DTS Outreach Update

As we are coming up on our last week of outreach, it's crazy to look back on everything. Panama was such an incredible time for all of us. We got to work with a Catholic boys home and spend some time just encouraging the boys, playing with them, doing a Bible study with them and just hanging out. The boys were really attentive and engaged and we are praying that God is continuing to water and grow the seeds that were planted. We also went to some different work camps for the indigenous and got to do kid's ministry with the kids there. The time in Panama was really refreshing and encouraging. On our way back to Costa Rica we met some backpackers and got to hang out with them as well as give them tracts and pray for them. That was a fun opportunity and chance to connect with another group of people. Now we are on Lake Atitlan...everything has gone really smoothly and we've been enjoying the beauty of this place as well as the people. The first five days we were here we worked in a village called Tzununa. Children's ministry was a large part of what we did there. We just hung out in the main square and did songs, games, and Bible stories with them. They all enjoyed it a lot and we had fun with them. We felt a little bit like we were in a zoo because the place we were staying at opened right onto the street and we had kids just hanging out in the doorway watching us a lot of the time! Doing Bible distribution here was a really great opportunity because we were going into places where people really wanted Bibles but didn't have any so it was such a blessing for us to be able to give that to them.  We prayed against a lot of alcoholism within different families which unfortunately seemed to be a common struggle for a lot of the people in this village. We are now starting out our last two weeks fairly strong! Leah and Andrea are a little under the weather so prayers for their full recovery would be appreciated. We are doing lots of open air preaching and evangelism this week so prayers for open doors and boldness are also needed :). Thanks for all your love, support, encouragement, and prayers. It's been great seeing God work in little and big ways during our time here and also all the things that he has been teaching us each and every day. We are so thankful that He brought us to this place and that He is always with us no matter what!!! 

DTS Outreach to Costa Rica Update

We have successfully finished up our 3^rd week of outreach!! Our second week was filled with working with some different ministries of the San Jose base. We spent most of our mornings digging trenches at a church that needed a new drainage system. It was pretty tiring but turned out nicely and will hopefully help keep the church from flooding! In the afternoons we worked with Metro Ministry which is the base’s kid’s ministry. This ministry goes into different neighborhoods and has Bible lessons, different clubs, and activities for the kids there. It was a great opportunity to go into these neighborhoods and get to see what life looked like for these kids and their families. We also got to do some home visits in these neighborhoods. Last weekend was the national Bible distribution weekend for Costa Rica so we spent 3 days going house to house, passing out Bibles, and praying for people. One of the houses we visited had a guy working outside of it who asked us if we needed anything. We told him what we were doing and he promptly informed us that he needed a Bible. We got to talk with him, encourage him, and pray for him as well as pointing out some good spots in the Bible for him to start reading. Another house that we visited had a little girl who really wanted her own Bible. We unfortunately couldn’t give her one because it was one Bible per household. Thankfully though another group had some houses who didn’t want a Bible and so we got to give her one. It was such a blessing to be able to give the Bible to someone who wanted it so much! On Wednesday of this week we went Patarrá, a community on the outskirts of San Jose. While there we worked with a feeding center that was doing a lot of construction work in order to make the center more self-sustaining, with a greenhouse, gardens, ect. So we got to do a lot more digging, moving rocks, and all that jazz! There was also opportunity to eat with the kids who were part of the program and play with them which was lots of fun. Unfortunately, our time there was cut short due to a large majority of our team getting sick from the water so now we are back at the San Jose base, trying to recover. We are all doing better but continued prayers for health would be greatly appreciated! We had a travel day all day yesterday (Monday) and after about 14 hours of travel we made it safely to the YWAM base in Chiriqui. God is good…it’s so awesome to know that He is using what we’ve been doing even if we can’t see it. He is so much bigger, better, and more wonderful than anything we could ask or imagine!