retreat

The weekend before I went to the United States for Trent and Micah’s wedding our team went on a retreat in Puerto Plata. Even though we had spent some time together, it was a time for us to really understand each other and to become the team that God wants us to be in the Dominican Republic.

Norm, our director, did and amazing job of putting the retreat together. Our theme for the week was all about the battle we are in. We were joined on our retreat by some members of our team that live in the United States. Tommy and Jill Reese and Mark Gibson are three people that have been a part of what is going on here on this island for a long time and they are huge people in our lives as a team. I am so grateful they were able to come and share in our weekend and help us be a team.

The first part of the retreat was spent getting to know each other. That might sound silly but it really was an amazing time. We did a personality test and within each personality understand how to interact with it. No one test came out the same, and I am thankful for that and I pray that we can learn to understand each other and our personalities. After learning more about ourselves we spent some time talking about the battle and what that means. We can not sit back and lie to you or ourselves. Being on the mission field, where ever that might be is a battle. It might look romantic at first but we must be honest, that romantic view goes away pretty fast. When it does go away you are faced with a bloody battlefield ahead that so many times looks so incredibly scary. But that is what we are here for we are here to fight for a cause we believe so much in. We watched the first scene of Saving Private Ryan and made analogies from the movie to the battle field that we are on. If you have watched that movie you know just how intense it is. As christians we are all on that battlefield, running on to that beach trying to take the front away from Satan. We know that God has the war won, but living day to day with so much war going on around us is oftentimes discouraging. Please continue to pray for us as we are on the battlefield and we will continue to pray for all of you as you are on the battlefield, fighting the same enemy, just in a different part of the world.

The last part of our retreat was focusing on our ministries in the Dominican Republic and how we are going to pull all of them together so that we do not have four or five separate things going on but that we have one team with one purpose working together for one goal and all of our works are working together for that one purpose and goal.

It was an incredible weekend together. Please pray for us as we learn to work and live together and as we try to be the team that God has called us to be.

GOD,

Thank you for giving us this past weekend to be together as a team. We all believe that you have called us to this place to be a part of what you are doing here. Help us to be the vessel you have called us to be to bring the Spirit into this place. Thank you for winning the battle already. We have no doubt that the war is won but give us the strength to fight every single day to keep fighting. I love you everyday.