New Beginnings

Since arriving here in Costa Rica to study Spanish I have had the privilege to be a part of a ministry began by one of my colleagues who has since passed the baton on to others, who have in turn passed it on to us. The place is called House of Restoration for Men. There is also a women's house that you can read about on this site where Kirsten serves as well.

Visiting the House of Restoration has definitely taken me out of my comfort zone, as least what was left of it after uprooting our family and moving to a foreign land with a most-foreign language. Here, men are struggling to leave a life on the street, a life of substance abuse, violence, and despair. It is not the typical recovery center you would find in the States. There are no counselors or professional treatment programs. There is simply no money. What is there is a commitment to the use of Biblical principles to teach faith and reliance on God to overcome life's challenges.

That is where we come in. Each Monday, a few of us language students come to share a time of fellowship and study in God's Word. We are welcome and one of several teams from various ministries that come in during the week. This week was a particularly uncomfortable one for me as I had finally stepped up to lead the Bible study after struggling just to communicate and understand others for months. The meetings are held entirely in Spanish so the anxiety factor was high. Anyone here can tell you I am not very functional in Spanish, but the need is great and our God is greater.

There are a lot of new faces at the house since the Christmas break, so I thought I would share a basic evangelistic message that I thought would be a shame to take for granted that all have heard. I began the time together asking the men why they were there. This drew, as you can imagine, a few blank stares. I clarified by asking them not why they were in this house or this program, but rather why are they here on this planet. What were they created for? More blank stares.

I lead the men through the story of creation and how God created us in his image. Why? A relationship with Him. I showed them the Greatest Commandment in Matthew 22 - "...love the Lord with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind..." How can we do this if we do not have that relationship with Him. What hope is there for any of us?

We then began to search through the text of Romans. What is God's purpose for us? What prevents us from having that relationship? How did God remedy that problem? And lastly, what will our response be to God's provision for us through Jesus Christ?

Now, my Spanish is atrocious. It was all I could do to read my pre-written comments. I told the men up front that I would be asking them a lot of questions but would most likely not understand their replies. They assured me that it did not matter. They are a very patient group and used to putting up with us gringo language students. So, with a sense of impending embarrassment and humiliation I pressed on.

God showed me something that day. He showed me just how powerful His Word is and how sovereign He is. He showed me that the Gospel was His and His alone. It did not come in the door with me. It was there with Him when I got there. When we came to the end of the "lesson plan" I asked the men to consider what they had heard. I asked if there was anyone present who would be willing to put their trust in that provision alone and turn from all other attempts to be acceptable to God, to please God, and to earn what they were looking for. Who wants to have that relationship, that forgiveness, and that assurance? To my amazement, at least 15 men bowed and prayed to receive Christ as Lord and Savior of their life.

The man in me wants to analyze what happened and ask myself if they really meant it. Were they just going through the motions to make the Missionary Man look good on his Spanish debut. I don't think so. I think God showed Himself real that day and I cannot wait to get back to hear how he is working in their lives already. I think He showed us in no uncertain terms that when you speak to people about their Creator, the language is universal and very personal.

Please pray for these men and others who will be coming through the house in the weeks and months to come. Pray that God will show them just how much they mean to Him and that He has already won the victory they so desperately seek. For the men who are now my brothers in Christ, pray that they will grow in their desire to know Him more, that they will know what it means to overcome through faith in the Overcomer.

For us, pray that we will be able to begin a discipleship of these men and that more students will join in the work. We only have a few short weeks or months to spend with the men as they pass through the house. May our time with them count. May this place indeed be a place of new beginnings.

One drop of Crimson

Basilica de Nuestra Señora de los Angeles is located in Cartago (about 25 minutes from San Francisco de Dos Rios). It was originally built in the mid 1600s, but has subsequently been rebuilt several times over the years due to earthquakes. On August 2, 1635, Costa Rican folklore says that the Virgin Mary showed herself as a small, black doll to a young girl named Juana Pereira. After the doll disappeared and reappeared several times at the creek where Juana had found it, the Catholic Church agreed that the Virgin wanted a cathedral built on that spot. The Basilica is today considered the holiest church in Costa Rica, and every August 2, the faithful make their way from all over the country, many walking for days on the side of the road, to pay homage to "La Negrita", the little black statue of the Virgin Mary found by the little girl over 370 years ago. The statue can still be seen today on the same rock it was supposedly found on.

People come to the Basilica in hopes of redeeming their loved ones from purgatory. You can purchase gold charms in front of the church to receive a healing. You can purchase charms in different shapes like arms, legs, stomachs, hearts, etc... Holy water runs from a spring there at the church and many people believe that it has special healing powers. Just about anything can be purchased in front of the Basilica... charms, holy water, rosaries, toys, even lottery tickets. I wondered if Jesus would have cleared the place like the temple 2000 years ago.

