Finally - Miami

Acts 16: 4-10

“Now while they were passing through the cities, they were delivering the decrees which had been decided upon by the apostles and elders who were in Jerusalem, for them to observe. So the churches were being strengthened in the faith, and were in increasing in number daily. They passed through the Phrygian and Galatian region , having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak The Word in Asia; and after they came to Mysia, they were trying to go to Bithymia, and the Spirit of Jesus did not permit them; and passing by Mysia, they came down Troas. A vision appeared to Paul in the night: a man of Macedonia was standing and appealing to him, and saying, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.” When he had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go to Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the Gospel to them.”

Despite all of our efforts to make our way to Santa Cruz, Bolivia, God made it clear to us that He had other plans. After twenty hours in the Lima airport, when American Airlines and Lan Airlines convinced us that they were unable to give us a flight to Bolivia for the upcoming week, American Airlines flew us back to Miami. The whole team was disappointed that we were so close to Bolivia and yet couldn’t quite get there. In two separate groups, we tiredly boarded our planes and made our way back to the States. Needless to say, there was a lot of sleeping going on in our hotel after we arrived!

We used Monday as our day of rest to recover from the last 55 hours spent in either airplanes or airports. After a good nights sleep, we traveled to the Everglades where we took an airboat through the swamps and marshes of Miami to see hundreds of alligators and crocodiles! We ate lunch at IHOP (an international restaurant!) and went back to our hotel for more rest. We finished the day off in a cool theater watching a movie and fellowshipping together.

During this time, God confirmed His calling for us to serve in Miami. Throughout the day, six to seven organizations contacted Michael asking for our help in various ways. Our need to be in Miami was evident and clear.

On Tuesday we began our work here in Miami with an organization called South Hope Miami. This organization works with homeless families in South Florida to give them a place to live, food to eat, and employment. We spent the day working in their food pantry organizing the great amount of food that was donated to them in their last food drive. The temperature in the mini-warehouse where we were working was around 100 degrees, so we were soaked from head to foot with sweat. We were carrying heavy boxes filled with canned goods to sort and load on trucks. To stay on a positive note, the team had made a pact early on in the trip to replace the word “nice” with the word “hot”. So you often heard exhausted and sweaty youth muttering the phrase, “Man, it is so “nice” in here!”

It was amazing to see all the kids bring their special gifts, personalities, and abilities to this task. We had Ashley and Ellie Cate’s organizational skills to help sort the food. Sammy and Brent acted as our muscle men, carrying the heavy boxes to Paige who loved operating the lift to the back of the truck. Andrew was very quick at unloading boxes, while Isaac and Davis made good runners. Apparently the shelter doesn’t want bugs mixed in with the food, so Mary Gillan was our bug spotter and did a great job eradicating the creepy crawlies.

After a day’s work, we went back to the hotel where we took super-long showers and ate dinner. We then headed downtown to experience Miami nightlife! We walked through a park and enjoyed the waterfront glowing from the reflective city lights. On our way back to the car, a homeless man who was asking for money approached us. After offering to bring him food (which he turned down), we were touched when a couple of our students laid a hand on his shoulder and offered to pray for him.

We are currently on Day 2 of working with South Hope Miami. We are volunteering in the center’s preschool and helping with the children. Watching our students love on these children is heart-melting.

Our kids have such a heart for God and a powerful desire to share HIS love with everyone they meet! We love our team and have enjoyed watching our students persevere in their positive attitudes despite the many setbacks.

We just got the text that Jimmy (after multiple Bolivian flight cancelations) has arrived at the Miami airport to join us. Hooorrraaay!!!!!!!

From our students:

Mary Gillan – I’m having fun playing with the kids and just having fun working for God.

Davis – It has been a lot of fun. It is cool watching God take control of the trip.

Brent – It is cool how a change of direction can still be cool.

Andrew – It is really hot and I’m glad we are in the air-conditioning today.

