A Very Special Person

When I came here to the Dominican Republic the first time I never knew what I was getting myself into. In fact, there was a boy that was in the Children’s Home that, to be honest, I saw as just a punk who did not want anything to do with anyone.

Now, five years later that boy lives with me. His name is Jean Carlos de Peña.

Jean Carlos grew up in a very hard situation. His mother was not able to take care of him and had no other family that was able to. His grandfather is a minister and was one of the initial people to bring the Church of Christ to Santiago. At one point in his life he was living on the street with his mom and some of his siblings. His grandfather knew of the Children’s Home here and had him put in, along with two of his brothers and his sister. While here, the three boys rarely got to visit their family were normally left behind here when the other kids left for vacation.

When I came back as an intern, Jean Carlos was the only one of his siblings left here in the Home. Jenifer had left shortly after she arrived, Alberto left and went to the States to live, and Antonio left the Home shortly after Alberto had gone.

As I said before, he was usually left

behind when most of the kids had gone home. For this, he was here in the summers when there were not that many kids here.

It was that first summer that I got to know that punk kid who I had many two years back. He opened up his rock hard outer shell to show me a broken but huge heart inside. He was someone dying for attention and love.

God used this boy to open my heart to a new world. I am forever gra

teful to him and the way he allowed God to use him, even though he had no idea.

I have many stories of the time I have spent with him but a new development in our relationship has come up in the last month or so.

His brother, Antonio, was kicked out of the Children’s Home shortly after Alberto had left for the states. He was quite a terror from all that I hear. But even thru that, he was also someone who was looking for love and attention.
Thru my relationship with Jean Carlos I have been able to get back in touch with Antonio and create a new friendship with him.

Antonio is someone who needs prayers, like the rest of us. He is someone looking for God. He knows what the world has to offer him, but has realized that the worlds offerings will not fill his needs. To be honest, I did nothing. He came running, like the prodigal son, a few weeks back and God did the rest. He worked thru my amazing cousin, Weston, to be able to talk to him and help him find direction for his life. He is still working, as we all are, but making the right steps toward his Savior.

Thru Antonio we were able to go on this retreat this past weekend. God used Antonio to talk to Jean Carlos and something beautiful happened.

The last night of the retreat we had a beautiful devotional. Many people responded and as we were singing Antonio said he felt the urge to talk to Jean Carlos. They talked for a little bit and Jean Carlos responded to the gospel of Jesus Christ and was baptized. He could not even wait until Sunday and went right then with three other people to a very cold river and was baptized. It was beautiful.

I can not say that I did anything. God used me as a very small piece in the puzzle of many pieces.

I can not even begin to mention all the pieces of this puzzle, but I am so very thankful for everything that has been done for his boy and am so proud and excited to be able to say that he is now a brother in Christ.

Please pray for him in his new walk with Christ. He will fail, as we all do but help him to know that even when he falls or even runs away, he will always be welcome back into the family of God and will be right there for him to embrace him.

Dear God,

I could not be more happy. You have had in plans something very special for this boy named Jean Carlos. There have been so many pieces to this puzzle that have helped him to make the decision to give his life to you. I was a very small one, but I am grateful for the privilege to be one. Antonio was one, and for him I am grateful. Brian and Tammie were huge instruments in getting him here to the Home.

LORD, thank you so much for the decision Jean Carlos has made. Be with him in his walk with you. Hold his hand and help him to know that you are holding him even when he is turned the other way.

I love you everyday!

A Terrific Weekend

A terrific weekend.

This past weekend I spent in Neiba, Dominican Republic. I went with the purpose of going to a retreat for young people from all over the country.

I had no idea about the retreat but Antonio told me about it and encouraged me and Jean Carlos to go with him.

On Wednesday, Jean Carlos and I went to Puerto Plata and spent the night with Antonio then left on Thursday for Santiago to meet up with their cousin, Wendy. We spent the day in Santiago visiting their family, including their mom, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and lots of friends from Santiago.

On Thursday we woke up around 2:30 AM to head to Neiba.

We were the first ones to arrive about six hours later.

Their camp is way up in the mountains and it was very cold but very relaxing and ve

ry fun.

The theme for the weekend was “Luciernagas” which is like a lighting bug. All weekend we talked about shining our light for Christ and reflecting his light onto others.

I met many awesome people. It was so encouraging to see how many people there are in this country who are desperately trying to follow Christ and what he has planned for them.

One of the leaders for the weekend was n

amed Christian. I spent a lot of time with him talking and getting to know his work and a lot of the work going on here in the Dominican.

