Day 2 - Monday

Dominican Time

This morning we awoke and had breakfast and coffee out on the veranda of our casa. Rough life right? We soon heard scooters arriving at the casa for our children’s conference we were holding. However, the attenders of our conference didn’t get the addendum to the schedule change (just something you get used to here). We left the children group here at the casa while we went and toured the clinic and COTN office that is located close by. We met all the staff members, and saw some old faces as well as some new ones. One of the introductions was of a young woman who works in the office. She was a sponsored child in Algodon when she was young. But through COTN partnership and sponsorship from her sponsors, like you and me, she was able to graduate from the university and is now giving back to her community. A true COTN full circle story!

We then toured the clinic. You can see in pictures that while it may look like a seemingly sketchy dental office, that you would absolutely stay away from if you were in California, it is actually quite a nice facility. The shelves are stocked with many supplies, their operating rooms were large, the technology they had access to was pleasantly surprising, and the room they keep patients in had painted walls with familiar characters like Winnie the Pooh and Mickey Mouse.

We then headed back to the casa so we could lead the children’s conference (an hour and half late not to mention). Noma, Netters, and Phyllis led a large group of children’s directors and volunteers in a session on Children’s Ministry. Their goal was to give the leaders tools to make Sunday children’s ministry the best hour of a child’s week. They went over some practical tools and systems in an effort to help them implement that goal. Phyllis exampled how easily crafts can be made with only construction paper, crayons, glue and scissors. One attendee pointed out that construction paper is not a tool used in the Dominican Republic. They barely even knew what it was. The team was so caught off guard by that. How can they not know what something as simple as construction paper is? If you look at any teacher’s classroom in the states you’ll see a Himalayan Mountain sized stack of the stuff. I guess it’s just one of those convenience things that we take for granted. In the second half of the day Deron, Jim, and Netters led a group of Pastors in a conference about effective church planning. Deron shared many of the core values and systems that the Gathering has based our church model on. Our group provided many translated printed materials for the leaders to refer to later down the road in their ministries.

Roll out the Welcome Mat

The response from both conferences was more than welcomed and appreciated from the attendees. We were concerned when we were asked to do this, for the COTN staff, that we would be perceived as the know it all American’s who have come to inappropriately and unnecessarily change local lifestyle. However, the feedback our team received was cherished. Our apprehensiveness about potential perception was completely unnecessary because they ate it up! Many of the attendees asked for extras of the supplies we gave out. They asked great questions and had a genuine attentiveness in what we had to offer. Thank you for praying for the success of these conferences! While the conferences were going on the rest of the group was in Algodon. We piled into our previously familiar COTN school bus. Our bus driver honked the horn in rapid succession to let all of Algodon know we were there. What came next was so unanticipated; an out roar of excited cheering and screaming from our Algodon kiddos! Kids immediately flooded to us. The welcoming into their community was far different from what those of us remember from last time. Two years ago when we came, the Algodon children were very timid about our interaction, even more so with adults. It took a few days before they were open hearted to us. Today, for those of us second timers, it has felt like no time has passed. A few of the kids even recognized us from our previous trip. It was incredibly rewarding to know that the relationships we established haven’t been forgotten. It helps validate that we are doing effective work with our kids as well as with the COTN staff. While we were there our intention was to play baseball with the kids, but plan change here in the D.R. They often change quickly without a moments notice, even multiple times a day. It is just culture, but thankfully we are doing our best to be flexible. Instead, Deron gave a mini message about how we are the salt and light of the world and we are called to be like a city on a hill (in kid language of course). The kids ate up just being with different people. The children are fascinated by picture taking, iPhones, and watches that light up. Many of us girls found the little girls running their coarse fingers through our long pin straight hair; something they do not have.

Instruments Cannot Create Music Alone(A quote by Phyllis Freeman)

In the evening we had some time together after dinner. We spend some time in worship, in laughter, game time, debriefing the things we’ve done today, and sharing the new experiences we had. One of the things we noticed is we’ve had some extra time and space to ourselves. We come from a culture that is busy all the time. We feel like in order to be efficient we find ourselves filling every minute of the day with crossing off a task list 13 miles long. However, here we have time in the afternoon for rest. Our projects, so far, have been relation rather than physical. We know there is a reason for that. We also know that our space offers room for opportunity. We spent some time in prayer that God would use us as the instruments to his plan. Instruments cant make music without someone giving them the breath of life. We need God to orchestrate us and breath into us each of us to create a sound that can only be made by the unique set up of our ten.

Immediate Prayer Needs:

• Tomorrow morning our girl’s bible study starts. We have invited 13-18 year old girls for several studies on “Godly Women of the Bible”. The studies will be broken up over a couple days and taught by several ladies in the group. Pray our nervous would subside, and that we would speak with passion and excitement. Pray that the girls coming would find value in the character traits we discuss and they would even carry out godly living.

• We’ve noticed that we’ve had some extra time and space to ourselves. We come from a culture that is busy all the time. We feel like in order to be efficient filling every minute of the day with crossing off a task list 13 miles long. However, here we have time in the afternoon for rest. Our projects, so far, have been relation rather than physical. Pray that God would use our time effectively. Not that we would find extra things to do necessarily, but maybe we spend time establishing a new relationship, or maintaining an old one. Pray that God may use our time to speak to us, lead us and guide us in a way he cannot do at home. Here is what we know… we’ve all been hand selected to take part on this trip for a reason.

*Click the image at the top for more!

**Netters says “Hi!”