More Pics

Here are a few more pics from when the mission team was here.Check out Facebook to see more. Hope you enjoy!!


Ruth and Wendy helping out at the school when the mission team was here.
Sheila, Judy and Ricky helping out at the school.
Ana Carolina and her friend playing during recess.
Praying for Dr. Inri as he is leading the Bible studies up on the volcano.
Carmen she lives next door to the site where the new Center will be. She is a sweet little old lady.
Judy and Roxana playing at the Center.
Annette and I at the Center.
Annette and Karla playing with the children at the school.
Ruperto at the school.
Ana Carolina at the school. Margarita playing in the bounce house at the party for the children. A ministry that throws block parties with bounce houses came and threw a party for the children,
Here is the bounce house. The group also brought cotton candy and ballons. The kids loved it.
Elias working up at the construction site.
Working on building the new Center.
Working on building the new Center.

Stonebrook Mission Team

Hey all!

Sorry it's been so long since I blogged last, it's been a bit crazy around here but God is doing some amazing things. The biggest thing that had happened is that the mission team from Stonebrook (my home church) came down for a week to serve in Guayabo! Words can not describe what a blessing it was to have them here. We were also blessed with having five translators from the Great Commission Church in Honduras to help us with translation. It was an amazing week and God was so glorified through it all.


The mission team from Stonebrook Community Church was our first mission team of the year and they were such a blessing to have here in San Salvador. They were such a blessing to the local church and the Guayabo Development Center. God was glorified so much during the week that the team was here. Here are some of the highlights from the week.

Construction of the New Center: One of the biggest things that the team did was that they were the team to start the construction of the New Center. The team began by clearing the land by cutting and digging out trees, stumps and other plants. It was lots of hard work but the team loved it. The team also laid the foundation for the new Center. It was such a blessing to have all these hard workers serving the people in Guayabo.

Helping out in the Center: Another thing that Stonebrook did while they were here was that they helped out in the Center. They were such a blessing to have in the Center and the children loved them! They lead our Bible story times every day and one day one of the translators gave an amazing visual Gospel presentation to the children at the Center.

Helping out at the school in Guayabo: The team was also able to help out at the school. Three mornings that the team was here in San Salvador they had the opportunity to go to the school that is near the Center. It was an amazing way to just be able to serve the teachers at the school. It was really cool to see how the teachers in both classes just handed over their classes to the missionaries. They missionaries taught numbers, letters and shapes in English and with the little kids using Mr. Potato head they taught them body parts in English.

Leadership Seminars: One huge blessing to the local church was the leadership seminar that was help Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday night. We had about 40 people attend the leadership Seminars. All three nights were great and filled with so much truth and it was a very encouraging time. Brad (the pastor from Ames) shared two nights on leadership and it was such a great and then Duane taught on Nehemiah, which was also so great and a great example of what the Bible says about leadership. The local church was tremendously blessed by these seminars and many of the locals have came up and said that these seminars helped change how they view leadership, what an amazing blessing.

Women’s Conference: On the day after the team got here the local church put on a conference for the women of the church. It was the first women’s ministry meeting this year for the church and it was such an encouraging time. We had 36 women attend the conference. Annette Barrett, Diana Whipple and Judy Anderson shared on topics ranging from the importance of spending time with Jesus to having hope to what it looks like to be a woman of God. The women from the church were so blessed by the time and many left the conference very encouraged.

House Visits: Each member of the mission team had the opportunity to go to a home of a child that attends the Center. It was an opportunity for the team to see how these children really live and to really see how needy these families are. It was also an opportunity to talk with these families about God and share the Gospel with them. Both the families and the missionaries were very blessed by these visits.

Parent’s Meeting: On Thursday, when the team was here Brad and Annette Barrett shared with the parents of the children that attend the Center during a parents meeting. There were about 14 moms that came to the meeting and at the end of the meeting the Gospel was shared and four of the women raised their hands and said that they wanted to accept Christ. Praise God!

