Day 6:
Thursday, March 24, 2012
Today was Day 4 of going to campus and it was different from all the other days. For starters, it rained ALL DAY. Usually it is clear all day and then it might rain later. But today it would downpour and then stop and the downpour and then stop. We did pray before we left that it would stop raining all the way while we walked to the University and God answered! God gave us a lot of grace with improvising and continuing to share and build relationships even when circumstances aren't ideal. My day started out kind of rough and I didn't have a great attitude. It was hard not to get caught up in the exhaustion and the rain. So when Caleb and I went out sharing I wasn't super motivated to go start conversations with people. After lunch at D'A Buen Tiempo we had our English Class in an actual classroom! None of the girls came so I was really sad but there were some new guys there. It's sweet to see how God brings us new people and we don't even have to seek them out. After our class I went out to see if I could find the girls behind the building and as I looked into the building doorway a woman teacher began to yell at me and tell me I had no right to be in the Dominican pushing my religion on people. She said a lot of things about Americans and how religion only brings division and that I should leave and not take advantage of the Dominican people. It was hard to listen to her and I could feel her hatred toward me as an American and Christian. Steve came over and saved me by taking me out of the conversation, I had no idea what to say. I kept thinking about how we are blessed if we are hated for the sake of Christ but I didn't feel like I was blessed. I wanted to cry my eyes out. I went over away from people to compose myself and two guys came over to talk to me. They had been standing by the woman and had heard what she was saying. They apologized for her behavior and said that even though she said that, no one else thinks that. They were all so glad that we were there talking to people and sharing the gospel and they encouraged me not to take what she said to heart. I was so thankful for their words and I know that God was definitely comforting me through them. It changed my perspective too and helped me to remember that we have an enemy and he is very active. It started raining soon after that so the Bible Study was moved inside. It was totally packed and I was really excited to see so many people learning about the Bible. At the end we sang worship songs so we would sing it in English and they sang it in Spanish. I started tearing up because I knew we were all worshipping the same God we could love him in different languages. It also made me really excited for heaven and that I would be singing with these people again one day even if I don't see them on earth. It was one of my favorite parts of the trip. Then we went to speak in an English class. We introduced ourselves and split into groups and talked with two or three people each. It's so great when people want to practice English and it opens a huge door for the gospel. And you can give people tracts to "practice" their English as well so everybody wins! The teacher of the class, Juan, was really funny and he kept calling Ben spiderman or Ben Parker. We topped the day off with pizza. We have a lot of trouble ordering food because we don't speak spanish here so it is always a surprise what we get. Ben thought he ordered three pizzas each with pepperoni, veggies and chicken. But they thought he said he wanted one pizza with all those toppings. We laughed really hard when the pizza came.
No one is a fan of rain here.
In our classroom for the first time!
Jeff, Carlos, Gilbert and David
Robert and Erin
Jeff, Carlos, Caleb and Gilbert
Elizabeth and David
Bible Study was packed!
Watching the rain under the overhang
These blinds are comparable to the blinds at the Girls House! Haha
So wet!
Singing in the choir room, it was unbelievable
Erin and Celeste
Elizabeth and the guys!
Worship
They were teaching us a couple songs in Spanish and they were pretty into it...I just clapped and smiled.
These students were in choir and when they sang songs for us they were amazing
We were able to talk to a lot of people because of the rain
Looking in from outside
Yay girls!
Isaac is so nice to sit in the chair while the girls do wall sits
This is when I accidentally poked Allie in the eye after she burped in my ear
Cool mural on the side of the art building
Our class that we met, they were so fun! This has Juan in it
My friend Roxanna is right behind me
Our shoes after walking all day in the water and mud
And our very pretty tan lines from our shoes
Edward made us sweet beans to eat since we had never heard of them!
Mmmm it reminded me of what sploosh would taste like.
Erin eating the sweet beans
Yummy everything pizza
Erin chugged that whole Coke!...not really
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