerta del Cielo, and we are thankful to God for that.
At this point we are beginning to move into the next phase of our purpose for coming to the Dominican Republic: To set up a support system for the ministries that we’ve been able to augment so that they can be self-sustained and operated by members of the local faith community. In the case of the youth ministry, this support system will include leadership training, the creation and writing of a challenging-but-relevant Sunday School curriculum, and equipping church laity to work with the youth. Please pray that God will continue working in our minds in order that He (through us) can bring new innovative ideas to this community.

Saturday, Chris spoke to the youth about the revolution that Jesus made available to everyone in His arrival to earth called the Kingdom of God. The youth were challenged to change the way they see the world, and as a result change the way they live their lives, treat their friends and family, and make decisions that will face them. Sunday we explored the parable of the Hidden Treasure (Matthew 13) by hiding 25 pesos in an old rusty tin can. It provided a valuable learning experience that we hope the youth won’t forget. (See Pictures: also included the plants that were planted in the good soil GREW!!! Mat 13 also).

Next Sunday we will be going to the Yaque River for a baptism service. Three members from Centro Cristiano and two members from Casa de Dios, Puerta del Cielo have completed their baptism/new-Christian classes (Pictures of classes attached) and will be making a public demonstration of their new-found faith.

E' pa'lante que vamo'

Unfortunately, construction for the new temple has been temporarily put on hold due to insufficient funds, so there is no news regarding this portion of the blog.

On a brighter note, we met a missionary couple the other night at a couples’ dinner of another congregation. This couple is working with the organization Teen Challenge (Desafío Juvenil) here in Santiago in La Ciénega, close to Casa de Dios Puerta del Cielo. (For those unfamiliar with Teen Challenge, it is a Christian organization that works to bring in drug addicts to house them, to put them through a curriculum which teaches them about freedom and God’s love, and to help them work towards a holistic healing and healthy lifestyle. So, a rehabilitation center that creates redeemed Christians who graduate and eventually become pastors themselves to help others find freedom from drugs and the lifestyle of drug addicts.) We were able to spend a few hours at the Center with some of the graduates of the rehab, and we were invited to participate in a going away party for the current pastor. It was beautiful to see a very large group of “manly men”, previously very hard men, say heartwarming things about another man whom they love. Very touching.
After the party, the missionary couple took us out to dinner and we were able to share a little about each other. They are in their late 20s and have been married 4 years. They have been redeemed by God and have amazing stories to tell. The man, José, is actually a graduate of the rehab program, and will be taking the place of the pastor leaving the center. His wife, Nelly, emigrated from Mexico to the states and experienced an incredibly disturbing life B.C. (before Christ), and she is working on opening up a women’s rehab, as they do not yet have one here for women. Dinner with them was refreshing (they also both speak English) and they were able to help us process things we’re experiencing as “missionaries” (they kept calling us that).
They invited us onto their radio show on Wednesday, which apparently can be heard online. We’ll let you know if we plan on doing that. We hope to be able to build somewhat of a friendship with this beautiful couple in the time we have left here. Nelly says that since seeing us, she has believed that we will have a future with Teen Challenge in some form. We’ll see 

At Centro Cristiano and Casa de Dios, it seems like members have begun to see things a little bit differently. Instead of just attending church services, they have been more motivated in recent days to look a little more outwardly and it has been apparent because they are actually seeking out friends to bring to the services.

The Youth Camp is coming up soon, so all the kids are counting down and getting really excited. There are several kids who don’t have enough money and are bummed that it looks like they might not be able to go, so we are trying to come up with some fund raisers here to help raise the money for those who don’t have it (it costs RD$800, so about US$25). We’re thinking of having a ‘homemade Chocolate Chip Cookies’ party with those who want to raise money and they each can take their batches and sell them. People make sweets and sell them a lot here, and since they don’t really have chocolate chip cookies here, we thought it would be a good sell! Any good ideas of some easy activities, let us know.