Hello Family,
It’s month 7 here on the World Race and I’m in Nicaragua!
My time here is fleeting, and I leave for my next country very soon—April 10th to be exact. So my apologize for not getting this blog out sooner. In my defense, life here didn’t really begin to feel normal until about a week ago. My squad and I were only here for two days doing “normal” ministry before parents began showing up for PVT (a week long event where our parents get to spend time with us and see what life is like on the World Race!!). It was wild.
The first day we got here there was a big fire that put the farm at risk. People at our camp were running to it, trying to put it out. Our guys team helped a lot with it, but for a while the fire had a will of its own. It was there and it wasn’t going away. After a while it was contained and put out, but it was a nice preface to what God was going to show me here: that he’s a fire that has a will of its own.
So I’ll give you the rundown of what life looks like here.
My ministry hosts, Scott and Jen, ask us to be awake and spend time with the Lord from 6:00am until 7:30am breakfast. It can look like whatever we want: prayer, scripture, worship. Literally whatever time with God looks like—with the exception of “resting with the Lord” aka sleeping. Tried that once, and I didn’t fool anyone.
I think it’s sweet that they give us this time. One may see it as ‘religious’, but it’s not something that I feel is forced. We all want that time anyways, it helps us to really focus on what our day is about.
Even better, Wednesdays and Fridays we all wake up for 5am prayer where everyone on the site prays for the community, churches, and ministry here. We pray for that anyways, but it’s nice doing it together bright and early with the sunrise.
Average Day of Ministry:
Farming: Working on the farm has been good, hard work. The first day I worked on the farm I was entrusted with a fancy machete where I chopped down old plantain trees to make room for them to plant new ones. It was wicked cool, and I felt like I was on some kind of survival reality TV show or something. In reality, I probably felt way cooler than I actually looked. The majority of my time working on the farm has looked a little different though. We’ve been given the infamous job of pulling weeds in the fields. Yeah yeah, I know when you first hear “pulling weeds” you think “that’s it?”. But these aren’t just any weeds. These weeds look like sweet little plants on the surface, but they have roots that are two sometimes three feet long. We’ve been given pickaxes to get them out—and they’re everywhere. It’s awesome, and I again think I feel cooler than I actually look with a pickaxe. Every now and then we have the chance to harvest the moringa trees where we get on a big ladder and pick them. Not as much action, but also not as much sweat and tears, so you win some you lose some.
Prayer Walking: This is where the real magic happens. We’re sent in big groups to squeeze in the back of a truck and drive to different neighborhoods where we literally walk from house to house and just hang out with people. Sometimes they’re Christians and we talk to them about what God’s teaching us, or we share a scripture that the Lord has put on our hearts. My favorite is when they’re not Christian, or they’re just on the borderline where God only has to take a few more swings until big breakthrough happens. I like the challenge of that because people don’t have to pursue Jesus or order for him to pursue them. He just does. And sometimes it’s through us! I like that there’s no agenda, no hidden motives, just the body going out to see, listen, and know the community. Every now and then we get a new (heavenly) family member and it’s a quite a sweet sight that I’ll never get tired of seeing.
Odd Jobs:
Farming and prayer walking is what a usual day looks like, but sometimes I get to do different jobs that are less frequent. Every now and then we visit some people who work at the dump. They sort through garbage all day and collect recyclables to sell and profit off of. You’d think they don’t make very much money, and you’re right, they don’t. So we try to make our visits as meaningful as we can. We bring a truck full of food to feed them and someone will usually give a little 5 minute devotional to remind them that God is good and he’s pursuing them.
A random thing my whole squad did was donate blood! One day Scott said, “we have a pop-up clinic in the community center and you’re all donating blood.”, so we all did! People were freaking out, panicking that they’d pass out, and some did. It was awesome. Especially the cookies we got after, those were awesome too.
On Sundays we have sports camp, and it’s exactly what it sounds like. Community kids and teens come and play sports all day. Basketball, volleyball, kickball, softball, even corn hole! Just a healthy way to bring the neighborhoods together and hang out!
This is how I spend the majority of my time. Ministry is Wednesday-Sunday, Monday I’m normally at the lake or in town with my team, and Tuesday is my sabbath where I stay at the camp and hang out with God all day.
I’m thinking of good ways to interact with you guys now that I have better access to talking to you, and me and Eliza (my teammate, she’s awesome) are trying to make videos every Tuesday where we answer questions and just talk about life on the race! We’re excited to invite you in more on what we do and what we’ve been learning so let me know if there are any topics you want us to cover. Don’t be shy, we’re not!!!
