Welcome to Panama!
As we walked across the border of Costa Rica into Panama, I started getting giddy with excitement. When I applied for the Race and picked this route, Panama was the only country on the list that I didn’t have any particular feelings towards. I didn’t have any expectations for it at all, for better or for worse. That expectationless expectancy got me hype as I (literally) walked into this month. Guatemala and Nicaragua were a little underwhelming to me; many people back home love Nicaragua and Guatemala and I honestly picked this route partly because I would be able to go to the places where those people fell in love and really saw Kingdom. But I didn’t experience that like they did, so my expectations weren’t met and it was an underwhelming experience.
So for me, our month in Panama was a new, clean slate with no expectations! Our ministry this month is also completely different from what we have experienced before. In both Guatemala and Nicaragua, our team was expecting to do children’s ministry and then we primarily did manual labor both months. This month, our ministry is completely relational – something both exciting and challenging.
We are partnering with Shibu, a Christian man from India who the Lord called to start a Christian Fellowship for Indians in Panama City, where there are over 15,000 Indian families and not a single Christian ministry for Indians. We are providing lift to him and his ministry by praying intentionally for him and his family, open doors (literally) for house visits to occur, softened hearts and ready soil to receive the Gospel, and the Indian community in Panama as a whole. We are also preparing songs, sermons, testimonies, and words of encouragement to share with his Fellowship during prayer meetings and during worship. We are partnering with one of his members’ children’s ministry and are creating songs and dances and skits and games to share with the impoverished and endangered children in the city. Our big task this month is to create and execute an entire Christmas program for the Fellowship; we are hoping to reach many Indian people with the Gospel through this program.
Last Sunday we had the privilege of joining Shibu’s Fellowship, Navjeevan Christian Fellowship, for worship. We sang worship songs in Hindi and then our team led three songs in English. Shibu shared a message about communion that was translated into Spanish for the Spanish-speaking members in the congregation. Then Shibu led the Fellowship’s in their first communion as a congregation. It was really special to be a part of a milestone day in their community – sharing the Lord’s Supper as a Body of Christ with at least three people groups represented in two different languages. How cool is that! After the service, we met and mingled with the congregation, learned names, and shared refreshments.
The Navjeevan Christian Fellowship! Shibu is in the orange shirt, front; his wife, Lily, is beside him with the black scarf. They have three children: Timothy, Leah, and Sarah (the latter sitting on my shoulder).
Please join us in prayer this month by:
- lifting up Shibu and his family. Their ministry is entirely relational and is a very slow, gradual process of inviting Indian families into relationship, earning trust, starting conversations, and being sensitive to their culture while also sharing the Truth of the Gospel. Rejection and burn out are very common for them to feel and experience. Pray specifically for a refilling of the Holy Spirit and renewed strength and vigor for ministry.
- asking God to send more workers into the harvest. The harvest is plentiful and the workers are few; Shibu, his wife, and one other couple at church are the only Christian Indians he knows of after his three years of ministry in Panama City. His congregation does not have the same passion for reaching Indian families like he does. Pray for God to send him Kingdom-focused Christian individuals to partner with him in long-term relational ministry, and for his congregation to rise up and step into Kingdom work alongside him.
- interceding for the Indian community in Panama. Many Indians in Panama are Hindu or Muslim. We are praying for a softening of their hearts and for their hearts to be fertile soil to hear and receive the Gospel message of freedom and salvation through Jesus Christ. One way we can share this message is through house visits, so please also be praying for doors to be opened for us to visit with families, and the leadership of Holy Spirit over us while we meet in those homes.
- blessing our times of planning and preparation for prayer meetings, Fellowship worship, children’s ministry, and the Christmas program and asking Holy Spirit to lead us in our preparation and execution.
Thank you for your support and encouragement through prayer!
As you may know, I left the United States for the World Race in October FULLY FUNDED. You all helped me raise $18,017 in a little less than 6 months! Hallelujah! Thank you again! As we enter month three of the Race, I still have sisters on my team and squad who are not fully funded. Their goal is to have the full amount needed by the end of next month, but I think it would be incredible for them to be fully funded by the new year! We as a squad are a Body of Christ, and like our physical bodies, each part is essential to us being who the Lord created us to be!
Here are my sisters who are still in need of funding. Please click on their names, get to know them, read their stories from the field, and pray about supporting them financially. And pray for them and their journey! Thank you for supporting my Race by supporting the Body I am a part of! Their goal is $18,017, and their name is listed with their current total. Those with asterisks are on my team, Wild Fires!
