I was sitting on the bus looking out the window as we were driving (quite fast if I might add) through a city in Costa Rica. Street shops, colorful houses with tin roofs, dogs, stop signs, and people passed by as we drove. The sun was slowly setting. It was about 5:15pm in Costa Rica. The bus driver had just picked up another team from their ministry. He handed us the aux and some of my teammates turned on some jams. This is when it hit me so hard straight over the head. This is my life. This is my reality. These moments will never happen again. I get the opportunity every day to ride that bus for three hours with my teammates. I get the opportunity every day to seek the Lord through the faces of the little kids he has put before me. I get the opportunity to grow through the tough moments and through the challenges. I get the opportunity to choose to keep looking up.
Here is a little glimpse into what my life looks like right now.
Sunday and Monday are my off days. Since we haven’t been here for very long (even though it feels like I have been here for months), we haven’t explored very much yet. But there are so many cool things here in Costa Rica that I am excited to do! Adventure is everywhere in this place – waterfalls, volcanoes, hot springs, rainforests. My Sunday’s and Monday’s are about to be filled with adventure. I’m so excited to seek the Lord’s beauty through those things. Tuesday through Saturday are ministry days for my team. And WOW, the Lord has given me a pretty cool opportunity with this ministry. I am working with a ministry called Renuevos. My team and I have been trusted to start up a whole new program within our ministry. I’m not sure if you have heard about the civil unrest that is taking place in Nicaragua, but it is getting pretty serious and unsafe. A lot of Nicaraguans have crossed the border to Costa Rica and found themselves in the community of La Carpio, the community where my ministry is located. Our ministry host explained to us that a lot of Costa Ricans look at Nicaraguans as lesser humans, resulting in the lack of job opportunities available to Nicaraguans that recently came to Costa Rica to find safety. This means that a lot of Nicaraguan families are being crammed in small houses because they cannot afford anything else. They are sleeping on floors and not getting fed very much. A lot of the families cannot afford to send their kids to school, so children are sitting at home literally staring at walls with nothing better to do. Their mommas were getting headaches from trying to occupy the kids all day every day. My team was given the opportunity to change this for them. No, we are not able to come up with money to send all of the kids to school. No, we are not able to find jobs for everyone who needs a job. But we are able to provide a safe place for the kids to play and be kids. We are able to take some stress off the moms’ backs by playing with the kids, but also doing their hair, painting their nails, listening to what they have been through, and letting them know how important they are. We are able to love them. We are able to share the Gospel with them. And that is exactly the opportunity we have been given. When we arrived at ministry for the first time, there was no agenda. Our ministry hosts left the planning completely open ended. This was a big and scary task, but by the grace of the Lord we were able to serve these people. From around 9am to 2pm every Tuesday through Friday, this is what we do. We play games with the kids. We push them on the swings. We play a lot of soccer. We skateboard (well I don’t because I don’t know how). We paint pictures. We make bracelets. Starting next week, we are going to start incorporating English classes into the agenda. After ministry, we take a three hour bus ride home every day. At first, this made me so frustrated. After a long day of ministry, I just wanted to be home to eat dinner and take a shower. My team gets picked up from ministry around 4pm, then we pick up two other teams so we arrive back home around 7pm. But this bus ride is such an opportunity! My team gets to spend time alone together for about an hour before we pick up any other team. We get to spend time with the Lord. We get to bump the aux. We get to see a whole lot of Costa Rica. Some days we even get to take a nice nap. After we get home, our sweet cook makes us dinner and then we have team time. Team time is just a time for us to spend as a team and talk about how our days were. I’m slowly learning to love team time. After team time, we just hang out until we all get sleepy and go to bed. Then we do it all over again. It’s the best. This is my life.
I have learned so much already and I’ve only been here for about 12 days. I’m learning to look at every moment as an opportunity. I’m learning to give myself grace because I am still getting adjusted and I am still learning. I’m learning to live in community, I’m learning to think of other people before myself, I’m learning that everyone deals with things differently, I’m learning that I’m not always right. I’m getting to know the Lord. I’m learning to leave comparison behind. I’m learning that my relationship with the Lord doesn’t have to look a certain way. I’m learning obedience. I’m learning the step out of my comfort zone. I’m learning what it means to let go of things and trust the Father. Growing is not easy. It brings up emotions that don’t even have names, feelings that you can’t even explain. But growing is so necessary. I’m learning to allow the Lord to grow me how he wants, not how I want. I’m learning to love exactly where my feet are on the ground. This ministry is such a big opportunity and the Lord is moving so much within it.
I just wanted to say thank you so much to everyone that has supported me on this journey. I am praying for you and over you. If you have any prayer requests, send them my way! I would love to pray for specific things for you. If you could keep my ministry in your prayers as well, that would mean so much to me!
I am also still fundraising, so if you feel called to support me through a financial donation, you can hit the orange “donate” button at the top of my blog! Thank you!
