Mission Nicaragua 2016

MARCH 12-19, 2016

I came across these two quotes from John Piper:

“To belong to Jesus is to embrace the nations with Him”

and

“Go, Send, or Disobey”

I am so proud of my Nate for keeping His eyes on Christ and His mission, not only for himself and our family, but for our youth and church and THE Church.  He is humble, strong, sensitive, patient and a wonderful leader!  I couldn’t be more proud of him.

Nate is constantly putting himself aside for the sake of Christ.  My heart simply swells with joy, love and pride when I think of how well he leads groups to Nicaragua year after year…. And even more when I think about all the Nicaraguan lives that have been forever changed because he took the time and energy to put these trips together.

Even though I miss him every minute we’re apart, I know this is necessary and so very eternally important.  Not only do we see lives forever changed in Nicaragua, but it always changes, and blesses, every person in our groups.

Over the last five years, we have seen around 1,200 Nicaraguan people give their lives to Jesus.  On this last trip, they were amazed to see 881 salvations throughout the week.  It was a wonderful trip!

In the months leading up to the trip, we had several fundraisers.  Always fundraising…. from September to March.  Anyways, one of them was a garage sale.  Mollie isn’t too big on giving away any of her toys, but we were able to make some small cuts.  When it came down to having two “Joy” figurines (from the movie “Inside Out”) she wanted desperately to keep both.  Then after a few days of her thinking about how it could make a Nicaragua little girl very happy, she gave it to her Daddy to take with him.  It was so sweet to see her little heart wanting to help.

So that’s exactly what Nate did.  He found the perfect time to give “Joy” to a sweet little girl in Nicaragua. Her name is Catherine and Mollie still talks about making her happy when her dad gave her “Joy.”

It reminded all of us that small sacrifices given with great love means more than anything.

They also had a great fun day where Nate sledded down a huge volcano.  That. Is. Crazy!

We were also super proud of our great youth that went down this time.  It was the second trip for a few of them, first international anything for three of them, and the first time on a plane for another… They did so great and we couldn’t be more proud of them…. Dylan, Colin, Maddie, Katelin, Kayleigh, Shelby