Now, I know what you’re thinking, you’re probably questioning why I’ve suddenly decided not to use song lyrics as my blog title for the first time all year. Let me tell you, it was hard not to. There were so many good song lyrics that could have easily worked for this blog, in fact, it took everything I had in me not to title this blog “Livin’ La Vida Loca”. But this is just too exciting not to just put it all out there, so,
I’M GOING TO COSTA RICA!!
That’s right my friends, God has opened doors like crazy and phase 1 of my Costa Rican coffee shop is complete!
Here’s the condensed version of how exactly this all happened:
-pre-World Race, I never had any desire to ever to go to Central or South America, I had opportunities to go and flat out just didn’t care. Also, I hated high school Spanish and Mexican food. Really just one big equation for someone who was never going south of the border.
-on the Race, as you know if you’ve been following this blog, God changed my heart like crazy. I was by far the biggest hater, of all things really, and God broke me and He broke my heart, and I learned how to love and be loved.
-in Kenya (January ’11), after deciding that going back to working with animals wasn’t going to do it for me, God told me I should probably start preparing myself for Central America. “Ah great.”
-very long story short: over the next few months, God made my heart beat for people and, for some bizarre unknown reason, for Central America. As the months went on, He was constantly crossing my path with people who had contacts in Costa Rica, no other countries, just Costa Rica, that they could hook me up with, seriously like every other day for two months. Maybe I was reading into things, myabe I wasn’t, either way I took that as a push in the right direction and started networking.
-two months before the end of the Race, I googled ministries in Costa Rica andChristian Surfers Costa Rica was the first thing that came up. I emailed them on a whim just saying that I’m pretty incapable on any kind of board but I like people and asked if they needed any help.
-no reply for two months. Then I came home and still no reply.
-about a week after being home, I found myself writhing on my bedroom floor asking God what the heck I’m supposed to do with my life now. That night I checked my email and Christian Surfers emailed me back. April, the missions coordinator, told me that my email had mistakenly gone to her spam and she had just found it and had an opportunity for me if I was still interested. PRAISE THE LORD!
So that’s the backstory and now I’m Costa Rica bound. I’m going down to Jaco in mid-January to work with Christian Surfers Costa Rica. Christian Surfers’ goal is to reach out to the surf community with the Gospel and connect them to local churches. Jaco is a big tourist town and with tourists come drugs, prostitution, etc, so Christian Surfers provides a good, fun community to get away from all of that. They do this with youth groups, discipleship programs, and surf and skate contests. It’ll kind of be World Race style in that I’ll be doing just about anything. I’ll be working with the missions coordinator, doing a lot of relational outreach, hanging out with youth, maybe bar ministry, cutting the grass, who knows, I’ll be doing it all! I have initially committed to 9 months but my hope, whether with Christian Surfers or not, is to make it a much longer stay; I’m over all this traveling and I’m ready to settle down, maybe even have a dresser.
I do have to raise support again and to be able to do this I have to raise $9,000 ($1000/month) before January 18th. As you can imagine, I’m kind of writhing about the fact that I only have a month to support raise, but I’m trusting Him and asking you to prayerfully consider partnering with me.
There are two ways you can do this:
1) Make checks payable to “World Outreach Ministries”, in the memo line write “Sarah Olmstead #139”, and send them to:
World Outreach Ministries
P.O. Box B
Marietta, GA 30061
2) Donate online by going to www.worldoutreach.org, go to the “Donate” tab, and select my name from the list.
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(at the CSCR ministry-owned skate park)
I feel like this blog was all business and no heart, so here’s my heart:
I know this is what God has for me. It seems crazy, sometimes I feel crazy, going to a place I’ve never been with people I’ve never met, where they speak a language I only barely know, but then again, that was my entire last year and it turned out alright. I don’t know where I heard this phrase but it sums it up perfectly, “I feel joy and terror, all at once, ripping through my heart.” I can’t say it enough, and there’s no way to fully explain it, but God changed my heart, all I want to do is hang out with people, and love people, and see them walk in freedom and experience God on a real, life-altering, perspective-changing, tangible level. And He’s given me this awesome opportunity to do it!
Thank you all for your love, prayers, and support! I am incredibly blessed by you!
PS. Because I know you’re wondering, I have taken up learning Spanish and I’m loving it and while on the Race, I grew to love Mexican food, granted I will still choose a cheesebuger over a burrito anyday, but a burrito comes in close second.
