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| My HS friend, Linnea & I |
The last part I want to share about this trip is more of where I saw the Lord move. I got the opportunity to experience this with 7 of the high school kids who I have spent lots of time with since I've moved here to Pittsford. 5 of them I knew very well and 2 I had only met a few times. Again, it was incredible. This week was such a blessing. Here are a few more highlights from a mission/community view point:
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| Pittsford girls (plus a new friend) |
-It was such a great privilege to watch high school kids experience true community for the first time. There were 22 adults/college leaders and 16 high school students. I loved that ratio. The high school kids got to live with these Christ-following adults for a week…got to eat meals with them, work alongside them, travel with them, listen in on their conversations, take part in conversations, and truly see a full picture of what it means to follow Christ all day everyday, not just at Young Life on Thursday nights. In particular, I loved the conversation part. The first day I was working in the field with 2 other college leaders and 3 high school students. The leaders and I were having a great, long conversation about ministry and what fellowship looks like in our different settings. The high school kids would just follow us…barely said a word, but they definitely heard every one. They were slowly learning what it means to have a conversation about real things, about more than the latest gossip or who's dating who. To talk about life and about Christ, which are one in the same. What was cool was then to see, by the end of the week, 4 high school kids sitting down together having real conversations. Truly listening to each other and asking questions about people's backgrounds and about the Lord. Incredible.
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I got to celebrate my birthday in El Sal!
Rochester East Staff (minus Max) - Alex, myself, Dan, Rob |
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| Sharing my ice cream cake |
-The other sweet part was to see prayers being answered. One of my biggest prayers going into this trip was that kids would come home with a love for people. And I got to see that happen all over the place. One of our kids was sick for the first 3 days, some serious stomach pain. So he couldn't work. He would play with the kids when possible, but spent a lot of time sitting/laying down just watching it all happen (which let me tell you…that is super frustrating…to travel to a foreign country with the intention of physically serving people and getting to know people, and having a hard time doing either…so tough - he was a trooper). Well the cool part was that by the 4th day he was feeling better. And that morning another girl on the trip came up to me and said she wasn't feeling all that great. But she was all excited, and told me, 'Megan, it's because I prayed for it!' Which I didn't understand at first, but she proceeded to explain and said that she had been praying after 3 days of this guy being sick, that she would be sick instead, so that he could go out and experience this incredible place and the joy of serving these people. WHAT! That is the gospel. John 15:13 - "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends." She was literally laying down her life for her friend. It was incredible to see these kids develop a heart for people and truly start to see the gospel transform their hearts.
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| Arts & crafts outside the medical clinic |
Overall, the trip was awesome. The Lord is good. We went down with the intention of blessing this community, and in turn were blessed beyond belief. I think everyone who went on the trip would agree that they will never be the same. And we're all counting down the days and praying for opportunities to go back again!
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| Los ninos at the playground dedication |
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| Beautiful sunset our last night at the hotel |
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