Thursday, April 19, 2012

So Little Time, So Much to Do

"The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few." Matthew 9:37

Today I was able to sleep in until 8:45.  It was such a blessing.  God knew I would need the extra sleep for the busy day He had planned.  Lindsey was going to our friend Babe's house to plan for her women's group that will start on Sunday and I was planning on meeting her there at 10:00 to go to Isla Bonita with them.  I wanted to do a few home visits while we were at Isla Bonita.  During my prayer time this morning two ladies were on my heart, so I decided that those were the ladies I would visit.  I packed two dispensas (sacks of food) in my backpack and walked to Babe's house.

Once we were all together we walked to Isla Bonita. (I am loving all of the exercise I get here by walking places.  It is nice sometimes to not have a car!)  As we got closer to Ilsa Bonita, I ran into a guy that I met at a meeting I attended a few weeks ago.  His name is JoeMar and he was a seminary.  We talked for a little while and then invited him to our bible study.  (We have a bible study every Thursday evening at 5 at our place.)  He said he could come.  I think it was a "Divine Appointment" that God set up.  Anyways, we continued to Isla Bonita.

As we arrived so did my friend Annalee.  She was the first lady I wanted to visit, so she invited me into her home.  She has 6 children, with her youngest being two year old twin girls.  We visited for a short while, shared about life, read the bible and talked about God, and prayed together.  This is my favorite ministry, just being able to sit down with people one-on-one, and form relationships.  I left her with a dispensa and walked over to my friend Geraldine's house.  Geraldine also invited me into her home and we visited just like Annalee and I visited.  I am so thankful that these ladies just open their lives to me and all of the missionaries.

From the last few weeks of visiting Isla Bonita and getting to know the people there more and more, we are seeing exactly what the needs are.  Many of our friends don't have running water, electricity, and are have hard times in their marriages.  The ministries we currently have there are home visits a few times a week, ALS (Alternative Learning System) classes on Saturday mornings (ALS is a program for people to get their GED), Catechism classes/bible stories for kids on Saturday afternoons, and a women's bible study/prayer meeting on Sunday afternoons.  I feel that God is calling us to do more and more with the beautiful people here and I am so happy that He has let us to this place.

Okay, back to today.  After our time at Isla Bonita (actually Lindsey and Babes left before me), I walked home to relax for a little while.  The sun was really strong and I was tired from all the walking so I was looking forward to sitting down and resting for a moment.  I was home for about 30 minutes when Lindsey said she needed to go to town.  I decided to go with her because I had many errands to run.  We were on a mission to find a place to print out the materials we needed for the bible study we had tonight because it was a brown out (sometimes they come at the most inconvenient times!) We finally found a place, printed the worksheets out, and looked for a place to buy snacks.  We found snacks and hurried home to get ready for the bible study.

Sammy led the study tonight and shared on Luke 9:18-26 where Jesus asks, "Who do you say that I am?" vs 20.  JoeMar came as well as six others.  The discussion was very deep and people really opened up and shared.  I feel as though God is doing big things in the hearts and lives of those who are coming.  Several of our friends that attended stayed around for hours just talking a hanging out.  We actually invited many of them for dinner.  We had nine plates around the table and had to eat in shifts because we don't have that many chairs!  It was so good to have friends over, sharing the word of God, and just really visiting and getting to know one another better.  At around 9:30 we said good bye to our last visitors and ended the night with community night prayer.

When I was in training in Louisiana a year and a half ago, Mr. Frank said he would pray that he and Mrs. Genie would fall into bed at night exhausted from working for God's kingdom.  I can proudly say that tonight, I am falling in bed exhausted from working hard for God's kingdom today!  It is such a marvelous feeling knowing that I gave everything I had to give today for God and didn't hold back at all.  I pray that I can surrender my life each day in the same way and fall in bed each night exhausted from working for God.

Randomness for the day:
Lindsey bought Anders (really Sammy) Lord of the Rings toys from a store here.  One of the figures is fire that holds the ring.  Sammy builds a wall with suitcases in our living room each day to keep Anders from going by the stairs.  I tripped over the suitcases and my foot landed on the fire.  It shattered, and I mean shattered!  I didn't think it was possible for a plastic figurine to shatter that way.  Only me and my clumsiness!


Hope you've enjoyed my day!  God Bless!!


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