Party for the Children at the Center: The last day that the team was up in Guayabo the team threw a party for the children at the Center in the afternoon. They partnered with a ministry that is called Hope 4 El Salvador and they go all around El Salvador throwing block parties for churches and using bounce houses as part of their ministry. The children absolutely loved it! Many of them have never seen a bounce house in their life or have eaten cotton candy, to say the least the children really enjoyed their time as well as the missionaries.

Overall, the trip was amazing and we here in San Salvador cannot thank the team from Stonebrook enough for your servant hearts! God did some amazing things this week and the friendships that we have formed will continue for eternity! For me it was such a refreshing and encouraging time and I am going to miss everyone. I will be writing about a couple of events more specifically later but God did some awesome things this past week through the mission group from Stonebrook and it was such a blessin gto have them here with us.

Here are a couple pics but check out my Facebook page for more because I took a ton!

Playing Simon Says with the kids at the Center.
Leo( who was one of the translators from Honduras) and I at the Leaders seminar.
The mission team from Stonebrook with Sarah and Victor.
Working on constructing the new Center.
The translators from Honduras, members of the local church and I at Don Leo's coffee shop.

So Thankful!

Over the past couple days I've been blown away and completely humbled by the way that God provides for us. I don't even have the words to express my thankfulness to the Lord, because thank you isn't a stong enough word, but so thankful for that even when I can not adequately express my gratitude, the Holy Spirt in essence translates it for me and above all the Lord knows my heart.

A little while ago I wrote about the "dulce espera" or the sweet wait in which I talked about how sometimes in life when we are praying about things God gives us an answer of yes, no or wait and how at times the answer of wait is the hardest, but how instead of saying how hard this wait is we should enjoy it and I've experienced this first hand this past week. There have been three/four huge prayers that I have been seeking the Lord on regarding decisions I have to and will have to make and wow I can say that I am so thankful that the Lord didn't give me the answers right away, because through this past month of just competely surrendering all these things to the Lord and daily seeking and praying to the Lord, I have been drawn closer to the Lord and our relationship has gone deeper. It's so amazing! I'm just so thankful for what the Lord is doing in my life!

So I encourage you when going through trials or seeking the Lord on certain things to continue to trust in the Lord and wait for his response and enjoy that dulce espera.

Visa stuff and Valentine's day in El Guayabo

Hey Everyone!!

I have great news!! They approved my visa extention to stay in El Salvador for 90 more days in order to continue my application for residency here!! Praise God!! Thank you so much to everyone who has been praying and SO thankful that I am able to stay here in ES!Please continue to be praying as I am still waiting on some paperwork from the States in order to apply for residency.

Yesterday as you know was Valentine's Day and La Red put on a party for the kids at the Center. In Spanish it's call Dia de la amistad y amor. It was a great time and the kids were so blessed by the time. We played games like Twister, had pinatas and the children also received cookies and a drink. Then to end the time we gave each child a Valentine's Day card made by people from La Red and the children loved them!!

Here are a few pics from the party:

Dios sabe

Dios sabe means God knows and I have been repeating this phase over and over to myself this past month and a half. As I wrote before there have been a lot of aburpt changes with having to move and stuff like that and the other big thing that I've really had to keep handing over to the Lord is my visa situation, as some of you know I've had quite the time with trying to get my stuff all together in order to apply for residency. We'll I still haven't gotten the permission to stay in the country from the El Salvadorean goverment in order to complete the process of applying for residency, so what that means is I have until tuesday night to get the extention or I have to leave the country for 72 hours and go to Costa Rica or the States in order to get a new tourist visa and as I have been looking into flights, flying to Costa Rica is almost as expensive as flying back to the States, so as you could imagine I've been a bit worried about this, especially since if you know me I always like to get things done before they are due and I am always early for things if I am in control of it. However, in the midst of all of this I've have this deep seeded peace and that soft whisper saying Dios sabe, meaning that God knows how he is going to work this all out and that worrying isn't going to solve anything. It times like these when situations like this I'm so thankful that Dios sabe when I don't. I am going to the immigration office Monday morning to ask for my extension, so pray that this all goes well but most importantly that I would just continue not to get super anxious or worry about this situation and continue to just trust that Dios sabe and if I have to leave again to go to the States or Costa Rica, Dios sabe why I need to leave, because God has a perfect and flawless plan for everything in my life and even in those times when I can't see where I am going I know that I can confidently rest in the fact that Dios sabe y Dios es en control!