The last night we were there we had invited many people from the community to come and here the lesson. Many people responded to the gospel

and were baptized, including someone very special to me, but a separate entry for that.

It truly was an amazing weekend and I pray and w

ait the next time that I will be able to meet up with these great people.

Dear LORD,

thank you so much for this weekend. I am so thankful to have been able to spend it with some amazing people. I am so thankful for all the people that made it possible

and made it go so well. Help me to shine and be your light to the world as we were talking about this weekend.
My prayer is one that I read that Mother Teresa used to always say:

“Dear LORD,

Help us to spread your fragrance everywhere we go.

Flood our souls with your Spirit and Light.

Penetrate and possess our whole being so utterly that our lives may only be a radiance of yours.

Shine thru us and be so in us that every soul we come in contact with may feel your presence in our soul.

Let them look up and no longer see us but only Jesus.

Stay with us and then, O LORD, we shall begin to shine as you shine. So to shine as to be a light to others. The light, O LORD, will be all from you, non

e of it will be ours. It will be you shining on others thru us.

Let us thus praise you in the way you love best by shining on those around us.

Let us preach you without preaching. Not by words, but by our example. The catching force, the sympathetic influence of what we do.

The evident fullness of the love our hearts bear to you.”

Transformation

When this last group was here from Freed Hardeman they did a Dominican style home makeover.

Norm has been taking care of the work projects for the groups and been doing an awesome job. Well, this past week we had two days of work projects, one full day and one half day. For the half day we went to Acapulco school and painted the outside. For the full work day Norm decided to transform my house.

Jean Carlos and I moved into our house in January when I got back from the United States. It was the old Juaquine house and has been inhabited by some other people since then, but it has not been well taken care of since Juaquine left. There was a room full of

wood from where the tin roof had been taken off, and old car had been parked in the car port, a car that does not work, it had been partially primed to be painted a while back but never got finished, and so on.

Anyways, Norm decided to do a transformation on it while this group was here. It looks awesome. They painted the outside, cleaned out all the wood from the old tin roof, and pushed the car all the way to camp so that it was out of the house.

To be honest, I was a little worried about what the group would think about working on my house. Not that it was my house but normally groups do work projects to help out the Dominicans. I had even told

Norm that I think we need to make sure that we work on something for the Dominicans also during the week. He heard me but being the huge support that he is to all of us he decided to take the half day and help me out.

He started out the day by saying what Beacon Lights Ministry used to be, an organization he worked with. Their full purpose was to support missionaries while they were on the field. It might sound weird but it is something we are all grateful for.

To Norm: thank you so much for your support and your desire to be that support for all of us.

To Sigma Rho: thank you for taking time in your week to help out someone like me. I know you came to encourage the Dominican people, and you did, but you also encouraged me. Thank you so much.

Dear God,

thank you so much for Norm and this group. I am not just thankful to Norm because he cleaned out my house, but because of the huge support that he has been to me in my short time here, and because of the strong desire he has to serve you and help others do the same. Thank you for everything this past group did, and for the encouragement they were to me.

I Love you everyday!

another great group

This past week we had another great group. This is a group that always comes on Spring Break, but this is my first experience with them. They are from Freed Hardeman University. They did great things this week and were a huge encouragement to all.

A few highlights:

1. We had the Daihatsu the whole week!!!

2. Brian Wallace came thru for a night as he was traveling back to the United States

3. The Beckham family came for a visit. On top of being a huge support and encouragement to me they were able to see Rosmery, the child they have been supporting for a very long time.

4. Great singing every night

5. Lots of involvement from some of the Dominicans I am very close too

6. Dr. Pepper

7. a newly painted house (pictures coming later)

8. so many awesome people. these people that came were just awesome people. I know that they are a shining light on the campus of Freed Hardeman just as they are here.

9. teaching children to be "orgulloso"

10. continuing our relationship with the Acapulco school

To Blake: thank you for being such a great leader and an awesome friend. Keep bringing great groups and encouraging Sigma Rho to be a huge part of what goes on here.

To the Beckham Family: Blake, Katie, and Mrs. Jan, I love you guys very much. It is going to be hard to start groups without having so many people I know. You have been a huge part of my life and I am grateful for everything that you do.

To Sigma Rho: I pray that you continue to be the shining light on Freed's campus like you were here. You were great. We love you. And keep coming back. Oh yeah, and win Makin' Music!

