A town called Rio Grande and our time in it

 

Rio Grande, Costa Rica –

Let me share a little bit of the home we made there through image and word<3.

Some of us slept in hammocks looking out at the fruit farm, some inside on the ground. There’s one mini store in walking distance, and just 30 minutes further down a dirt path is a nestled-in mini beach that I miss already. It’s a town where homes are a open, welcoming invitation and you walk oxen in your rain boots, with a machate in your pocket. We gardened, cleaned up beaches, preached in church, and loved on the people…

I’m still support raising these next 2 weeks. You can donate at the top of this page to this incredible thing I have gotten to do, discipline and loving on 30 people and spreading Light and Love in Jesus, that we’d all serve beautiful people of this world like the ones above and below. 

I’m grateful for you reader. For the glory and love written inside of you by the Maker who wants to know you deeper each passing breathe.

Never forget those stunning moments where the light against the ocean moonlight hit foreign faces exactly before your eyes, you connected with them you shared stories of praying over prostitutes in Indonesia, they shared songs, they share tears of a recent tragedy, they shared the common passion to share the love of Jesus

But there’s something about sitting next to, connecting with locals where you feel alive. Where you know what you’re meant to do, and it has to do with them. You know it, cus they fascinate you, and they are beautiful. And you want the Lord’s love to cover them. Because it is their culture and their love that fills the earth with His glory and I can’t help but want to be a part of it for every nation 

This man walked up to us and gave a 30 min sermon in Spanish. He said our simple smiles and our Dios le bendiga as we walk by makes a difference in this small town

25 year old single mother had 7 children that we fell in love with. Walking over to the plaza where we’d play with them, were two men that we got to pray with.

The first the Lord highlighted to me numerous times; his wife deaf, his 8 year old boy died years ago. The other Daisy had said at the beginning of our walk we need to stop if we see him; of course he came. The first just got bad news at a doctor’s appt, the second shared the loneliness of his life. For paths to be interrupted, for God to show He cares.

Once we get to the plaza, we also get to play soccer with locals our age. One of them became a dear friend. He had stopped following the way of the Lord, and by the end of our time with him said I know like we talked about, the way of God is life; I know I’ll return to it. 

Hector, Patricia, and Tamara cried tears of love as we left them and prayed for them, to have mattered to ppl of the nations

And I was surprised by one of their tears. The Lord led me to give her the necklace I had waited to give since my international race. I knew it was for her, and it touched her. She saw that she matters, got to tell her God has big plans for you

Why can’t we be like them, and wear our hearts on our sleeve?

 

Divine appointment testimony at the clinic

We met T as we struggled to speak Spanish at the clinic, he said he felt a pull to come talk to us. He said he could tell we had this vibe that wouldn’t ignore him. He showed us quickly the cuts on his arms he had made in the past in states of hopelessness. Aneleise gently and kindly shared her testimony from hopelessness to joy in Christ to him. He had a terrible migraine, we prayed when he came back to talk to us later that’d it be gone. His pain was so much better when we came back, and we told him it’s because we prayed!

As he sacrificed his own appt efficiency, he worked for ours. He even ended up paying for our Uber on the way home. We were there for hours, but the Lord kept extending and making perfect the time to talk to T. He couldn’t believe that it’d be us from the United States at this clinic talking to him about Jesus. He’d been hurt by the church, so he left it. He misses it. He says even when he goes his own way; he sees the Lord’s hand. We screamed love on him, and encouraged him to read that Bible he still has and that the Lord NEVER stops pursuing us. He shared that Jesus was the one who ate with sinners, Amen my friend. Amen to the God who loves like this. He has divine appointments and purpose for you in any moment. For if there’s a person there, there’s a need for more of Love there

 

We are like waterfalls, we are literally just rocks without the water, the Spirit running through us, where we make room the Spirit to run through the rocky places, the caverns, the slow and fast and deeply and shallow parts of us there is beauty He makes and oxygen and life and vegetation 

We get to be a church of 30, and form the culture of how we want it to be. We started to create more space for God to move this week. As we did, one racer got visions from the Lord for the first time, one felt the Holy Spirit tingling as heat in her fingers and had the Lord speak some of the most beautiful things I’ve ever heard, and we saw Him answer prayers so vividly. 

Your identity is a worshiper 

Is He not worthy of our bodies of our 
mouths of our uncomfortability of 
looking foolish

I want us to be hungry for Him

Make room for the Potter

One touch, one word can change everything 

In worship we find joy and freedom

Maybe no one has ever told them that in the Lord’s Presence 
is when you can be the most 
free, yourself, spontaneous 

There is the place to be like a child, to express all of you

And I couldn’t get that time when one ran joyfully through the field out of my mind

So I went up to her

And we ran through the field

Under Costa Rican stars

And a bright moon sometimes hidden by 
silver clouds 

That’s what I want you to take away from 
this trip

Is living your life as worship

Connecting to the Lord without barrier and in freedom

Where it comes naturally to praise

Because He’s worthy of every breathe

Of all your pride

Of all your time

Of all your body

Of all your mind

He is worthy

He’s walking me through some awesome revelations right now. There’s multiple times in the past two days where He’s turned tears into praise, it’s an unfolding of so much of my life and the way I’ve lived in my mind…probs share more in another blog. In the meantime, praying debrief goes well, my co leaders and I get to run it and give teachings and all. And then we go to Panama!

Freedom looks different this time around

Laying on a Costa Rican beach I looked up and noticed how different the birds that search the sky are shaped here. Cageless birds is the song that had marked my race and the freedom I’d walk in even through the trials.  

The Lord spoke to me your freedom now as a squad leader is taking on a different form,I’m doing a new thing 

Christ was pierced because of us in anguish and on his back of agony we get freedom and rejoicing

Enchained to Christ, there are no other chains

Show up boldly

Today you have my yes, today Lord you have my life. Today I’m a slave to Christ. Not a slave to fear or the worlds standards. Give me a teachable heart 

The world, a significant other, a career, money, passions, whatever it is cannot offer you anything that I (God) haven’t already!!!

To be clear Ephesians 2:6.
 That’s how I see you royalty, 
no you didn’t deserve it, 
but it’s reality that 
I’m seating you high 
by My Grace alone