Good morning! Yesterday, we went to the church in San Jose to do some serious cleaning and organizing. We mopped, dusted, swept, hammered, and scrubbed everywhere. That church was clean after we were done with it!
After our amazing lunch, we drove through San Jose as Michele Perez explained to us how prostitution and human trafficking/sex tourism work in Costa Rica. My eyes as well as the eyes of many of my team members have truly been opened to understand how widespread of a problem it is worldwide as well as how horrific it is. It is hard to ignore a problem once you hear the stories of women and children and their needs. The picture below is of the gates that lead into the Rahab Foundation. Behind these gates is a three story building that serves as temporary housing for women coming out of prostitution or have been rescued from the sex tourism industry as well as the center for counseling and education. The women in the program must participate in individual and group counseling where the Gospel is shared openly and freely. They also receive education on a trade so they can have the tools to support themselves.
After dinner, we decided to use our CRamily time to bless our missionary family with the gifts that we brought for them as well as the funds that we raised through various fundraisers. It felt so good being able to give something that will go directly to help their ministry continue to grow. Yet, there is still so much needed. For me personally, I know that my mission is not over once I leave Costa Rica. There's so much that we can do even from back in the states to be able to support Bob and Michele's ministry.
Today we will be visiting two orphanages. Our prayer is that we give it all away today...that we empty ourselves completely. Today is our last day of this trip on this mission field. It is definitely going to be sad saying good-bye tomorrow. We have all fallen in love with the Perez family and are in awe of all they do for God.
Your posts have truly been a blessing to us at home... Thank you for serving in such a huge way! May you all have a safe flight home and get some rest!! Good job guys!!
ReplyDeleteHey Team!! As I was sitting here catching up on your adventures from yesterday and thinking about how you must have mixed emotions about coming home, I want to leave you with a short story to inspire you. I was talking with DJ and Kari Soto on Sunday and they shared with me how DJ's parents were born and raised in Costa Rica. Kari told me if it had not been for an American Missions team coming to Costa Rica many years ago, her life would be very different today. You see, DJ's parents were just teenagers when they accepted Jesus as their personal Savior because of hearing about His free gift of salvation through an American team that came to Costa Rica just like you all! To God be the glory for the way He has used you to plant seeds of hope and for the souls that were saved because of your sacrifice to die to self and give it your all to reach His people.
ReplyDeleteI pray that this special time of ministering will be forever in your heart as you continue to walk through this life in Christ, looking for new ways to serve Him. See you soon!!
Many blessings, Brenda
Please let me know how I can help from PA. Beira knows how to reach me. This specific issue is one that keeps me up at night. I will do ANYTHING I can to put a stop to it. God bless all of you for having the guts to go where you are needed. Safe travels back. Prayers sent.
ReplyDeleteLooks like a wonderful trip; just curious...the church is a Catholic church? They don't worship statues or idols; they are venerated.
ReplyDeleteCatholics use statues, paintings, and other artistic devices to recall the person or thing depicted. Just as it helps to remember one’s mother by looking at her photograph, so it helps to recall the example of the saints by looking at pictures of them. Catholics also use statues as teaching tools. In the early Church they were especially useful for the instruction of the illiterate. Many other churches have pictures of Jesus and other Bible pictures in Sunday school for teaching children. Catholics also use statues to commemorate certain people and events,just as many other churches, Protestant included, have three-dimensional nativity scenes at Christmas.
The Church absolutely recognizes and condemns the sin of idolatry. What some people fail to recognize is the distinction between thinking a piece of stone or plaster is a god and desiring to visually remember Christ and the saints in heaven by making statues in their honor. The making and use of religious statues is a thoroughly biblical practice.
Statues were used in the Old Testament: statues of angels adorned the Ark of the Covenant.
During a plague of serpents sent to punish the Israelites during the exodus, God told Moses to "make [a statue of] a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole; and every one who is bitten, when he sees it shall live. So Moses made a bronze serpent, and set it on a pole; and if a serpent bit any man, he would look at the bronze serpent and live" (Num. 21:8–9).
One had to look at the bronze statue of the serpent to be healed, which shows that statues could be used ritually, not merely as religious decorations.
Catholics do not worship statues or icons.