Drawing to a Close

Today is our last full day of work. Tomorrow we will go the beach and to the market, and then Saturday we will return home. We all can not believe thatthe trip has gone this fast, but we are all looking forward to getting home and seeing all of you.

Bill thanks for the update on the Reds. Hopefully they pullout another one against the Braves today.

Thanks for all of the comments as well. I will pass them along. We have loved hearing from all of you. Everybody loves it when I come back from updating the blog, because they know there will be news from home. Let me try to take a few minutes to update how things have gone since I last touched base.

I think a good way to some up the past few days would be to talk about a couple other missionaries you might be familiar with. Hudson Taylor, served in China, and David Livingston, served in Africa, both spent a great deal of their lives in the mission field. Giving all they had to growing the Kingdom of God. They endured much and had more than their share of trials, but in the end of their lives both of them said, that they had never had to sacrifice. What they meant was that there was never a time in which they felt like they were truly sacrificing something to follow God. In essence, serving God no matter what the circumstance was altogether more valuable than anything else they could possibly do.

Our group has truly sacrificed a lot of comforts, and energy. They have also worked incredible hard inspite of being tired or worn down. However I bet if you asked any of our group if they felt like they made a huge sacrfice to go on this trip and "suffer" for Gods Kingdom they would say that it wasnt a sacrifice and that they would do it all over again without hesitation.

The VBSs have gone great and we hope parksides has gone well too. Yesterday we were at a place call Macoris. Some of the church workers told us how dangerous the neighborhood was at night. It was so sad to listen to them tell us how many of the kids in the room no longer had fathers because of neighborhood violence. It was our privilege to love on those kids and show them their Father God loves them as well. Ethan led the game time and Hannah E. helped. They did a great job with the spanish as well. Everyone got involved in just sitting next to students and doing the activities with them.

The house at camp is coming along as well. We have the roof framing up and it will likely get roofed today. Hopefully we will also be laying the concrete floors and finishing putting stucco on the walls. Its been neat and rewarding for the students to see the house come together.

We appreciate all of your prayers. Hope we can not wait to tell you all the cool God stories that are happening down here. We see God in all the things we do and all the places. Everybodies prayers have surrounded us in incredible ways. Please keep praying that we all have patience. This is the time of the trip where everyone is worn down and small things can quickly become big things. Pray that in all things we do not forget our purpose in being here. We are here to reveal Gods glory and grow His Kingdom. Pray for continued safety and also praise God for the many ways He has gone before us and kept us safe.

Let me try to share a few quick little things before I go back to the camp...

Everybody who had stomache aches recovered a couple of days ago and are back up to full steam

The Dominicans have taken to calling Mike EL TIGRE. Which is a big sign of street cred and is a cool story too

Today we do our last VBS and it is at the camp we are expecting almost 200 kids

We might be playing capture the flag tonight to teach the Dominicans a new game.

Everyone is healthy, but definitely tired. The bugs havent been horrible just big spiders, and suprisingly no one has gotten sun burned too badly.


To wrap this up you all need to know just how tremendous of a job our adult leaders and students have done. I have been su impressed with their attitudes and just how consistently they have all brought their talents to the table. I can not wait for all of them to get the chance to tell you all the great things God has done on this trip, and what He has let us be a part of. You all should definitely be proud of this group you sent down to Salcedo and the Dominican to Reveal Gods glory.

Thanks for all the Prayers and Sorry I dont have more time to tell more stories.

Dios Te Bendiga
Mateo