Ellie Cate – I’m glad to be in Miami and not in an airport. It seems like God has wanted us here instead of Bolivia and we have had awesome opportunities here.

Isaac – Blessed.

Sammy – We are where God wanted us to be and we are just working to glorify Him through everything we do.

Paige – Even though we did not make it to Bolivia God is definitely working through all of us. It is awesome to see the difference we are making by helping out.

Ashley - It has been a journey in itself and I’ve realized what God has wanted us to do from the beginning.

Team 1 Adventures: in Pictures

Below are links to several photo albums from Team 1's trip to Bolivia. These are Facebook albums, however these links are public so you don't have to have an account to view. Enjoy!


https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150719247805697.705307.879405696&l=70775bd91d


https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150719198175697.705287.879405696&l=8b57f5363e


https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150719338070697.705337.879405696&l=04f825b634


https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150719415780697.705365.879405696&l=d3f4c84007

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150720257665697.705665.879405696&l=b8ccfd14a3

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150720054930697.705604.879405696&l=cdd1f5dd1f

Days 1 & 2

This team is such a group of troopers. We started this trip with the ultimate goal of glorifying God, and we thought this would be done in Bolivia. However, getting to Bolivia has turned into an obstacle and we are realizing that this trip is about glorifying God wherever He has us at the moment. I am so proud of the kids on this team, because they are doing a beautiful job of glorifying God during this rollercoaster of excitement and disappointment.

As many of you know, after driving the team to Charlotte on Wednesday, American Airlines canceled our flight due to bad weather. We drove home to Highlands that night and came back to Charlotte the following night in preparation for flying out Friday morning…on a new flight itinerary that was going to send us on four planes over a 27 hour time span to reach Bolivia. Despite all the confusion American Airlines had with our return to the airport, we eventually made it on two of our flights and landed in Miami. After a day of flying, our next leg was a flight to Lima, Peru. Just before midnight, when the plane to Lima was boarding, we were asked to wait in the terminal because Lan (our new airline) realized there were only five seats available on the next leg (Lima to Santa Cruz) and they were not sure if they were going to send us to Lima if we could not finish out the rest of our itinerary. As Amber, Michael and I talked this over with the ticket agent, we looked over at our students, who had all of their heads bowed together, praying to God for this trip to continue. Minutes later Lan said we could fly to Lima, and that is where we currently are.

Lan will not promise us the five remaining seats on the plane to Santa Cruz. Instead, they have put all 12 of us on standby for they do not want to separate the group. Hopefully we will know by lunchtime whether they will have seats available for us. Until then, we are resting in the terminal during this seven hour layover, awaiting news. The students continue to be hopeful, and we could not ask for a more flexible and positive team.

A few words from our teammates:

Ashley - zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Mary Gillan – I’m ready to be in Bolivia.

Ellie Cate – This has been an adventure in itself.

Paige – It has been crazy but it has been fun and we have connected as a group.

Andrew – It is an adventure and it is all going to work out the way it is supposed to.

Sammy – Yeah. What Andrew said. We are almost there.

Brent – He has a plan. And we just gotta stick with this until the end. Hope for the best and know that we serve a big God.

Davis – I’m ready to be in Bolivia.

Isaac – Tired.

Shining Like the Sun

“Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD rises upon you. See, darkness covers the earth and thick darkness is over the peoples, but the LORD rises upon you and his glory appears over you. Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn" (Isaiah 60:1-3) 

I don't believe there's a more fitting scripture to describe this team. You know the expression "go big or go home?" That describes this team perfectly. When it's time to work, they work tirelessly and fight the breaks we require they take. When it's time to love on the kids here, they are running around the soccer field 100 miles an hour and hugging the life out of them. And when it's time to play, they do it with all their might. And they do it all in the name of Jesus, and shine His light in every single bit of it.

