Christmas Time in Barahona

December is a month full of activities in the ministry and church here, as I know it is in your churches as well. It is a great opportunity to reach out, to involve our church members in service to the community and to fellowship together as believers. 

As with every year, we have Christmas activities for the sponsor children and this year our youth group kids were able to participate in the activities and serve the children. They helped set up, helped prepare and serve the food, and they performed puppet shows and a drama. They were a huge help to our ministry team at ICC as it is a lot of work putting on activities for the 250+ children in the sponsorship program! 

At church we had a Christmas Day service. It was another opportunity for our youth to participate. We had all the adults and children together and had puppets, drama, Christmas choir and teaching from the Word. It was a nice time of fellowship for our church body. The videos of some of the songs sung by the choir are on our Facebook page. You can watch them here!

After Christmas, the youth group boys went on a 4 day retreat to a town in the middle of the country, Jarabacoa. They spent those days in Bible study and fellowship. It was a great time for them to strengthen their relationships with the Lord and with each other. They came back with stronger bonds. There were 10 guys in all who went. None of them had ever traveled to that part of the island and it was a blessing for all of them, including Jared.  

As I sit back and think about the activities we had and the things the Lord did in the month of December, I realize just how much the Lord is working in our youth. As we serve here day by day, many times we don't see the big picture, or any progress. But as I examine the month as a whole, I see the fruit the Lord has brought forth in our teenagers. They by no means are perfect and still have a lot of growing to do, but the Lord is showing Himself faithful to work in their hearts and their lives and they are not the same kids they were a year ago, or even 6 months ago. God loves these kids so much and is pouring into their lives week after week and day after day. 

Thank you for praying for us. Thank you for praying for our church, our community, our ministry, and our youth. The Lord is working. Please keep praying... 

God bless.







 

Little Girls in the Big City

Our youth group girls were given a great blessing at the end of February. They were sponsored by a church in the states to attend a Women's Conference in Santo Domingo. This was something they had never experienced before!

The 8 of us, 6 youth group girls, myself and my good friend Jessica, set out Thursday morning, February 26th for the big city of Santo Domingo. We attended the conference True Woman, put on by Nancy Leigh DeMoss. The first session, Thursday evening, was dedicated to teen girls. Dannah Gresh was the speaker. It had been arranged by the sponsoring church in the States for my girls to have a few minutes with Dannah Gresh before the conference started. So, we signed in, received our bracelets and a large tote full of books and treats and were then ushered off by the event coordinator, who was expecting us, to have our meeting with Dannah.

 

Much of Dannah's main message is purity. She was great with the girls, encouraging them to focus on the Lord and to make a commitment to Him to remain pure. Then, she said she had a gift for the girls. She gave each of them a Boyfriend Bear. It is a cute fluffy plush bear with a pocket in the back. She encouraged each of them to spend time in prayer and then to write out all of their desires for a Godly man and their commitment to remain pure as they wait for that man and then they hide it away in the pocket of the bear. Then every time they feel lonely they hug their plush friend, they are to remember that commitment to the Lord. My girls felt like princesses. Which they are. Princesses of the King.

The girls receiving their gift from Dannah.

 

Then! Dannah had a gift for me. I had been praying about a new book to study together with my girls and had looked into Dannah's book, "And the Bride Wore White" as they were going to have many resources available in Spanish at the conference. Well, Dannah turns to me after she gives the bears to the girls and tells me, Here are 8 copies of my book "And the Bride Wore White" in Spanish!! I was blown away! God always provides beyond what we expect.




So, the conference began. Dannah Gresh shared about sexual purity and modesty in our clothing. Nancy Leigh DeMoss taught about the life of Mary, the mother of Jesus. How we, like Mary, can bring the life of Christ to others. Mary Kassian taught us that we should be the same woman in private that we are in public. Damaris Carbaugh taught that a woman who loves the Lord, obeys Him. With each speaker, with each session, although each speaker had her own style and each session had its own message, the resounding topic that was reoccurring hour after hour day after day is Read the Bible, Be In The Word of God. Each speaker quoted and read many scriptures and the very last session we attended by Damaris was completed dedicated to the topic of Reading the Word of God.

 

It is so important. We can't expect to remain pure and modest, or bring the life of Christ to the lost, or be honest and sincere about who we are, and we certainly can't love and obey the Lord if we are not daily in His Word. As Christians, the Word of God is our sustenance, our fuel, our guide, our wisdom. We can't live a life that pleases God if we don't know what it is He wants from us and for us.


Rosa, Amanda, Adriana, Angelica



Amaly, Jessica, Julieta, Rosa

 
This was a new and amazing experience for these 6 girls. For the majority of them, it was the first time they stayed in a hotel. It was the first time our youth group had spent time together in an overnight trip. The quality time these girls had together has bonded their relationships into something powerful. The abundance of food made us all happy. But beyond the hotel and the food and the fun, the seeds of God's truth that were planted into their hearts and the abundant overflowing love that God demonstrated towards them, will stick with them for the rest of their lives.

These girls do not have easy lives. For many of them their family is a mess or their parents are not believers or they go without things we in the states call "Necessities", but you wouldn't know it looking at the joy in their faces. Jesus has redeemed them. Although their lives here on earth will probably never be easy, their future is secure and they walk in the joy and strength of the Lord.

 

Pure and undefiled religion

Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world. James 1:27

Orphans and widows are people who can't give you anything in return. Serving those who can't repay you is the heart behind this Scripture. Our Lord is teaching our church to serve, to love one another without expecting anything in return. Many people came to Jesus in Biblical times for the miracles and healings. We are learning that we should not come to Jesus for what we can receive, for the bread and fish. We should seek Him for Him, for who He is. For what He has already done. He saved us. He has freed us from sin, from death. "We love Him because He first loved us."

