Painting God’s Kingdom

Today was long, and exhausting, but amazing on so many levels. Our day started with breakfast at 7am followed by a devotion and singing before climbing in the van and heading out to La Ceibita. When we arrived in La Ceibita we worked on preparing the bags for the home visits. Working together we got it done in no time and then started preparing the outside of the church for paint. There was some scraping and cleaning that needed to happen. Two of us from the team headed into town to pick up the paint with Pastor and Lorena. We did not know until we got there that they wanted us to pick out the paint color. So Alyssa and I spent some time debating and both of us knew we wanted it to be colorful and bright. Paint colors that you just simply don’t see on buildings in the US.

Once we settled on a color, we began negotiating with the sales person to bring the price down for us a bit since it was higher than we had budgeted. He was helpful and willing to work with us and ended up bringing the price down and throwing in some free rollers etc. While the paint was being mixed, we had the chance to chat with some of the people working in the store. They were in interested in what we were doing and what we were going to paint. Pastor Orlin explained where we were from the history of the church etc. It was a great time just chatting and sharing information and I asked them if they went to a church. They replied that they did not, but they seemed interested in finding out more about the church in La Ceibita. So I invited them to our Thursday service and they exchanged numbers with Pastor Orlin.

Later on we talked about the opportunities that God presents to us during our day that we don’t expect. We went to the store to buy paint, and left having planted and unintentional seed for leading someone to faith. God is good and works in mysterious ways for sure!!

We drove back to the church and distributed brushes and rollers and the team got to work painting. It was slightly surprising how much we got done and the team worked really well together. It was such a blessing to see everyone taking time away from painting to interact and chat with community members instead of just being focused on the paint job. There was lots of laughter and giggling as one of the girls thought it would be funny to tickle us all.

I got some time visiting with my little girl Valery and also got some time playing with her new baby sister Sadie.

Once we were done for the day with painting, the team cleaned up the brushes etc and we spent the rest of the afternoon visiting folks in their homes in the community. It was hot, and several people were really feeling the heat as we walked from house to house. But, they handled it well. It’s always a little hard to visit some of these families due to the needs that they have. We are so blessed and simply don’t realize the many blessings we have. One of the houses we walked to was at the top of a steep rocky hill that was hard to climb. Struggling for air in heat and working hard to reach the top, we soon forgot about the work it was to get up there after we spend time with a women named Maria. She was blind and explained that walking up that hill is very difficult for her that sometimes she feels like crying. Most of the time, her adult daughter carries her on her back.

After our home visits, we dropped off some of the church members back at the church and then headed back to the hotel. After some time cooling down with a quick snack, we got the call that we were being invited to Zumba at Lorenas friends house. So off we went, still in our paint clothes and sweat from the day and the majority of the team had a blast doing Zumba with Lorena and her friend. Lots of great team building and laughter tonight.

Back to the hotel, dinner time and devotion time. Lots of sharing of highlights of the day and low times. The team is exhausted but content with how are day went. Hoping everyone gets a great nights sleep so we can get back at it again tomorrow.

Blessings,

Shelley