Yesterday was a fun break from physical labor for us. It started at church with Larry, Patty and Patty's family. David and Jenny bravely shared their testimonies, Greg gave the sermon, and then the team performed their human video. They all seemed to be so blessed by it, and we were blessed to be able to minister in that capacity.

After church we hit the open market to do some souvenir shopping, and you all have some wonderful gifts coming your way! We also had lunch, and although we would obviously eat lunch...I mention it because, based on Larry's recommendation of how delicious it is...many of your kids ordered the cow tongue as their entree! I'll let them share what that experience was like. Suffice it to say, yours truly couldn't even look at it, let alone try it. It looked udderly revolting. You could see taste buds for goodness sake!

Later that night, we went to the Reintegration House to visit the boys who have graduated from El Camino (boys home) and are now in university. It also happened to be the birthday of the house dad, so we had another fun celebration. There were card games, Ninja and so much dancing! Some of the boys at the home thought it would be funny to start a cake fight, and by the end of the night, every single one of us were covered in frosting.

CAKE FIGHT!

Today was a really special day for us -- we took Jesus to the streets and spent time with kids there. The bus dropped us off at the sewer/canal where one group of kids that Operation Restoration has been working with live. Without hesitation, we all climbed down and into the tunnel. Most of the kids were sleeping at first, but woke up soon after we got there.

A few of us spent time talking and praying with a sweet girl who just came to the streets a year ago. Another group started a soccer match with some of the boys. And another group ministered to a precious girl who had four kids and was five months pregnant. She shared that her other children were in different homes, and that she wanted to put up this baby for adoption, but felt like she was a bad mother for doing so. One of our teammates instantly jumped in and shared their testimony, and the girl just cried and cried. It was a wonderful time of ministry that encouraged her greatly, and through a simple willingness to share, the light of Jesus was revealed to that girl.

Greg and Larry ran to get breakfast for the kids, and as they ate David shared his testimony. It was amazing to see them gather around him and just be fixated on what he had to say. They all were sitting on the ground...some on cardboard, some just on the concrete...but in the middle of sharing, one of them pulled up a bucket for David to sit on so he didn't have to sit on the dirty ground. They asked him some really amazing questions, and he was so courageous to be honest and open. The Lord was with David, and His glory shown in that dark and dank tunnel.

After that canals, we went to another group of kids in a different section of town. This was a new place we had not visited last year. Most of them were sniffing glue, very high on drugs, and a few of them were physically pretty beat up. There was a group of girls who were all pregnant, the youngest of them was just 15 years old. As if seeing "beds" in the sewers wasn't already, this was a very sobering realization of what life is like for these precious children of God. It's rough, and it's hard. They are dirty, drugged and despondent...yet God loves them the same as He loves us in Highlands and Cashiers. He looks at the inside, not the outside.

We spent the rest of the afternoon and evening at El Camino, the boy's home. After witnessing all we did on the streets this morning, it was so difficult to imagine their bright, shining faces living like the ones we saw earlier. The distant eyes and distorted walks of the kids on the streets, compared to the bright, shining and joyful boys who've made the choice to leave that life couldn't be more polar opposite. It's simply miraculous what God can do with one person who chooses to walk in the light and turn from the darkness.

More playing hard -- soccer, basketball and then (sniff, sniff) saying goodbye. It was a heartfelt and emotional time leaving. Many of them and many of us got up to say a few words about how much our time has meant to each other.

ALLEJANDRO & ARTURO DOING "UNO MAS" JUMPING SILHOUETTE PHOTO

FINAL GOODBYES AT EL CAMINO

So many of the boys gave some of our team members small gifts to remember them by -- pictures they drew, photos of themselves, friendship bracelets. One boy even gave Greg his soccer uniform. It was absolutely priceless to see them giving away what little they had out of such a joyful heart, purely to be a blessing.

Tomorrow (well, today now!) we'll spend the morning finishing our work at the girl's home, and then the rest of the day and night we'll hang out with the girls -- taking them out to dinner and some other activitity. This is going to be the hardest, I think, for all of us. We've spent so much time connecting to the girls, that leaving will be heartbreaking.

