We woke up on our first full day of ministry excited and ready to go. We got up, had breakfast, and jumped into shoveling dirt and scraping paint around the house. We had a list of things to do and we started on the big ones; finishing a stonewall and repainting part of the house.
After a full morning of dirty work we got ourselves cleaned up and left for ministry at 3 pm to go work with a U17 team at a small field (canchita) behind a church before heading over to the big field. We got directions from one of the missionaries at Casablanca and made our way to the bus station. All was going well.
We saw a KFC across the street, pounced up, hit the stop button and jumped off the bus. Before my feet hit the ground I knew we had gotten out too soon. The KFC was across the street like our friend had said but there was no graffiti brick wall in front of me.
The thing about Ecuador is that you can practically find a KFC on every corner. We made the decision to push forward and made our way down a street that had a similar name to the one in the directions. None of it felt quite right. That’s when the rain came.
We were wet, cold, lost, and confused. A perfect combination for a lot of negative feelings, and yet I found myself practically skipping down a random sidewalk in Quito, Ecuador. No idea where I was or where I was going, and humming the classic ‘singing in the rain’. God’s joy had washed over me. I waltzed into a store and asked a few ladies if they knew of the church, field, or street we were looking for. None of them did, so we moved on. After a phone call or two and more wandering we eventually found the church and canchita, 45 minutes late.
No kids had shown up due to the rain so we decided to find some food before having to go to the larger field. We walked back to the KFC to eat – which was in all seriousness our biggest mistake of the day. – We pulled chairs together in order to talk as a team, and Josh brought up the possibility of splitting up the 7 of us between soccer and Casablanca in order to better serve each ministry. We started mulling it over as we thought we had time before making a decision as a team.
Before leaving KFC, Josh got a call from Meji, the U17 coach at the canchita. He said he needed help renting out the field that night. So we split up for the first time this month.
That night Josh talked with our squad mentor, Stacy, and the decision to split up had been made. It was difficult to process because it all happened so soon. The 5 of us that were continuing with the soccer ministry felt as though we were leaving a job unfinished.
Once again this month, like the last, was not about the amount that I could do or people I could connect with. It was what God could do with the time and resources we had. I had to trust God beyond my own understanding to now that he did in fact have us there for a reason.
We finished the outside wall and repainting walls inside the house. This turned out to be such a blessing for Fabi as he had been trying to get a guy to finish it for months. It also saved him a great amount of money. And saying goodbye to a few of the soccer players that we really connected with was difficult. We learned from one another and inspired each other to continue pursuing the Lord.
The unfinished wall
The finished wall! (mostly thanks to Josh)
Casa Deportiva Cumbre Alta – the soccer ministry logo
An inside joke with Edgar and I, and Meji in the background at the canchita. It was always a blast with these guys.
The Lord is so good, and it is up to us to simply put our trust in him and his plans.
“Trust in the LORD, and do good; dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness.
Delight yourself in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart.
Commit your way to the LORD; trust in him, and he will act.”
– Psalm 37:3-5