First week at the Center and Tremors

Hey all! Last week was our first week back up at the Center and it was great to see all the kids again. Not all the children came last week because they were still getting use to going back to school so they didn't come. Overall, it was a great week and the Lord really blessed! Here are some pics from the first week.








Another thing that has happened the past couple weeks has been that I have felt my first earthquake tremors. We have had three really strong and kinda long tremors in the past three weeks. I have never experienced a tremor before that and I have to say that it is for sure a weird feeling to just feel everything shake. I'm hoping I don't actually experience a real earthquake but people here are saying that since we've had three big tremors in the past three weeks there is a huge chance that there will be an earthquake soon, so we'll just have to wait and see.

More waiting and trusting

It's been a little over a week and wow how things can change and happen especially here in San Salvador. If there is one big thing that I have learned about the culture is that things can change on the dime and you just have to get use to it. Praise God that I moved many times when I was younger so I can adjust to change and for the most part I am a very chill person so when things change I can just go with it.

This past week has really lead me to just continue trusting and waiting on the Lord more and more each and every day. In the past week God has put some circumstances in my life here in El Salvador that I really don't have a lot of control over and he has really challenged me to just continue trusting him but also to not worry about all these things (phil. 4:6-7) and to remember that no matter what is happening or what ever happens he has EVERYTHING under control.

Some things that I've been really waiting on the Lord and trusting him to provide are a building for the church here in San Salvador. We were told a couple weeks ago that the place where we have been renting to have our services is no longer going to let us rent there and we have till the end of Feb. to find a new place (remember things can change out of no where). So please be praying for this and also be praying for a location that we are seriously considering and it would be great for the church but we are praying to see if this is God's will and if we can raise the money for the new place. Another of the big things is regarding housing here. As many of you know I've been so blessed to be living with the Turcios family since I have been here and it's been such a blessing. The thing is that the people who the Turcios rent the house from also came last week (last week just wasn't a week filled with great news) and told us that the owners of the house wanted to move back and we have to move and be out of the house by May (I praise God that they at least gave us some time!). So this can be kind of stressful but I ask that you all be praying that we continue to just wait for the Lord to provide that perfect house that He already has picked out for us and that we would just continue to trust him in this.

The last two things that have really been on my mind and in and through them God has been teaching me more about waiting and trusting in are about my trial of trying to get residency here and a big decision I have about my time here in San Salvador. I won't go into to much detail now because I don't have a ton of time but I will give you the quicky version but I would so appreciate if you all could be praying! As some of you know I've already had problems with getting some of my documents in order to apply for temporary residency here in El Salvador and on Tuesday that hit another snag and lead to a little bit of frustration. I went to the immigration office on Tues to get permision to stay in the country longer while I was getting all may official stuff that I need in order to apply for residency, however they did not give me permision (big yuck duck) because they want even more information than what they had originally told me. I only have 12 more days before my visa is up here and so if I don't get all the paperwork that I need and they don't approve my extension I will have to go out of the country for 3 days (which most likely means to Costa Rica, because El Salvador has a pact with the 3 countries surrounding it were you can travel freely between the four without needed a new visa but to get a new visa you need to go outside of those countries and then re-enter. So please be praying for this situation and pray that everything falls together whether I can get all my documents and the extention or not but that I would be able to continue my time serving here in El Salvador. As I mentioned before I've really been praying and seeking advice about a certain decision (a pretty big one, if you want to know specifics, email me, Skype and I'll tell ya) I have to make regarding my time here in El Salvador. Seeking the Lord's will in this decison for sure has no doubt brought me closer to the Lord! So please be praying for desernment and wisdom as I see the Lord's will in this decision.

Well I think that is it for the most part, sorry for such a long post but I wanted to bring you all up to speed. We have however started classes back up at the Center, Monday this week was our first full day. I will post more soon and it will include some pics of the adorable children at the Center!

Adios!