Weeks 3-5 Update!

It’s so hard to believe that I’ve already been here for 5 weeks today! It’s been such a fun journey so far and awesome to see God working in some incredible ways. I’m so thankful for all the prayers, encouragement, and check-ins from some of you back home! I’m eternally grateful for you all and am excited to share about how these last few weeks have been going!

We’ve had a couple opportunities to connect with some of the students at a school nearby that a young lady from the church teaches. We were able to go to the beach and spend a day with them as well as on a separate occasion go and play some mini golf with a few of them to try to connect with them on a deeper spiritual level. This connection is going to provide other opportunities to lead a bible study or an evangelistic outreach event to reach these students with the Gospel. I was recently informed that I will be speaking at the event in March. As far as our friend knows (Romy – she is their teacher) none of the kids except 1 of them know Christ personally. So this will be a great opportunity to speak and share the gospel with them!

We had an opportunity to go and do a monthly prayer meeting at the top of a “mountain” here that overlooks a large portion of the island. One thing that I’ve been inspired by by being here and seeing how Pastor Carlos and his wife Denise are, is that they devote a lot of time to prayer and never hesitate to take an opportunity to pray with someone, for someone, for one another, the church, etc. As someone that has struggled with being disciplined in my prayer life, I feel that I have been growing in that area. We do this once a month and also began our every Thursday prayer meetings. This has been a good time to pray for the various ministry opportunities that we have as well as for the church and each other.

Our weekly Wednesday game nights have been a blast meeting new people and building relationships with them, as well as our Sunday afternoon ultimate frisbee group. Although we have been and are building great relationships with these people, it has been somewhat difficult to talk about spiritual things with them, as I mentioned before the people here are very closed off to those types of conversations. I desire nothing more than to share the truth with them. Please continue to pray for their hearts to be open and for God to show us how we can navigate the conversations that we have with them.

“Therefore, my friends, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you. Through him everyone who believes is set free from every sin, a justification you were not able to obtain under the law of Moses.”

Acts 13:38-39

Someone that we met at one of our board game nights invited us over to their house for board games and karaoke. This was a great time as well and we even prayed with them at one point! They somehow didn’t get sick of us and invited us over again! 🤣

Me and John had a cool opportunity to serve someone in the community by helping move a new bed into his house and put it together for him. Ministry is all about being available to serve and seeking opportunities to serve. It’s been my favorite part about being here. Being the hands and the feet of Jesus. From this little act of service, this person recognized who Pastor John was because he heard John on the radio promoting our marriage conference coming up on valentines day. Through that, the man expressed interest in coming! The gospel will be presented at this! We will hold one the evening of 2/14, and then we will have another follow up one next week. We will be doing the two conferences and then breaking off into starting a weekly Bible study in the book of Romans.

We’ve also been able to spend time with each family in the Church, talking with them and getting to know them better!

The last week we were able to spend a lot of time with a few friends of the Lowder’s that came to visit. It was nice to be able to see a little more of the island and relax a little before the busy weeks ahead of ministry that we have planned.

I had my first opportunity to preach two Sunday’s ago! It was exciting and I was very nervous. I feel it went well and had a lot of positive feedback! This was just a partial preaching (20 minutes) with Pastor John, but in March I will have an opportunity to preach an entire sermon by myself.

Not only will I have be able to preach in March, but this Sunday we will have our church retreat and I will be able to lead a Bible study with the youth as well as help plan games for the church to do. I’m very excited! I also was able to connect with a few women in the church and their children that are interested in being part of a weekly Bible study that I will be starting and leading beginning this Friday! Please pray for this! I have experience leading a few Bible study sessions before but this will be a little different as I will be doing most of it myself. I’m very excited!

Overall. These first five weeks here have been amazing and I’m very excited for whats ahead. We’ve been able to connect as a team and pour into each others lives as well as pour into the lives of those in the Church and I’m very excited for the opportunities that are coming.

Prayer requests:

1. I’m going to be going out more daily to try to build connections and do some evangelism. Please pray for confidence and open hearts.
2. My weekly Bible study that I will be starting this Friday.
3. Our marriage conference tonight 2/14, and 2/21.
4. My preaching opportunity as well as youth outreach event in March.
5. Continued Spanish language learning.
6. Continue to stay healthy.

“We are bringing you good news, telling you to turn from these worthless things to the living God, who made the heavens and the earth and the sea and everything in them.”

acts 14:15b