Our brothers and sisters are visiting each other when they are sick. The youth check on each other when someone hasn't been to youth group in a while or if they notice someone slipping away. A group of men from our church have started visiting a local drug and alcohol rehabilitation center and now are giving a weekly Bible study there.

Our core youth group in Discipleship class.

The second part of James 1:27 is very important: "Keep oneself unspotted from the world". If we want to grow as a church, if we want to be effective witnesses, if we want to shine as lights in this dark world, we MUST "lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us" and we MUST seek to be pure, holy, spotless.

This is our prayer for our church body. We trust that as we move forward as a church, as we draw closer to Jesus, He will be faithful to convict, to challenge, to change each one of us. It's not something Jared and I can do. It must be a work of the Holy Spirit. If we want to see a powerful and amazing work of God in our community, we must be close to the Source of Life, our Lord and Savior.

Our sanctuary ready to receive the Church.

We find great comfort in Isaiah 55:11and Hebrews 4:12.

So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; It shall not return to Me void, But it shall accomplish what I please, And it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.

For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

Johan teaching Sunday school.

As Jared continues to just simply teach God's Word, we can rest in the fact that God's Word is alive and powerful and it will accomplish His purpose.

Please continue to pray for our church body. Pray that the Word will take root in our hearts and that each one of us would be sold out for Jesus, holding nothing back, leaving behind every temptation to sin, serving Him with everything we have.

I know this post is very different from our usual updates, but this is what the Lord is doing in our church and is what He put on our hearts to share with you, the ones who participate with us in the ministry here by continuing to faithfully pray. Thank you! God bless!

Summer Growth

As we shared in our last blog post we were gearing up for a busy season of teams this summer. The last team left August 5. Now that we have had time to reflect on all the Lord did, we wanted to share with you as much about our summer as possible in our little blog.

The first team was the youth group of Calvary Chapel of Delta. The Lord put it on Pastor Doug's heart to include our youth group from Capilla del Calvario de Barahona as part of their mission team. So, our youth went on their first missions trip, right in their own neighborhood. It was amazing. Each American teenager was paired up with a Dominican teenager. They spent the week with their partner in discipleship classes, community work projects, cleaning the ministry house, preparing meals and evangelizing.

The work project was digging trenches for pipes to connect homes to our well to deliver water directly to the homes in the community. We connected 8 homes to the well. It was a joy for our kids to help their community. 

The discipleship course went over all the basic truths of the Bible: Creation, Sin, Jesus, Salvation. 

Evangelism was the activity that stretched our kids the most. They did not have much experience and were nervous. But by the end of the week, they were looking forward to it. It really grows your faith when you stand before a stranger and have to put into words why you believe in Jesus and what He has done for you. 

It was great for our kids to spend time with the American teens. They were interested to know our kids and everyone became quick friends. The whole week forced our kids to step out of their comfort zones, to push themselves, to rely on the Lord and to do things they had never done before. They worked hard, they played hard and served Jesus together. 

Here is a short video of the week put together by one of the team members from CC Delta, Ben Otte.

 

The following week came the youth of Calvary Chapel Central Bucks. They are a large group of almost 40 people. We did work projects in the community. They put in several floors and bathrooms in various homes on the mountain. 

They also held a two day purity conference for all the teenagers of the sponsorship program and of our church. That is something that is so desperately needed. The kids need to hear God's heart for sex and purity and marriage. The culture here, much like in the States, has it all wrong. It was a powerful two days. There were at least 30 young ladies and 30 young men in attendance both days. Please pray that the truth that was shared those two days will take root in their hearts and their lives and that each of those teens will make the decision to remain pure and to glorify Jesus with their lives and their bodies.

Our youth drama group teamed up with the drama group from CC Central Bucks and performed together at a community outreach in the village Don Bosco. A large number of kids from the community came out and the two youth groups presented dramas, puppets, Bible stories and music.  

CC Central Bucks also offered an evangelism workshop to our youth group kids. They brought some evangelism tools with them and helped the kids mark some key verses in their Bibles to make it easier to locate when sharing with someone. Our youth appreciated the workshop and were able to use the things they learned when the third group arrived, Calvary Chapel York

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CC York focused a lot on evangelism. Our youth were invited each day to go out with the team and share in the community. Many people received the Lord. Many people heard the truth. Many seeds were planted. It was exciting to see our youth kids show up each day to go share the truth in their community. These are their neighbors, their friends, their family.

As we look back over the month, its amazing to see how the Lord wove everything together. He put a specific purpose on the hearts of each team from the US and it all fit together. The Lord used this summer to stretch, strengthen, challenge and change the teens of our church. We pray that as they prepare to return to school this week that they will hold fast to the things the Lord has spoken to their hearts this summer. We pray they remain strong in their faith, that they take a stand for Jesus in their schools and among their unbelieving friends and family.

We are so thankful for each team that came this summer. Thank you for your hard work, your planning, your sacrifice, your heart for the ministry and the people. Thank you for serving Jesus and our community. Thank you for loving our teens and for encouraging them, discipling them, teaching them, motivating them. Please continue to pray for them. The battle is real for their lives. Their souls are secure in Jesus, but Satan is still trying to ruin their lives. He knows the mighty work God can do through them to change this entire community. He wants to stop it, but Jesus is stronger. 

Thank you Ben Otte, Jeremy Damiano and Chrissie Hastoglis for allowing us to use your pictures! We appreciate it!