Hey guys, haven’t been able to update much this past week. Don’t have access to WiFi, which I guess is good too cause it helps me focus on reaching out to locals and on the mission at hand. Also, I tried uploading photos at a coffee shop on our free day, but it took way too long… not sure what to say, but you may or may not see some photos of our current location for a while.
We arrived at Cicrin, which is in Ometepe Island, on Tuesday January 28. The city/area is called Los Angeles, Nicaragua, which is pretty neat since I’m from Los Angeles, California. The living environment here was way better than I expected; the three of us men share one room with one bed each, and it’s pretty comfy. We have a normal shower, and the only downside is we can’t flush the toilet paper. Also we started doing our laundry by hand, which was a huge blessing, because 1) I had dirty clothes in my bag since training camp and 2) the process was simple, effective, and the soap was quite fragrant. We get fed three amazing meals from the cooks at the orphanage everyday. Most of the meals consist of rice, beans, and various styles of plantains, while others are more familiar, like pancakes, French toasts (we even had hamburgers, even though the patty wasn’t exactly beef). Hammocks are also a common thing, so we set some up in front of the guys’ room, which is like a hallway+reception area, and in the pavilion where we have worship, team time, and debriefs. I wake up before breakfast everyday and do my devos/quiet time on one of the hammocks in front of our room, which is super peaceful and comfortable. Thinking about life/meditating on the hammocks looking out into the sunset, playing with scorpions, having children paint my fingernails, playing sports with the children, serving and worshiping God, living here has been a blast.
Our first day of ministry was on Wednesday January 29. Helen, who is the director of Cicrin and our host, gave us a brief tour and history of the orphanage, told us her testimony, and how God convinced her to stay and be director. For the next few days, our team helped with many different tasks around Cicrin: gardening, farming (plantain farms), painting buildings, helping in the kitchen, sweeping, cleaning church (which is located around 5 minutes away). I mainly worked on the garden and farm, and the experience was fun, extremely humbling, and nostalgic (all the garden work I did with dad back home). The children don’t start school until Monday, but some came in the afternoons, so we played lots of soccer, volleyball and basketball; we even taught some of them ultimate frisbee, which they picked up quickly. We also had worship time with them, which some of our team members would help lead (in Spanish too, cheers to them). Although I couldn’t communicate too well because of my extremely poor Spanish, it was still fun being able to hangout with the locals and pick up a few words and phrases; we were also able to get close with our translator Josué. We would have debriefs at night, where we would give feedback too each other and we also started sharing our testimonies.
This past week week has past very slowly in my opinion. I made a habit of calling back home every night at training camp, so when we arrived at Cicrin and had no Wifi (can barely connect with data), I was pretty sad. I pretty much counted down the days until I could update my family, which made the days pass even longer. During one of my quiet times, God helped me realize something incredibly important: I was depending on my family for comfort and guidance more than I was depending on God. I started thinking more and more about how I did this back home too. It was such a small habit of mine, I didn’t give it much thought until now, and I knew God wanted me to know that the only way I could have a stronger relationship with Him is if I learned to find peace and strength in God through reading his Word and allowing it to truly penetrate my soul. Back home it was easy to get distracted, and I have a feeling God placed me in this environment so I could understand what it means when it says God reveals himself through Scripture and creation. The more I read and meditate, the more I understand God’s goodness and how alive and active He is in my life. I just haven’t given time and opened up my heart enough to realize the perfect communication God has with us through the Bible. I really admire how David mentions time and time again how he find the strength to accomplish anything through the power of God. Knowing that the ultimate work was finished with Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross, I have the strength to carry out every other task God has in store for me through Jesus.
Hoping this blog will help update you guys for all the days I missed and will miss. Children will start school on Monday (tomorrow), so we’ll continue our work then. Had a great two days of rest this weekend: went to the town and beach on Saturday, and nice day off Sunday for Sabbath. Again, thanks for keeping me in your prayers. I’ll keep trying to upload photos… hopefully it works.
