I want to update you on some new ministries we are involved in since my last post. These are in addition to our kids club, Sunday School classes and weekly Bible study. The women have begun a weekly prayer walk and talk over different bars and casinos here where sex trafficking/prostitution are rampant. You can read more about some of these experiences under blogs for my team, Sculptor’s Seven, and Team Unsilenced. The men are involved with a weekly ministry where they feed and minister to the homeless, which is primarily made up of men.
We also got to meet Chris, who hosted us for lunch yesterday. He and his wife are long-term missionaries here in Costa Rica and have opened up a few different free pregnancy centers in Costa Rica with great success in the short time they have been here. You can read more about them by clicking here Beautiful Feet. We will be taking shifts going to the center they have here in Jaco this week.
While we have the unique opportunity to work with multiple ministries and people while in Jaco, one of our larger projects for the month is doing construction at La Ola, the mission hostel where we are staying. So, I wanted to share more about that project and what I’m learning through it.
The design of the land causes all of the water to drain down to the back (where there is a wall) and just pool there, flooding certain areas. So, Hannah (our ministry host) wants to completely fill in most of the area with more soil and create new walls, sloping it to allow even distribution.
It is a HUGE undertaking mostly because of the fact that many modern equipment is not available to us. I will give you a better idea of what all this looks like. We keep having a truck dump a massive load of rocky dirt from the river onto the entrance of the property (covering some of the street as well) as they can not fit into the front gate. This is what it looks like:
Then, we have to work as quickly as possible to move all of the dirt into the property and where we want it that same day with shovels and wheelbarrows as it can’t stay there overnight. In addition, there are often a lot of weekly meetings that take place at La Ola such as Christian Surfers and a weekly Bible study, so it all has to be cleaned up before those take place.
It takes us roughly 6-8 hours each day just to move the large pile since we only have a handful of shovels and wheelbarrows, and are down to 13 of us between the 2 teams. We have gotten some interesting reactions from different people passing by on the street (and struck up a few conversations) as they are definitely not used to seeing a large group of women wielding shovels and tools, especially in this humidity.
Photo Credits: Victoria Baxter (Team Unsilenced)
In order to begin filling some of the areas and creating the walls, we first had to move all of the rocks, from the tiny pebbles that were originally where the dirt is now to the large decorative rocks surrounding the flower beds. Then, we dug up all of the plants and trees, dug a trench and removed a fence. We spent 3 days in a row moving 3 loads (1 load per day) and have 9 more to go!
There is a chance that our host has found someone with a bobcat small enough to get through the gate who can help us out. We are praying that they are available to come on Tuesday as that will likely enable us to knock out the remaining loads in 1-2 days versus 9, and save us a lot of extra manual labor. So, fingers crossed for that.
I shared all of these details in order to help further explain the significance of something God continues to show me while on the Race. Picture this…it is the third day in a row of shoveling and dumping dirt and rocks around. As such, your muscles are sore and tight and each lifted item, shovel dig and wheelbarrow dump serves as a reminder of this. You are literally soaked in sweat, red in the face from the heat and physically exhausted.
Photo Credit: Victoria Baxter
It was at this point that I found myself wanting to complain, whine and question. “Why did it have to be done this way and in this timeframe,” “how do they expect us to do all of this on our own” and “how was this helping anyone?” It was in that moment when my selfishness and weakness was taking over that God reminded me of something discussed during my launch.
AIM (Adventures in Missions) staff talked to us a lot about Kingdom ministry and how it will often look much different from what we envision it to be. You won’t always be holding orphans in your arms or leading someone to salvation. Ministry will sometimes be a simple conversation with a stranger, vulnerability within your team or even learning to let go of what you consider to be rightfully yours.
I realized in that moment that all of the hard work we were doing was not simply to help the property look and function better. Our physical labor was serving as a huge source of aid and support to our ministry host, who pours her life into helping people within Jaco, and spreading the message of Christ.
Hannah works with so many different groups and organizations in the area and their combined efforts have made a very evident difference in this city. More and more have come to know Jesus as their Savior and get involved. This property is important in itself as it hosts different meetings, missions teams and Bible studies, as well as houses those who need a place to stay. However, the greatest part of La Ola is what it represents and the people behind it all.
God showed me in an instant that each plant dug up (and the many spider encounters during this process) or pile of dirt shoveled truly was a ministry all its own. Most things are often not about the actual actions themselves as much as the heart and love behind those actions. I did not leave my home and loved ones to be comfortable. I came to serve and love and do so with a willing heart.
So, I started viewing each moment as an opportunity to love and honor and it completely changed my perspective. I began smiling and even humming as I went about my work and my heart began to fill as I looked around and saw this among the rest of my teammates. Everyone was hot and tired, yet we all worked together as a group, and did so joyfully. We dug in and found laughter and community among that dirt pile.
Photo Credit: Victoria Baxter
We can now look back after each day with a sense of joy and accomplishment as we see what our efforts are creating, knowing that we have completed so much more together than we ever could have alone. I’m glad that God is teaching me this perspective now, so early on in my Race, as I know there will be many days ahead where I will need to remember it.
Ministry starts in the heart and soul, and from there moves outward to actions and people, not the other way around. Crazy how it took some hard work and bruises to realize this truth.
