Life in Nica.
For the most part, this is just a general update of what we have been doing here, I haven't really said much about all the awesome ministry we have been getting involved in and my blogging has been far from the best lately, so this will pretty much just give you a glimpse of all the things we have been getting involved in around here in Jinotepe.
We visit Los Popitos, a school for children with special needs. We can sit in on their classes, like sign language, or play with them on the playground (usually hide and go seek).
We also go to a nursing home and love on pretty much everybody there. This could be anything from singing to Francesca on her 99th birthday, playing checkers and listening to William's stories about how he knows Fidel Castro and Osama Bin Laden, or helping out in the kitchen with Marbli cooking and serving rice and beans.
A couple days a week, half of us go to the hospital and the other half stay back and worship and pray for those that have gone. This hospital is nothing like the in the states, it's pretty much like what you would expect a third world hospital to look like. But this has been SO incredible, we have seen so many amazing things happen there. We have seen physical healing, but beyond that we have seen broken people incredibly thirsty for something more in life. Being able to talk to them and show them Jesus has been so humbling, some of my favorite moments have taken place there. In going there, I have gotten to see new brothers and sisters come to Christ.
At least once a day we go out into the barrios (the slums surrounding our house) and visit and pray with people that live there. We have started to make some really awesome relationships! We meet any physical needs there we can, play with the kids as much as we can (regardless of how much lice we get from them), and we pray there. A lot.
One cool thing we have begun to do is a girls group on Tuesdays. At the church we are working with, Nueva Vida, we noticed right off the bat that there really aren't many teenage girls that come at all. There are plenty of teenage guys and things like football for them to do here, but not much here for the girls. So we walk around the barrios and invite teenage girls to come for some fellowship. Each week we have new people on the team speak and play games and hang out with them. It has been so fruitful! More and more girls are coming and getting involved and it's so cool to get deeper with them each week.
We also go to many church services each week, play plenty of football in our freetime, patch up roofs in the pouring rain for families living in the slums, help out with English classes, and hang out with all of the Nicaraguans that come and hang out at the compound we stay at.
Last week we put together a VBS for the kids in the barrios, my teammate Brittany put together a video of it at the end, so here you go!
I'll get better at blogging, I promise. Hope you all are doing awesome!