Probably the most moving sight for us when we visited earlier this month was that of people coming to the door of the church and immediately dropping to their knees to begin the long slow procession towards the front of the church on their hands and knees. Many are petitioning for healing of an illness. Some are pleading forgiveness for past sins. Sadly enough many are making this painful crawl for loved ones that have died in hopes they will be released from purgatory. All of this moved me to tears. As I sat in a pew and just took it all in, my oldest sat next to me and asked me why they were crawling to the front. I explained, "They don't understand, honey. All they need is the blood of Jesus. This statue can not bring them their healing, remove their suffering, or save their loved ones. Only Jesus."

The song is "Crimson" by Nicole Nordeman.

Birth Pains

Thursday afternoon at 1:11 our world was literally rocked. About 20 miles from us in a tourist area we visited during December, an earthquake of 6.1 magnitude shook all of Costa Rica and our neighbors in Nicaragua and Panama. What seemed like an eternity actually lasted only 40 seconds. As it first started I believed, like previous tremors we have felt, that this was just a little one. I discovered as the bed I was studying in did not stop jiggling, but actually started moving across the room that this was not just a little tremor. I heard Ken and the kids going to the front carport and realized Cade was still in his bunk bed in his bedroom. As I reached to get him the jiggling stopped so I thought, "Oh, it must be over." The jiggling turned into the kind of swaying one might experience on a small boat on the high seas. I quickly snatched up our youngest and ran for the door. Our Tico empleada was praying out loud "Santo Dios, ayudanos!" (Holy God help us!) I realized this was the real deal and started to pray myself. When the earthquake stopped I realized almost all of my neighbors had left their homes and were in the street. With all the power lines I'm not sure that is the safest place, but we have decided to have an emergency plan for the future now.

My neighbor said he thought we were close to the epicenter. Come to find out we were 20 miles from it. The town that was hit hardest is still searching for those missing. The death toll is at 34 with 64 still missing. Many children were killed in large mud slides while playing outside. Tourists in the area were also killed. Scarily enough there have been over 2,000 aftershocks. We have felt several of them.

We watched the coverage late into the night as the rescue workers tried desperately to get to people buried beneath the dirt that slid down the sides of the mountain. Connor asked me at one point what was that white bag they were trying to dig up. As I listenend to the newscaster I realized that they were trying to get to two little girls that had been buried alive while selling candy on the side of the street to tourists during their summer break. This picture is of the parents of those two girls. Please keep them in your prayers.

As you look at these pictures I ask that you would pray for the people of Costa Rica, especially those from Alajuela where the quake hit hardest. There is an active volcano there (Poas) that some believe could cause problems if we continue to have many quakes this year. Most of all please pray that the people of this area would seek the Lord as their source of comfort and healing. Thank you for your prayers and for your concern for us during this time.

...There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All of these are the beginning of birth pains...

Matthew 24:7-8

That's a bunch of bull!

Every year for 2 weeks in December, San José hosts what some Ticos claim to be the event of the year. Los Toros, the Costa Rican annual bullfights are a sight to behold. Never having a desire to see a bull slowly tortured to death, attending one of these events has never been on my "do before I die" list. However, here in Costa Rica, a bullfight is not the fancy-pants show you have seen on TV and movies. There is no three-cornered and fringed hat, no silk hosiery, and certainly no red cape. Instead, what we have is more like the product of a mixed marriage between the running of the bulls in Pamplona and the WWF. We don't kill the bulls here. In fact, the bull has the upper hoof most of the time.

The object here is to release a large, highly irritated bull, complete with goring apparatus into a redondel (bullring about the size a rodeo ring) to be taunted by a few hundred of Costa Rica's judgement-challenged, machismo-obsessed, allegedly sober citizenry. In fact, sobriety is a test before entering the ring. Though safety is not sacrosanct, at least they strive to give these poor hombres (and a few mujeres) a fighting chance by ensuring they have command of what is left of their senses. They run around the bull, swatting at his back side, trying to pull his tale, and generally anything else they can get away with to get the bulls attention and provoke an adrenaline inducing few seconds of sheer terror as he attempts to run them down with the aforementioned goring apparatus positioned for maximum effect. Most scamper away safely, but a few leave with permanent reminders of their flirtation with death.

They hold two shows a day for the duration, resulting in a great number of battered and bruised participants. And, just in case you are wondering, gorings are not terribly uncommon. They even have a special medical treatment facility accessible from the ring fully manned with paramedics and replete with the necessary life-saving equipment.

My colleague, Anthony, invited me to a show one evening after Christmas. Being the culturally sensitive lifelong learner that I am I said yes. The video pretty much says it all, so take a look and see for yourself. Except for the occasional electric goad, I would think most animal activists would find this turning of the tables acceptable. In the body count, the bull always wins.

¡Disfruta!

Ken