The process leading up to our new
church plant in the town of Tirrases has been quite the journey! Jairo, our
pastor at the church, had a rough past growing up. He was the town drug
dealer/gangster, but God saved him from that mess. Later on, he went to a Bible
Institute where his love for the Lord and the Bible continued to grow. One day
he was back visiting family in Tirrases and got on the bus ready to leave, but
just before sitting down he felt the Holy Spirit telling him to share the
gospel with 5 kids on a basketball court who were playing soccer (anywhere
that’s flat you’ll see people gathered playing soccer down here).
Fast forward 3 ½ years, now God
has lead us to having our first church service and things are going great! Seeing
where God has taken our ministry from those 5 kids playing soccer, to now
having 40 kids in the morning, 25 soccer boys, and around 25 teenagers coming
out each week has been incredible.
For me, a normal week in Tirrases
looks like this: I leave my house at 8:00 in the morning, and it takes about a
half hour to get there. Once we arrive there, we walk to different houses to
pick up the kids and take them to the church building where we hold the kids
club. When we get to the building, we have different games, crafts, snacks, which
all related to the Bible lesson for the day. After we drop the kids back off at
their houses around 11:00, we take a small lunch break and some of the kids that
live close to the church hang around with us. At 2:00 in the afternoon is when
our youth group starts (jovenes). Since returning from camp, it has been
awesome to see the consistency of the jovenes group, and the number of
teenagers that have been attending. For me, it is been really great having that
time to deepen my friendship with some of them. Our new church plant has
brought a lot more work our way, but it has been great seeing how all of the
pieces have come together. I never thought that I would ever be a deacon in a
Spanish church in Costa Rica. It was not even close to being on my radar, but
that goes to show that our plans don’t always work out the way that we have
planned.
Prayer requests:
- · Our new church, Iglesia Emanuel Tirrases.
- · For this summer with it being my first full summer leading teams of gringos, translating, and being the mediator between the two different cultures.
- · Pray for our GAP students as their time is winding down here in Costa Rica, and that God will continue to use them in the USA.
The street where the majority of our kids live
A look down on the city of Tirrases
Some of the kids that come out to our ministry
Our first church service at Iglesia Emanuel in Tirrases
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