Hello to our church family at Westheights. We arrived safely home about 11:00 pm last night (Sunday). The flights went very smoothly and everything was on schedule. We had a scheduled 7.5 hour layover in San Salvadore but it did not seem too long as the team played a card game of Chase the Ace to help pass the time. Marg Simpson is the official Chase the Ace champion of our team for 2011. Chase the Ace became one of the favourite things to do on a few of the evenings during our trip. Of course going to the Ice Cream store every night around 9:00 pm was even more popular.
Overall, we had an an awesome time helping the church in Leon. The second floor of the church building is now complete. We also added a wheel chair ramp on the side of the building and painted the entire first floor sanctuary. Of course, the Kids program will leave the greatest lasting impact on the church and the city of Leon. We will never know the difference we have made by bringing the message of the gospel to the 50 kids that came to the program each day during the two weeks.
In general the health of the team was really good. Matt Reist became ill (Montezuma’s revenge) for a couple of days but has fully recovered and is back to normal … at least normal for Matt. He actually had to start back to work this morning at 6:00 am. Poor guy.
During our last meal in Managua on the night before our departure flight we met up with the missions team from Wainfleet BIC church who were also flying home on the same day as our team. They were on different flights but still heading to the airport about the same time as we were. It was interesting to see some friends from another church so far away from home.
There are many stories to tell and if you have been reading the blog you have seen just the tip of the iceberg. On March 6th at 5:30 pm the team will do a presentation for the church family. I hope that you will attend and see for yourself the impact the experience has made on the 13 people that went to serve in Leon. And I truly hope that every single person in our church will eventually join a team and go to serve the poor of this world.
If you were to ask me what impacted me the most I would immediately say it was the people and the kids. During the two weeks in Leon, I met a little girl named Reina. You could not help but love her. I wanted to bring her home and give her the same opportunity my two girls have had but of course I could not. I truly hope that some day, in heaven more than likely, I will see Reina again. Perhaps, in the way Jesus describes in Luke 16, Reina will greet the team that went to Nicaragua in February of 2011 at the gates of heaven as friends and welcome us into our eternal dwellings.
Jesus: I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings. Luke 16:9