Pray for us that we'll accomplish all the work we set our hands to, and that our time with the girls is full of joy, laughter and muchas, muchas amor.

Our Jericho

"By faith the walls of Jericho fell, after the army had marched around them for seven days." 

- Hebrews 11:30

The walls fell down today.

We all have been marching faithfully around our Jericho. The days leading up to leaving Highlands was a march. The journey to Santa Cruz was a march. The tensions, relationships and challenges we came to Bolivia with were a march. And finally today, the walls fell, and we took the city.

It seems so fitting that today was the third day of our work at the girl's home. If you search the words "third day" on BibleGateway.com, you'll find multiple scriptures that indicate very spiritual events that happened on the third day. Most importantly, Christ rising from the tomb. And Jesus rose here today. He shot up out of the dark, encamped all around and shone His glory for all to see.

Physically it was a difficult morning -- progress was going very slowly on the removal of the tree stumps. We were working with more primitive means - shovels, pick axes, regular axes, saws and rope. And since our first day was so incredibly productive, it felt defeating to have the stumps slow us down. And that defeat, coupled with exhaustion made for a frustrated group the first half of the day. And it seemed like the enemy was doing all he could to take advantage of it.

STUMP'S ANGELS

But we know a few things -- first that God had gone before us to Bolivia. Second that we had all prayed specifically for this trip. And third that we have friends, family and supporters that are praying for us each day while we're here.

We had a quick team meeting to vent a few frustrations, and then broke for lunch. And suddenly, after lunch, everything shifted. Individually, Mary and David had the opportunity to share their testimonies with the girls. With both of them, there were girls crying as they heard their stories, and different girls asked to pray over each of them. Their walls came down. To see these girls -- the ones that themselves are experiencing hardship we'll never know -- give of themselves to pray earnestly for Mary and David was just so weighty. I don't know another word to describe it. It just spiritually carries so much weight. I know both Mary and David sensed that and that it touched them in an indescribable way.

LYDIA & VICKI PRAYING OVER DAVID AFTER HE SHARED HIS TESTIMONY

We all saw a different characteristic of Christ today. For some it was in the kiss from one of the girl's on the cheek. For others it was the walls coming down from a girl's heart and allowing us to love on her. For yet others it was the release of bondage and the peace that descended from heaven as they faced fear and kicked it in the tail. It was a spiritually important day for everyone. Relationship happened today.

FRANCO, VICKI AND LYDIA PLAYING WITH US

Physically we ended up removing both MAMMOTH tree stumps (think sequoias) and got a lot of the trenches dug. That, in and of itself, would have satisfied us for today. But more important than the satisfaction of the labor of our hands, we saw the fruit of our marches. It may have felt at times like we've been walking in circles, not understanding why God would have us remain silent and then blow our trumpets and shout. But as the trumpets sounded and the shouts rang out, the walls fell. And that's when He showed up and showed off.

JENNY & ABIGIRL GOING TETANUS ON SOME TRENCH!

We are thrilled to say we have one more day to spend with the girls, and will go on Tuesday to finish our work and then spend time playing and having fun with them. We all couldn't say goodbye tonight -- we wanted to stay and they wanted us to stay as well. So much so they talked us into body surfing.

ALL HANDS ON DECK FOR JIMMY'S BODY SURF

We cannot wait until Tuesday to finish being Jesus' hands and feet to them one last time. He wouldn't have it any udder way.

Pooped.

I'm sure I can speak for everyone when I say we're udderly exhausted.

We woke at the crack of dawn for breakfast and devotions, and then headed to Alfarero, the girl's home. It was an emotional arrival, at least for me, because as everyone got off the bus there were shrieks of joy, enormous bear hugs and genuine excitement for the team to see these girls again. One little girl ran up to Greg and just jumped up in his arms; Jenny and another girl just hugged and squealed with delight; David and the little boys picked up right where they left off and started playing and roughhousing immediately. The instant lump in my throat caught me by surprise, but reinforced to me that God's love is universal and timeless.

