Panama memories!

Christian Temple

What a thrill for everyone to be able to attend the Assemblies of God church right down the street from the hotel! It was fabulous! David Godwin pioneered the work and when I heard that name, I remembered him from Spain. He has started numerous churches in Latin America, but he also was a church planter in Spain when we lived there. This is one of his legacy's.

Pastor Dixson was so kind. We really enjoyed his ministry. He began his sermon with prayer for the United States. He was so sensitive to our group and making us feel comfortable. What a preacher! It was a great day.

Our Four Day Trip to Panama...

Every 90 days we load a bus to Panama to accommodate the visa requirements for the students. It is a great trip! This was my first, but not Denn's. He has gone before. When we loaded the bus on Friday morning, I didn't know what to expect. I had no clue where I was headed! It was so much fun. There were 39 of us.

 It is a long trip because of making comfort stops but also because the customs at the boarder takes at least 2 hours.

So we left on Friday at 7:00 in the morning and arrived at the hotel in David, Panama at 6:00. Just in time for dinner. The hotel is so nice, beautiful rooms and 4 restaurants.

 It is right in the heart of the city so we were able to walk to most places. It is a Spanish speaking weekend, not an English retreat! Teachers gave us homework on Thursday and we added a beautiful component to this trip and we will continue to do so. A Cincel professor went with us as well as our administrative assistant. This was the first for a professor to go. What a delight. Just her presence kept everyone remembering why we are here, but also she was able to converse at meals with different families. She went shopping with different ones, she was in the pool with yet some more. So it was perfect in every way!

October..a beautiful month for a wedding!

Each month I host Chica-Time. A time for the women students to share a little lunch and "just be together!" Since Ryan and Lauren's wedding is October 25, I decided that would be our theme for today's Chica-Time. How special it was.

One of the new students, Jess, catered for 10 years. She also studied culinary arts, specifically baking. What a special treat to eat one of her cakes! Her husband told me she was out looking for flowers this morning to decorate the cake! It really was a wedding cake and oh so tasty! One layer was white and one was chocolate.

One of the third trimester students did a project last trimester that was a research on Latin American weddings. Janene gave her presentation to us since some of us weren't here last tri. It was so fascinating and raised alot of conversation about out own weddings and questions about what she learned from many interviews and discussions with other nationalities. It was so good.

Notice the orchid on the table. A beautiful Costa Rican orchid that Denn bought for my table. So beautiful!

Gifts.

When we were language school students in 1987 one of our teachers was Vicky. She was always so precise, so intentional, so supportive. She is a gifted teacher. Vicky was raised in a Methodist church although didn't have a a vibrant life in Christ. When she began to work at the language school at 18, she worked in the mornings teaching missionaries the language and then entered her other life. She was studying in the university of Costa Rica. There she became a part of the communist movement. This was in the early seventies. She was teaching U.S. missionaries in the morning and protesting American imperialism in the afternoons, including going to the U.S. Embasy to throw rocks and painting graffiti on the walls. The Communist group was divided on if the revolution here in Costa Rica should be peaceful or violent. Some of her compatriots in the University were going to Cuba and Nicaragua for training. She learned how to make molotov cocktails and how to shoot to kill. Vicky's character wouldn't allow her to become violent so in her disillusionment she left the group. She married, had 2 children, divorced. After the divorce she thought it was important for the girls to go to church. At the same time she was still teaching Spanish to missionaries. From the testimonies of the missionaries and attending the church, she got saved! God got ahold of her life in a magnificent way. She loves Jesus. She loves missionaries. She loves following Christ.

She retired from teaching and has been volunteering her time teaching English to Asians here in Costa Rica. A few months ago Denn learned that we needed to hire another teacher part time. He could have never dreamed that God would bring Vicky back to Cincel. Through a series of events she is now a part time professor once again for Cincel.

This morning she gave her testimony in chapel and wow is all I can say. I had heard it before, now hearing it again I stand amazed at God's grace. After she finished Denn had the Cincel staff come to the front and each one of the students went to one or more of the teachers and staff and gave words of appreciation. After they encouraged one another, they prayed together. Talk about special. There were lots of tears. Not of sadness, but of pure love and appreciation. Can you imagine how much reward the professors will receive one day when lots of people stand before the throne and through a missionary that learned to speak Spanish they were won to the Kingdom of God. It really is mind boggling. Their daily work is so much more than that. It reaches to many countries, many people and many forms of  ministries. We are all a team, I am so glad we are on the same one.

central market in the rain....

What a beautiful day! After work we went downtown San Jose. I have been longing to do this since my arrival and with so much going on we couldn't fit it in! But today we had too! We leave for Panama this weekend and the next weekend we are in the States for 3 weeks. So today we had too! I had some things I just had to pick up and away we went. When we arrived it wasn't raining, when we left, oh my!

It is a very turbulent rainy season. They say October is the worst month to be here and I believe it as far as the weather goes! Yesterday the turbulence was so great we couldn't hear the person speaking in front of us. Today it was bad again but that's okay. We walked the walk we used to walk when we were students in 1987. We went to some landmarks that today are changed but we remember what was. We had so much fun. When we were students before every week at least once we would catch a bus downtown, eat and browse and then get home to study. We were out practicing our Spanish then we would go home to do the book work. Today we have a car. We parked in a public parking place and walked again in the rain. Thank God for the big umbrellas Denn found here! My shoes were just black when we arrived home tonight. That's okay, I would do it again tomorrow if I could!

The market is under roof so it was fun to shop and talk and shop some more. I found the items I needed, but more than the shopping, it is the experience. I love it. Crowded, people, noise, smells of the cooking stations, just all around fun!