Living Hope Spring Break

Well, I finally went through my Spring Break pictures and want to share them with you. We spent a week in a town right outside of Chinandega. It's about 3 hours outside of Managua. We partnered up with a local Nicaraguan pastor and his church and worked together to reach out to an area where his church is planning to expand. We spent the first day just walking the area and praying and the other days we went door to door handing out the book of Luke and inviting people to see the Jesus film in an open outdoor area. Several people put their faith in Christ during the week. I really enjoyed a moment where I was able to pray with a mom and her daughter to accept Christ. As I explained that Christ died for our sins and offers forgiveness and a new life, an eternal life with God forever they were wide eyed and hungry to listen. She said no one had ever told her this before. I gave her a bookmark with clear scriptures about what I was sharing and a new testament because she didn't have one. Then she and her daughter said they wanted to put their faith in Christ for their forgiveness of sin, salvation, and to have the eternal life He offers. It's beautiful to be a messenger. Many people have never heard. It's that simple. If they haven't heard, then we should tell them. God, help us to be bold witnesses of your grace and truth.

Lanzamientos!!!

Lanzamientos are what we do once a year in all our Bible Clubs. We work with youth and college age kids so our program coincides with their school year. Their school year is just beginning and so the Clubs do a big kick-off activity to start their ministry year with a bang. It's hard to explain exactly what a lanzamiento is so I'm just going to post some pictures of lanzamientos in three different Clubs that Jader and I attended. These youth get really creative when their plan their lanzamientos!!!

Lanzamiento de Tabernaculo



Lanzamiento de Elim




Lanzamiento de Encuentro con Cristo

Nica Food

I have a great love for Nicaraguan food! I'd like to share with you what we often eat here in Nicaragua. It's one of my favorite meals. It's called gallo pinto. It's basically beans and rice but you cook the beans the old fashioned way and not straight out of the can. Also you add garlic, onion, bell pepper, and some seasoning. Jader and I eat it several times a week. Often for breakfast, but really any time of the day is great.

Also something very Nicaraguan are plantains. They are really big bananas that you fry. If they are ripe they come out really sweet and if they are really green they come out more like a potato.

I also added a picture of one of my favorite things. It's cheese that you cook in a pan. It's called queso ahumado and it's one of the best foods on the planet. We buy it on the street outside our grocery store. They have a huge block of it and they cut off chunks and sell it to you just like that. Most Nicas fry their cheese but I usually put a little Pam and it's enough. I try to be healthy if at all possible.

Jader and I will be looking around for furniture tomorrow. As you can see he's sitting in a folding chair. :) But thankgoodness we have those folding chairs and they are actually quite comfy.

Well, as time goes by I will continue to share with you some of the foods we eat over here in Nicaragua. Yum!!!

Wedding Photos!!!!

I've been wanting to share these for a long time and now they are up and ready to view. Here's a slideshow of our wedding! It was at a place called the Kyle House in Bryan, TX and we kept the wedding pretty small. We had around 85 to 90 guests. My pastor Butch from Living Hope married us and the Director of Word of Life, Guillermo Aguilar, also had a time of sharing during the ceremony. The background music was classical guitar and my aunt sang Amazing Grace (Chris Tomlin version) and Mayra and Andrea Aguilar sang a bilingual version of Great is Thy Faithfulness. It was a bilingual wedding. We actually did our vows in Spanish! :) I hope you feel like you are there as you view the photos!

Apartment pictures

I have not disappeared off the face of the earth. Im sure you may think that! We have been busy situating ourselves into our apartment along with doing a week of outreach with my home church Living Hope. I want to share with you all some photos of our apartment before the cleaning and set-up. Some came out a bit blurry because the camera can be really sensitive and Jader is not used to it. But, you will be able to get an idea of what the place is like. I have the wedding pics to share but I will have to wait until I can use my personal laptop which I dont have access to right now. Anyways, I hope you enjoy these pictures and I will be posting wedding and Living Hope Outreach pictures soon. Enjoy!

apartment

A new life together

Jader and I have been married for 26 days now and we are loving married life!!! I'll be posting wedding pictures soon along with apartment photos. We arrived to Nicaragua one week ago and are getting settled in to our new home. I look forward to sharing more with you shortly!

Time has passed!

I can't believe that it's the 13th of February and I'm getting married tommorrow! I have left a big gap on my blog between the time we had camp in Nicaragua and today. I returned to the states a little over a week ago and have been very busy with wedding preparations and enjoying this time here with my family. I have much to tell. Many gaps to fill in regarding all the amazing things God did during our three weeks of camp, more pictures to share, and some to share about the neat blessings I've experienced over the past week or so of wedding prepration. Next time I write I'll be married!!! :) It will probably be post honeymoon and I'll have some wedding photos to share! Anyways, I've had a few people remind me that I haven't written on my blog and I'm encouraged to keep writing. I believe I have some loyal readers out there! :) Thanks for keeping in touch!