Where's Mary?

My travel companions were wonderful. They made me laugh and we cried together. Mary is fluent in Spanish...the rest of us...not so much. So, we said at least 50 times during the trip, "Where's Mary?" (even in this picture, one of the three of us asked the question as someone was taking the picture). 99% of the time we were asking, she was off ministering to someone...getting their story and sharing her heart. It was wonderful. That's what we went to do. The call was to "visit orphans", but Mary found all kinds of ministry opportunities. The owner of the hotel, the night guard at the hotel, the man in the city who knew her name because she forgot to take off her nametag, the woman at the skate park who was experiencing incredibly difficult relationship problems, the store owner as we were trying to quickly shop for souveneirs...Mary was always there. She was in the midst of the people...in the midst of the hurt, sharing God's love. As a friend, oh I am so proud of her. I know that the Lord is smiling at her obedience. She gave everything she had to give when she went to Costa Rica. She poured out all that she had to offer. That's why we found her this house. We offered to pack up Mike and the kids and send them down, because Mary is at home in this country.


The trip would not have been the same without Mary. She made us laugh all the time just because she was so comfortable there. Every time we said, "Where's Mary?", we would just giggle like little school girls. By the end of the trip, the whole team was saying, "Where's Mary?" and laughing because we knew exactly where she was....she was listening to someone's story. She was being the hands and feet of Christ and doing it well!

If I Could I Would

This is the one I would bring home. Her story is sad. She has had a hard life...not as hard as some, but too hard for a seven year old. Her mother is a drug addict. I don't know anything about a father so I assume he is not involved. I would imagine she has some trauma in her life because she spent part of each day crying on the couch...but no one, no matter what...could get her to talk or share her story. It would pass and she would be a happy little girl with an incredible laugh and smile.

It's amazing how quickly a child can capture your heart. There's Joel and John in Africa and Keoshina and Jennifer in Costa Rica. This is Keoshina. Isn't she absolutely gorgeous?

Bumps

That sums up today.

We have bumps from bug bites (lots of them).

Bumps in the road. There are major potholes (Tiff says they are autobus caves) in Costa Rica. And just for the record when you're in the back of the bus and the driver is going 50 miles an hour and hitting a bump every minute....the ride is beyond rough. We are flying around in the seats. I have all kinds of bruises on my legs and knees to prove it. It's great memories though...so we're thankful for the memories.

And the biggest bump of today was having to say goodbye to a very sweet group of children that have stolen our hearts. We cried as we hugged their necks and got on the bus. It's amazing how quickly you can become attached.



Then you leave and the bump on our soul is forever there. We came to change lives for God's glory, but we quickly realized that we would be the ones whose lives would be forever changed. Costa Rica and two orphanages in the port city of Limon will forever be part of our God story.

And here's the reason they don't have mirrors in Costa Rica....we're looking kind of rough.

There may be a reason they don't have mirrors

Well...Ashley wins the prize for reading this before we even wrote anything (thanks for the comment :-). We are experiencing techincal difficulties in Costa Rica, so now we're adding the full story.

There are very few mirrors in hotel rooms in other countries. I remembered this once we arrived in our hotel room in Costa Rica and there was one mirror in the bathroom and four girls in the room. Not a good set-up. I said to my travel friends, "I should've reminded you to bring a hand held mirror". But we survived with one mirror and one handheld mirror.

So we returned from a hot and rainy day at the orphanage yesterday. We all looked horrible to say the least. Mary came out of the room as we headed to dinner and said, "There may be a reason they don't have mirrors". Classic comment....I knew it was a blog post.

I don't have a picture of us all looking horrible...terribly affected by humidity, heat and active play with children. So here's a fun little picture from a crazy game we played. (Doesn't Tiff look great with springy curls?)

A Day of Adventure in CR

Our hotel in San Jose had a beautiful view. It was hot and sunny in San Jose. We drove through the rain forest to get to Limon. It rained all day, so that was kind of sad because we didn't get to play outside with the children. The orphanage was small and the space was tight, but we still had a great day.

Our guide Brian is wonderful and we are learning so much about Costa Rican history and their beautiful landscape.

We are waiting for our dinner right now and we are eating chewy potato chips because the humidity is so high here. Everything is getting soggy including all our snacks. It's just part of the adventure.



We've had an adventure filled day. Our driver left the lights on and we had to push the bus. Then because of all the rain, part of the road was washed out so we had to wait for them to fill the road with broken tree trunk and tree branches. Fun times!

Pura Vida (pure life)! It's the phrase Costa Ricans use all the time.

I Should've Learned Some Spanish

We arrived in Costa Rica on time. Our guide is wonderful and knows so much about Costa Rica. He has lived here for 13 years. We will be doing ministry, but also getting educated about Costa Rica. (smiles) He already shared too much information about bats, scorpions, 200 species of snakes and large spiders.

Tiffany and Carrie had a very large spider welcome in their shower...just one spider, but he was quite large. I quickly exited their room.

We will leave the capital city tomorrow and drive to the orphanage (about 4 hours). Pray that we find favor with the community and the orphanage workers.

We quickly stopped at a Target to buy bananagrams because I forgot mine (Hanks...I'm practicing for the Africa trip :-) and we saw three teenagers being handcuffed and put into a police car. That was the craziest thing about the day...unless you know JC from the Africa trip. He always adds some excitement and craziness to each day.

Love to all!

Leaving Soon....

Not sure what to say, except this trip wasn't on my radar. I've never really wanted to go on a mission trip to Central America...my love for Africa runs deep and it's the only place I've wanted to go.

God works in mysterious ways. He pricked my heart immediately when I first heard about this trip. I wrestled with the Lord for a little while, but then decided that I should at least pray about it. God confirmed the trip in several ways including a pineapple from the grocery store that was a product of Costa Rica. I really haven't lost my mind...but if the Lord speaks through a donkey, why not a pineapple? (The pineapple didn't talk...just an fyi)

So, we're heading to two orphanages in a poor city. These orphanages have never had a mission team come. What a huge opportunity and responsibility to be the first team to visit these two places! We are excited to do what God has called us to do.


And God has blessed me with three sweet friends from church that are along for the journey. This is a first time mission trip for each of them and I am as proud as a mama bear that they are taking this huge step! We are travelling with 6 others from the Nashville area and we'll be playing sports, doing crafts and of course telling about the love of Jesus! On Friday evening, we'll be working alongside a surfing and skate ministry which is just funny if you know me at all. My prayer is that I'll obey immediately every time in Costa Rica...even if it means getting on a surfboard or skateboard.



Pray for us...that God would do great things and that this nation would rise up and serve Him!

....let the little children come to Me.