Wow, it's been over a month since we updated our blog! It's been a great one, filled with visits from friends in the States who have been a tremendous blessing to us and to our missionary student community at language school.
First, David Beisiegel, a chiropractor friend of ours, came down for a medical mission to Costa Rica and Nicaragua. He offered to do free chiropractic adjustments for fellow missionary students, and 35 people took him up on it! We hadn't really thought about it, but lugging books back and forth to school, sitting in hard desks all day, sleeping on strange beds, and being stressed out about language and culture shock can take it's toll on one's spine. There were many happy students around campus after David came by!
Next, Jonathan and Joy Klee arrived to do a ministry check-in and help us make a video to capture our lives and ministry here in Costa Rica. Jonathan has his own fundraising ministry in Kansas City, and was a great help to us in preparing financially to come to the field. He has generously offered to be an ongoing support to us on the field by making this video. We took advantage of Jonathan's visit to bless the missionary student body again with a fundraising workshop. It was a great encouragement to about 25 missionaries who participated, all of whom are faced with raising financial support during a time of unprecedented financial strain in the U.S. and needed some fresh assurance that God continues to provide for all of our needs in his own creative ways.
Anyway, Jonathan and Joy have shadowed us for the better part of a week, filming as we go. We are very excited to share the final product with you all soon, and hope that it will be a good visual summary of our lives here so that you can see with your own eyes what we're up to!
Blessings,
Andrea
Hearts, Minds and Spirits Being Restored
Posted by Seth and Andrea Sears on Tuesday, October 6, 2009I thought I'd write a bit about my experiences so far at Restoration House, a recovery home for women with addictions who have been living on the street.
What an amazing and receptive group of women! They are strong -- they've seen horrible circumstances and survived them. They are spiritually hungry -- they have no illusions about their "goodness" and are seeking God because they are desperate for Him. They are welcoming -- willing to share and invite myself and other women from the language school into their lives. There are about 15 to 20 of them living in the house at any given time, and they are wide-ranging in age (ranging from high teens to over 50). I had apprehensively wondered if they would be sullen or unfriendly because of their life situation, but have found that most of them want to learn about the Bible, read it and contribute to the discussions. Thank God that their terrible circumstances have gotten them focused on what's important!
Isabel's story is a common one in the house. She did drugs when she was younger, but stopped when she got married and had children. She had 3 children, and then her husband left her. In the ensuing depression, she again turned to drugs to relieve the pain. She was out of control, lost her kids, and ended up living on the street. She now knows that her lifestyle did nothing to ease the pain, but rather caused her more and more pain. She is putting her life back together and looks forward to getting her kids back, and now knows that Christ is the only thing that will fill her and sustain her when she has problems to deal with.
We are alternating between studying through the book of Romans to go over a sound and progressive presentation of the gospel, and studying themes of interest to the group. We have covered the first 3 chapters of Romans and this week will be studying on the topic of Self-Esteem: Who Does the Bible Say We Are? Understandably, many of these woman feel worthless and used up. I pray that they will be encouraged and equipped to fight the lies of Satan and rely on God for their worth when we discuss that they are the bride of Christ, friends of God, adopted daughters given an inheritance, wives pursued by her lover even when they are faithless, and conquerors with the power of the Holy Spirit. Please join me in praying that they will grab hold of these identities and claim the love that Christ has for them each day.
Since my time with these ladies, I've seen and felt (and been somewhat surprised by the strength of) very real spiritual warfare. First, I was prevented from visiting them to start the bible study for nearly a month when I was ill. Ironically, Paul starts the book of Romans by talking about how many times he has been prevented from visiting Rome despite his heart's desire: "I planned many times to come to you (but have been prevented from doing so until now) in order that I might have a harvest among you." Romans 1:13 I don't think that's a coincidence. I believe God plans to make a harvest among these women who are so thirsty for his Word, and He WILL change their lives!
