Wow! We only have 11 days left and I'm stoked! This trip has been so life changing and I feel like a new person. I can't wait to get home and put to work all the good info and tools that I've learned here. Yesterday, Sunday, was great! Brandie, one of the girls on our trip, and myself do the music for one of the services and it has been great to expand my abilites. It's so hard because they all have their own ideas on how the song should go so they all do their own thing! HAHA! It's so funny. So me, as the pianist, just plays it my way and Brandie sings with me and thats it! LOL! I will never be critical of music in the States ever again!
The people here have such a love for God it is unreal. It's like a church of 700 members of new converts. You know that fire that is in new converts? That's what this whole church has. It's amazing. It reminds me of all the messages and songs about not losing your first Love and always remembering where God has brought you from. It's really unreal to me, the love and appreciation these people have for God. The focus here is all about God, all of the young people have youth service every other Friday night and its games and fun but at the end there is a speaker and there is ALWAYS and altar call that is absolutely amazing. Every youth service we've been to, someone new has gotten the Holy Ghost. I long for that fire in Portland!! Then, for the whole church, they have prayer Mon-Fri 6:30-8:30 every morning and it's kind of like come and go as you please but at 8:15 they all come together and worship together and sing a song or two and start the day together as a whole body of Christ! It's so amazing!!! The unity here is so strong and you can sense it. They start each day together and they are so open with each other's needs so they all pray and intercede for each other.
The church here is so big and it's only because of Home Bible studies! I can't wait to get home, I have such a burden for Bible studies! More so than I ever have! Look out Portland, I'm coming home soon! Ain't nothin' going to discourage me, I'm sold out for God!! God bless all of you, I pray this blog has blessed you in the last two months. It's been encouraging to hear from you all. Love you all!
7.18.2011
7.11.2011
Oops! Forgot about my blog!
Okay, I really didn't forget. Our internet has been down and we had no internet access!
Anyway, these last few weeks have been great! We took a roadtrip to Portugal to meet with the AYC (American Youth Corps) group that had a 10 day trip to Portugal/Spain. While there we were able to go to 3 churches and I immedietely (sp?) fell in love with the people. They loved us so much and we blessed them so much just by being there. As a gift of appreciation when we left they have each of us a silk flower with a ribbon tied around it. This made me cry. It was just something so small and I know in the states it would've been taken as a joke. But, these people are so poor and they don't have very much so for them to take the time to do this meant so much. As our bus drove away the whole church stood in the middle of the street, okay in the middle of the dirt road that was barely wide enough for our bus waving and blowing kisses. It was the sweetest thing! The country of Portugal still has spiritual strongholds that Spain had years ago. We need to pray for that country. The Collins' are missionaries to Portugal. However, we need more that will obey the call and go. The Collins' in their 60's-70's. They shouldn't be the only ones having to be there...much less alone. It hurts me so bad and I was praying and one of my quizzer friends said she felt a call to Portugal, she talked to the Collins' and she's coming back next year! I was so excited for this news!
We brought the AYC group back to Madrid with us and, of course, they loved it here! Who wouldn't?! We were able to take them to the Royal Palace of Spain where the King and Queen still live. They tour parts of it while they stay in a different part of the Palace. We took them to Toledo and Segovia which are two very old cities. Segovia dates back to 2,500 years back. In Toledo the city still has the old, huge walls up for defense so you can see the whole city up on the hill from miles away because, although you can see it, if you wanted to attack it, you would have an almost impossible mission on your hands!
The AYC group left today and we were all very sad, but we will be able to reunite at Youth Congress which is only 3 weeks away! It was a breath of fresh air for the Next Steppers though. Because we've been touring nonstop with the AYC so Bro. Sones so graciously gave us the day off to do NOTHING! It felt great! Tomorrow starts Week 6 and we will be working for the remainder of our trip and then we head home in 18 days! :)
I think that everyone needs to go on Next Steps at point or another. We have people on our trip from 18-28 singles and a married couple with their 2 year old son, they left the 5 and 6 year olds back home! Even though you don't think you're called to Foreign Missions, soon to be called Global Missions, it doesn't matter. It's a place to get away from all the distractions in the USA, it allows you to go to places with God you never knew existed and it allows you to find your calling in God, if you don't already know it. It's expensive and a major sacrifice but because of that, God blesses it that much more. Really consider it, it's life changing. Thats so cliche but really, I'm not the same person I was when I got here 1 1/2 months ago. Consider it, pray about it, do it! :)
Anyway, these last few weeks have been great! We took a roadtrip to Portugal to meet with the AYC (American Youth Corps) group that had a 10 day trip to Portugal/Spain. While there we were able to go to 3 churches and I immedietely (sp?) fell in love with the people. They loved us so much and we blessed them so much just by being there. As a gift of appreciation when we left they have each of us a silk flower with a ribbon tied around it. This made me cry. It was just something so small and I know in the states it would've been taken as a joke. But, these people are so poor and they don't have very much so for them to take the time to do this meant so much. As our bus drove away the whole church stood in the middle of the street, okay in the middle of the dirt road that was barely wide enough for our bus waving and blowing kisses. It was the sweetest thing! The country of Portugal still has spiritual strongholds that Spain had years ago. We need to pray for that country. The Collins' are missionaries to Portugal. However, we need more that will obey the call and go. The Collins' in their 60's-70's. They shouldn't be the only ones having to be there...much less alone. It hurts me so bad and I was praying and one of my quizzer friends said she felt a call to Portugal, she talked to the Collins' and she's coming back next year! I was so excited for this news!
We brought the AYC group back to Madrid with us and, of course, they loved it here! Who wouldn't?! We were able to take them to the Royal Palace of Spain where the King and Queen still live. They tour parts of it while they stay in a different part of the Palace. We took them to Toledo and Segovia which are two very old cities. Segovia dates back to 2,500 years back. In Toledo the city still has the old, huge walls up for defense so you can see the whole city up on the hill from miles away because, although you can see it, if you wanted to attack it, you would have an almost impossible mission on your hands!
The AYC group left today and we were all very sad, but we will be able to reunite at Youth Congress which is only 3 weeks away! It was a breath of fresh air for the Next Steppers though. Because we've been touring nonstop with the AYC so Bro. Sones so graciously gave us the day off to do NOTHING! It felt great! Tomorrow starts Week 6 and we will be working for the remainder of our trip and then we head home in 18 days! :)
I think that everyone needs to go on Next Steps at point or another. We have people on our trip from 18-28 singles and a married couple with their 2 year old son, they left the 5 and 6 year olds back home! Even though you don't think you're called to Foreign Missions, soon to be called Global Missions, it doesn't matter. It's a place to get away from all the distractions in the USA, it allows you to go to places with God you never knew existed and it allows you to find your calling in God, if you don't already know it. It's expensive and a major sacrifice but because of that, God blesses it that much more. Really consider it, it's life changing. Thats so cliche but really, I'm not the same person I was when I got here 1 1/2 months ago. Consider it, pray about it, do it! :)
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