The Hole

Devotion:  Why and Worship
John 16:33
“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace.  In this world you will have trouble.  But take heart!  I have overcome the world.”
For those of you that have never been to Santiago, The Hole is a difficult place to describe.  Hundreds of people live in the city dump, many of them children.  The poorest of the poor.  Our visit there is a tradition and the children seem to enjoy it almost as much as we do.  Pictures capture the experience better than any words we could type….  Basically, we love the children.  Hug them.  Carry them.  Play with them.  Feed them.  Pray for them.  Ask any of us the one thing about our trip that affected us most deeply and we will tell you about our visit to The Hole.

Today was the last day of construction work and most of our time was spent cleaning the church in preparation for Sunday’s service.  We were told today that Pastor Dan will be preaching for the congregation with a Spanish translator!  There were still some odd jobs to be performed, but cleaning was the chore of the day.

The VBS crew spent their afternoon helping the kids create T-shirts for them to keep.  Your T-shirt donations have been turned into smiles!  125 of them!  Tomorrow, we will have a full day of VBS with the entire crew.

As a special treat after dinner this evening, Nina arranged to have us visit a local memorial for worship and fellowship.  The view of Santiago from the memorial steps was breathtaking at night with the twinkling lights and cool breeze.  She shared that this place held special memories for her because she had worshiped there before with the extended Partin family.  We sang worship songs accompanied by Keith on the guitar while locals would linger nearby and listen to our expressions of faith.  For our devotion, we shared our feelings about our visit to The Hole and closed with an open group prayer for the DR, GO Ministries and the Partin Family knowing that our words would “float on the wind up to Rob.”  It was a beautiful evening.

Another wonderful side of serving in the DR is getting to know the group and sharing laughter.  We are here for a serious reason, but we don’t always have to be serious!  As an example, for the construction crew, we have attached a photo that sums up our labor force today.  Hmmm….  they may think cleaning is women’s work, but we know for a fact that Nina works as hard (if not harder!) as any man and Laura enjoyed her experience with the jackhammer!  We promise you that this photo was not staged - it was just the guys being guys.  ;-) The Spanish language (and our lack of ability to speak it) has also given us a few giggles.  Zoanne accidentally, and repeatedly, told the children that there was a “fire” in the church when she meant to tell them to go “outside”!  One letter change can mangle word meaning… which Barbie also discovered when she was leading the children in singing a Spanish worship song that ended up teaching them about God’s bathroom!  Ooooops.  To finish us off, on our mystery ride to the memorial we approached a casino and discotech and Dan joyfully exclaimed, “What happens in the DR, stays in the DR!!!!” 

Please continue to pray for our group as we grow closer to God and each other while serving the DR in His name!