Approved!

Thank you for praying. Our visas were approved. It was such a whirlwind. Jared and I went to the capitol  last week to request some paperwork needed for the visas. We expected to have to come back the following week to pick up the paperwork and begin to submit our renewal request. Instead, the documents were ready in about an hour, so then we headed over to the Migration office to ask for them to review our paperwork to make sure we had everything in order before we submit it. Instead, they started processing it right before our eyes. Two hours later, we walked out of the Migration office with our new residency cards in hand. We are still a bit in shock. Last year it took months to process and many trips to the capitol. God is good. It is a great reminder that the Lord has called us here and we can rest that He will take care of all of the details, small and great, to keep us in the center of His will. 

Children Full of the Love of Christ, the name of Wilkyns Chal's school in Batey Central

The first of the two eyeglass clinic teams from Calvary Chapel of Fredericksburg, VA came at the beginning of this month. They were a huge blessing. They provided four days of eyeglass clinics to Batey Central. Our friend, Wilkyns Chal, opened up his school and church building to us. The team examined over 500 individuals in Wilkyns' community. There were some pretty amazing moments. There was one woman, probably in her 50's or 60's who had problems with her vision for many, many years and never had a pair of lenses. Kim Nolasco from the team brought her a pair of lenses which matched the woman's prescription. She put them on and immediately began to cry and thank the Lord that she can now see clearly. It truly was a work of God that we had matching prescriptions for the hundreds of people who needed them in the boxes of pre-made lenses that the team brought with them. 

Kim Nolasco of CC Fredericksburg with the sweet woman with her new glasses.

       

This team also put on a children's program in Batey Central. They did dramas, puppets, stories and activities with the kids. The kids loved it!

Wilkyns is the man in the window with the red Philly's hat and the huge smile.

Many of these kids are Wilkyn's students and church attenders.

This team also blessed our church, Capilla del Calvario de Barahona, with dramas and children's programs at our regular weekly services on Sunday and Thursday. We have a young boy named Abel who attends our church. He is deaf. He isn't able to understand much of our services, but we try our best to communicate the love of Jesus with him.  Kim, from CC Fredericksburg, knows sign language. So, Sunday and Thursday Kim translated the Bible stories for Abel. For the first time, he was able to understand the whole service! He was so blessed by it and so were we. 

Carlos and Samuel, two of our youth group boys. 

Thursday afternoon children's program in English, Spanish and Sign language! Abel is the boy in the maroon shirt and white tennis shoes.