When it 'Works'

Door to door evangelism.
Usually this makes one think of Jehovah's Witnesses or Mormons or an evangelical Christian technique that is antiquated and totally doesn't work. That's what I've always thought, too. When it was announced in church two Sundays ago that the whole of the Dominican Republic was going to be canvassed by evangelical (not Catholic) Christians going door to door and that our church was going to participate, my head was immediately filled with cynical thoughts. I also felt relief, knowing that it was optional and that my Spanish wasn't really good enough to make me be an effective witness anyway. And then the Pastor announced that everyone taking discipleship class would be required to participate. Uh, that means me. But, surely he won't send out the Americans! I thought, aghast. But then a little voice in the back of my head gently reminded me that (1) I'm a missionary and this is why I came here and (2) I've been speaking to people in Spanish for well over a year now and surely I would be able to get a simple message about Jesus out. Ugh. Don't these people KNOW that door to door evangelism puts people off and pushes them farther away from wanting to ever hear about the love of Jesus? Regardless of my arrogant 'expertise', I prayed, nonetheless, that God would prepare my heart to go do this thing. Oddly, as the date drew closer, I became more and more excited about going out to do it.
When all of us gathered together on Saturday afternoon at the church, it was announced that we were to split into groups of 3-- a guy with 2 girls. Thankfully a young Columbian girl I knew latched her arm into mine and picked which guy we could go with. As we set out, I made sure to let them both know that my Spanish wasn't good enough to communicate the Gospel, but they weren't having it. At the first house, we were immediately invited in to sit down and were served coffee Dominican style-- very strong with loads of sugar. We quickly discovered that they were already Christians and I was relieved. We offered to pray for the husband who had a bandage on his leg. We prayed blessing over the house and the family. We went on to the next house. Again, we were immediately welcomed in. The three of us sat down with a young mother. Laura, the Columbian girl, started to share with her about the Gospel, but having never done it before, was quite nervous and kept leaving out major details. When I looked to Angelo to hopefully take over and explain things, he just looked at me sheepishly. That's when something shifted in me. I just looked at this woman and without hesitation told her the whole story of Adam and Eve, about sin and what it means, about the debt we owe to God for our sin and how Jesus came to pay that debt for us by giving His own life on the Cross. I told her what it meant to believe in Jesus, what it would mean for her to be able to live eternally with God because of what Jesus did for her. All of this flowed out of me in perfect Spanish. And then she accepted Jesus to be her Savior and Lord.
God does not like to be put in a box. Before going out, I had limited Him in my own mind. It hadn't really occurred to me that door to door evangelism in a country that LOVES it when people drop by to visit, woud be a very effective way to share the Gospel here. As well, I had limited His power by believing He couldn't use me just because I don't speak fluent Spanish. I was so humbled, but so overflowing with joy that I could have gone door to door all night. We actually did go to several more homes and were able to pray for many people. I was again reminded why I love being a missionary, why I continue to go out to different countries: Jesus loves people and He shows up when we go to love them in His Name. If you want intimacy with Jesus, go love on a poor person, a broken-hearted person, a really down and out person, because that's where He loves to be. And healing occurs. Relationships are healed. Real transformation, the kind that only God can bring, takes place. It is exciting to see Heaven come to Earth.
God put me in my place, and I loved it.

We got a dog.
Well, Katie got a dog and Amy and I just play with her.
We named her Feliz, which means 'happy'. I would never name a dog Happy in English unless I had a very young child who insisted on it and cried a lot at my resistance to the name. But, Feliz has a nice ring to it, I think.
She's a great dog. I am normally not a fan of the lab variety of dog, and so I'm trying not to hold the fact that she's 1/3 lab against her. She is also 1/3 Dalmatian and 1/3 Great Dane. But she pretty much looks all lab except for her underbelly which is white and black spotted and the little tuft of white fur on her chest. She is incredibly obedient and has the softest head of any dog I've ever petted. Plus, the fur along her back is starting to get coarse and wavy, which bears a striking resemblance to my hair, so that made me love her even more. Isn't she adorable??

Nos Hemos Mudado!

Simply, Amy and I have moved.
Yes, after 17 months of living together in our little 'cottage' in the middle of a bumpy dirt road, we finally let our new friend (and SI staff member) Katie convince us that we 3 should live together and find a bigger house to let that happen. While I was in the states over Christmas, Katie looked at a house here that she thought would be perfect, but too expensive. When Amy and I got back here in January, we went to look at it, fell in love and begged the owners (Dominicanyorks-- Dominicans who live in New York) to lower the price. They refused. We were bummed. The next day they called and said they'd lower the price. We were ecstatic. The next hurdle to get through was finding people to take over the lease on Amy's and my house and keep our two brutish Dobermans. Thankfully, Josh and Vicki (who are about to join our staff) agreed to take over the lease and keep our doggies. God works all things together for the good.
So, a week ago today we moved into a palace. I'm not joking. This place is HUGE. It has 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, a dining room, kitchen, living room and a separate room just off of my room where we keep the treadmill, yoga mats and exercise balls. We have a wide balcony that goes almost all the way around. We rent the upstairs and the downstairs in inhabited by the groundskeeper, Ysidro.
At first, I felt odd moving into such a rich looking place. I mean, we're missionaries. My monthly budget didn't increase though because, even though I pay a little more for rent, we now share the cost of paying for the cleaning lady (which I was paying by myself at the old place, while Amy payed for the lawn guy, who we no longer need since new house comes with a lawn guy), and we share the utilities 3 ways instead of 2. However, just because our house looks extravagent, doesn't mean we don't still have the same issues. Our kitchen sink has been completely stopped up, our toilets don't flush well and half this week we were without water because... I don't even want to go into it. Not to mention it took the phone company a week to come out and hook up our service-- still waiting for the internet to get hooked up. Thankfully, we live near our staff pastor's family, so we went over there in the mornings to shower and use the bathroom and we used rain water to wash our dishes outside. We may live in a palatial estate, but we still live like Dominicans!!
Here are some photos of the new place, our new roomie and Amy washing dishes in our outdoor sink, using rain water! P.S. my ankle is mostly better, but my foot is still having issues. I'm hobbling around wearing an ace bandage, but at least it's without crutches!