We brought huge bags full of items for the girls -- everything from shirts to bubbles to nail polish. They tore into the bags and wasted no time getting started. We painted nails, colored and played with sidewalk chalk.

Shortly after, we got to work. And by work, I mean the most tiring and backbreaking labor you can imagine. We removed and rolled barbed wire from the existing fence. We dug up every. single. post.  We cut down trees, cleared & burned shrubs and dug up stumps. We moved stacks and stacks of bricks, and did some brick smashing, too. It was exhausting, but equally exhilarating to see the result at the end of the day. Everyone stepped up and worked until they had blisters, callouses and scrapes. Personally, I'm thankful for the tetanus shot I received the month before.

 

The girls made us lunch that was absolutely fantastico! They labored long and hard over that meal, and it was incredible. Not only did it taste good, but it also gave us a chance to sit and spend some time with them. We also got to take periodic grapefruit and tangerine breaks, picking from the trees that grow on the property.

It was an incredibly productive day. Tomorrow we're back at it again early and will start digging the trench where the old fence was, and the goal is to have all the concrete poured the day after that. Also, it's Larry's birthday tomorrow (Friday) so we're looking forward to a birthday celebration.

This team is amazing, hard-working and fun. They have worked through hunger, fatigue, cuts, bruises, torn jeans, bandanas and bandages. All without a single word of complaint.

They are like no udder.

Bolivia!

(The original working title for this post was going to be, "This Post is Sponsored in Part by FOOD," but didn't want to sound too glutenous.)

We made it! After checking into the hotel around 1 am, we all went straight to bed. Our journey from Miami was smooth and incident-free.

We were able to get a good night's sleep, and then began our day with Larry & Patty. First we visited Patty's mom in the hospital; they were all involved in a car accident on Tuesday, and Patty's mom was kept for a couple nights in the nearby hospital. Nothing's broken, she's just in some pain, as are Larry & Patty. Please pray for their speedy healing! Patty's mom had a wonderful attitude though, and it was a joy to see her.

Next we went to lunch and ate the best steak of our lives. Seriously, Filet Mignon in the best steakhouses in Atlanta don't taste this good. Some of us tried the gator tails and a few others even had the cow udder (yes, you read that correctly, and no, the writer of this post did not).  (Out of courtesy, the writer of this post also abstained from writing bad puns about it tasting "udderly delicious." But she can't guarantee they weren't said at the table.)

After lunch we had the best part of the day -- a visit to the boy's home. It was such a fun afternoon with them! We laughed, danced, played and ate. Again. They greeted us with a traditional dance native to Santa Cruz, which was just precious. Here's a little clip:

Then we performed our human video for them, and the kids did a fantastic job yet again.

We were treated to homemade empanadas (which were divine) and spent the rest of the time playing basketball, soccer, Ninja and arm wrestling each other.

Everyone did an amazing job of jumping right in and spending time with these precious boys. Even if most of us didn't speak much of each other's language, it was a great time of laughter and fun just being together.

The sweetest part of the night was as sunset was upon us, and we all gathered together to hear some people share their testimonies. Jimmy & Mary from our team shared, and did a great job sharing how Jesus has changed their lives. When Mary was done, one precious boy who was probably around 11 or so walked over to her and just gave her a huge bear hug. It was so special.

After we gave more hugs goodbye than we could count, we headed back to town for dinner. And we proceeded to eat two entire pizzas that were ENORMOUS.

Tomorrow we wake up early to get started on three days of manual labor at the girls home. Please pray for strength, continued positive outlooks, and for divine encounters with each of the girls at the home. We can't wait to love on them.

It's going to be udderly amazing! (Pun TOTALLY intended.)