Over spring break, I had the privilege of returning to the Dominican Republic for a week-long mission trip there. Ever since I went last year, I have been itching to go back and bring more USC students with me. This year, we had 9 Trojans, 11 people from NAU, and 5 people from UofA. What I loved about this group of people is that we all bonded so well and never had any major arguments. I've been going on spring break mission trips for years now, and this was probably some of the best bonding I've seen on a trip, especially with 25 students from 3 schools; that's incredible.
Check out this awesome team. Honestly could not ask for a better group!
What's more incredible though, is what God did this week. Let me preface this by saying we spent the week in Santo Domingo at the UASD, the largest university in the DR and the oldest university in the Americas. It was founded in 1538 and has over 160,000 students at it! Last year, we spent the entire week around the English immersion school, so most of our conversations with students were in English. This year, since there were 25 of us, along with another 35 from Oklahoma, we were placed all over campus. Now, this being my second time coming, I was a little afraid of the sophomore expectations, where everything couldn't live up to how great the year before was (especially since the year before was awesome). Needless to say, I was a little weary heading into this trip; excited for sure, but weary.
Let me tell you, God blew all my expectations out of the water. This trip was seemingly incomparable, yet totally awesome by itself. Our first night there, we got placed into 4 different teams and briefed on what we would be doing. At this point in time, I was not excited at all about ministry. I didn't want to do graffiti boards; I didn't want to perform a skit; I didn't want to walk around campus and talk to random Dominican students who couldn't speak English. Yet, God had bigger plans than my little box of ideas, and I actually really loved everything we did.
Not gonna lie, it wasn't easy talking to Spanish-speakers Tuesday morning and trying to discuss the tough question they were answering. I didn't really have any other translators around me so I was trying to fend on my own, and it kinda freaked me out. Thankfully, God is good, and a translator helped us gringos out for part of the morning (just so you know, I can speak Spanish but not fluently). In the afternoon we played sports with some of the students, and small talk in Spanish got easier.
The second day on campus, I had to be in a skit, and this is going to sound shocking to those of you who know me well, but I actually didn't mind being in it. Of course that only meant fake beating up someone, but still, I had fun. Then the challenge came. We got paired up to talk to students and share the gospel with them, and I was the "Spanish speaker" in my pair. My partner and I prayed, and then we went out. Guess what? It actually was really fun, and God definitely gave me the words to say because I did not remember all of that Spanish. That began the sharing my faith in Spanish portion of my time in the DR. Last year I probably shared the gospel in Spanish twice, whereas this year I shared the gospel in English only twice. The rest of the time was sharing in Spanish.
Cool Story: On Thursday afternoon, my team and I headed over to the English immersion program to talk to the students there. Of course I was excited because that was like my old stomping grounds. Well, once we get there, our leader was in a discussion but said we would be going to some nearby volleyball courts to just hang out with the locals and get into conversations if we could. Major letdown. While I was sitting there waiting for the balls with a staff member from Oklahoma, we strike up a conversation with a student sitting by us, asking him if he had any questions about Christianity. Turns out he did, and so through a long conversation we got to share the gospel with him, help him think through some of his major questions, and see if he wanted to bring Jesus into his life. And he wanted to! He kept saying how beautiful the whole thing was, from the way God loved us to the way Jesus died on the cross to pay for our sins and make us perfect in God's eyes.
It was so encouraging, and I am so excited to have another brother in Christ!
So yeah, it was a great week. God did some awesome stuff, both on campus in the Dominican students lives and in the lives of those who got to spend a week there. It was encouraging, during our debrief time, to hear how God was revealing more of Himself to everyone on our team. Yes, this trip was different than what I expected, but it was better than I could have imagined. I was so blessed by our entire team, but especially by our team from USC. They were all close friends of mine, so it was cool ministering with all of them and just encouraging and edifying one another throughout the entire week.
This was actually my 10th straight and last spring break mission trip I'll take, which was so weird to think about. It is really starting to hit me that I'm about to move on and that my current stage of life (education) is about to be done. Honestly though, I don't think I could have asked for a better way to end my spring break run and rejuvenate me for the last final seconds of my time in college (and it feels like only seconds.). I'm sure you'll be hearing many more of my nostalgic posts in the future, so get excited.