Dear God,

thank you so much for terrific groups. Thank you for the opportunity to work with these groups. It is truly and honor and privilege to work with them. And the ones likes Sigma Rho make it so much easier. I love you every day.

Tennessee Tech, Florida, Harding, Chattanooga

This past week we had an unbelievable group here. They were a mix of people from all over the place. Most of the were either students from Tennessee Tech or from the University of Florida. The others were the Reeses, my dad and sister, and Kyle Farmer.

The week started out for me with quit the surprise. We were in the airport waiting on the group to come thru when my cousin, Weston, shows up. I was very excited to see him, especially with his new look.

As it turns out, there was definitely a plan God had in mind when Weston got the opportunity to come here. He was a huge instrument in the lives of so many, I am sure, but especially in the life of a boy that used to live here in the Children’s Home, Antonio de Pena. Antonio is the brother of Jean Carlos, the boy who lives with me, and he came to us for a visit. While he was here, Weston was a huge part of being a major encouragement to him and being a mentor to him.

Weston left a huge impact on the heart of Antonio. He also left a small piece of his leg at the children’s home.

With this group we mixed over 40 bags of cement, did 3 Bible classes for children, painted three houses, visited the houses of many Dominicans but spent hours in the houses of 4 Dominican families, visited the sick in a hospital in Rio San Juan, visited the workers of a dump in Puerto Plata, went to the beach, and did so much more.

My prayer is that all of these people we came in contact with were touched in some way. I pray that they saw Jesus on the faces of every single group member. I know I did.

To the group: thank you so much for everything that you did. You were a huge encouragement to me and I know i can say the same for so many people.

To Jeff: what an amazing person you are. To lead this group like you did was unbelievable. We will very much miss you not being here in the summer but know you will be spectacular in Haiti. You are a huge encouragement to me.

To FeFe: do not ever change. Don't stop making people laugh and keep the joy of the Holy Spirit in your heart. Thank you for you leadership in this group. And thank you for always being there, even if you are a little late.

To Dad and Nikki: thank you just for coming. wow. I am so lucky to have a family that supports me like you do. Nikki, I am excited to see what summer has in store for us. I know it will be a blessing.

To Tommy and Jill: every time you guys come I never want you to leave. You are so encouraging, so fun to be around, but always have your eyes and heart on the things that matter the most. I love you very dearly and always look forward to your visits.

To Weston: what a surprise that you came. I think the staple of my week was our time with Antonio. I honestly believe he is a great kid, even though he is only 19 and been thru so much. You are in my prayers. Please keep him in yours. God planted you here this week for a reason and I one hundred percent believe it was for the counsel and prayer time and attentive ear that you have to Antonio.

I love you all.

Dear God, thank you for such awesome people. I am so lucky to always have the right people come at the right time. I end up saying that a lot that you always know exactly what I need and exactly when I need it and that absolutely applies to this group. They did so many great things and I was blessed to be a part of it. Protect them. I love you everyday.

Cold

Last week here in the Dominican Republic it was actually cold. We had a group here and they were prepared for very hot weather, as any group should be, with good reason. Well they got here and it was a cold ride back to camp and a cold three or four days. I do not know if they were as cold as I was but I know it was not what they expected.

In reality it was probably in the 60s or so, but for here, that is pretty cold. I am used to the hot weather and except for a couple of weeks in December I totally missed the winter in the United States. I also think they cold weather made me a little sick and that made me feel even more cold.

During those few days I asked most of the Dominicans I know if they had ever felt the weather here that cold and for the most part they had not. Jean Carlos, the boy that lives with me, said he had never felt anything like that and really did not like it at all.

It was kind of a nice change of pace around here to get some really cool weather during the day and cold nights, but to be honest, I am glad it is gone.

I guess to most of you, it would have not felt cold at all and you probably would have laughed at all of us who were freezing, but we do not get weather like that here.

Dear God,

thank you for that change of pace. It really was a nice few days. I liked being able to wrap up in a blanket and walk around in a hoodie.

Problems

Thanks to my terrific family I have a new computer. (They are not terrific because they helped me get a new computer). My other computer was getting weird. I did not think it was posting anything from this year because it would not let me see the posts. It turns out that I think they were getting posted I just could not see them. I do not know what the problem was but hopefully it is fixed now so that I can post and know that it is getting posted.

Thanks for you patience.

Dear God,

what a great family I have. Help me to never take advantage of the things that I have. Help me to always be grateful for the countless blessings I have, including a computer that does not always cooperate. At least I have a computer.

I love you everyday.