Next, a new resident shared a chilling dream she had on her second night in the home. In the dream, she could see a small group of believers worshipping God, and a large group of people worshipping Satan. She was in a neverland between the two groups of people, and knew she had a choice to make. She felt that she wanted to join the smaller group of Christians, but felt the strong pull of "the known" with the group of worldly people who followed Satan. When she tried to move in the direction of the Christians, she was confronted by Satan, who told her, "You must worship ME! We had a deal, you can't be with them! You won't be accepted!" She expressed a desire to leave him and he taunted her, saying, "I'll be waiting for you on the street; I know you'll be back." I believe these woman are regularly fighting these types of mental and emotional persecutions as they attempt to break the oppression and bondage in their lives. And how brave they are for persevering!
Finally, I've felt personally attacked this week. As I've prepared a study on self-esteem, I've experienced unexplained feelings of worthlessness myself, and found myself taking comments made by others to reinforce this view. This is not a normal preoccupation for me, and finally I realized on Sunday (at church during worship) that it is the enemy trying to distract and disable me from teaching strongly on the subject! After praying and asking God to bind these efforts, the feelings have begun to subside. I'm not one to "over-spiritualize" things (if that is really possible, that's for another blog post), but it's been made clear to me that the source of this oppression was not natural.
Please join me in praying that God would heal all of the many wounds that these women have accumulated in their lives, and specifically for the following women:
- Lorlly, who went home to return to her 8-year-old daughter after only one month in the home. This is a short time, and she was anxious about the strength of her ability to withstand temptation, but had to resume care of her daughter. We prayed fervently together before she left the home that God would protect her and strengthen her, and enable her to be a good parent to her daughter.
- Mari-Paz, who is young and lively and always contributes to the discussions. She has been in the home for about 9 months, so she is preparing to evaluate her readiness for the outside world as well.
- Jerilyn, who shows interest in learning about God's Word and actively participates in the study, but is shy about it and seems unsure of her faith.
- Isabel, mentioned above, that God would heal her wounds from divorce and life on the street and continue to grow her as she walks steadily while leaning on Him.
- Maria, who is young, pregnant, and so wants her child to be healthy and not affected by her former habits.
And please lift up all of us, including my co-teachers Helen, Sandra, and Tiffany, and ask for protection as we fight this battle (spiritual and earthly) together!
For the King,
Andrea
The title of this post has several layers of meaning for Andrea and I. She's back in action after more than two weeks sick with flu, and the pneumonia that landed her in the hospital for four days. While she was on her "vacation" as the kids and I jokingly referred to it, we had a ton of support from the States and also from our new community here. Our church, La Iglesia Berea, lifted her up in prayer throughout the illness. And our friends and fellow missionaries at the language institute fixed us meals, cared for the kids, visited her in the hospital and prayed for us, too.
All of this love and support really demonstrated the love of God for us and confirmed that He is, "... the Father of compassion, and the God of all comfort," (2 Corinthians 1:3). So, thank you for all of your love and prayer and support of us!
Andrea also had another "back in action" moment, when she and our new good friend Helen (she and her husband Steve, and daughter Nisha, are missionaries from England) went to the "Restoration House" and led the women there in a Bible Study. The women in this house are voluntarily living in a home together as they try and overcome drug addiction and life on the street. Andrea reports that all of the women were very eager to participate in the study and engage. It was a real encouragement to her to be back in the game and feeling better physically and spiritually by sharing scripture and discipling women who've known real hardship.
Finally, I've been able to go up to La Carpio several times a week and begun to engage in ministry there. While I've been making some cabinets for the offices above the shop, several young men wandered in and began hanging out, asking if they could help. What a blessing it has been to be back in action in ministry and beginning relational outreach with these young men. Please join me in praying for William, Jeffrey and Ricardo. I'm praying that we'll connect relationally and that by God's grace I'll be able to share my skills, but more importantly my faith and love for Jesus.
Many people told us that one of the fringe "benefits" of being a missionary is how many times you say goodbye to good friends. That's been the theme this week, as the trimester in language school concluded and many of our new friends are heading to the field. Today, we grabbed some pizza and met our friends Anders and Jessica at a park nearby to say goodbye to them and their kids, Addie and Boden. Anders and Jessica became fast friends these past few months and will really be missed. They're off to Chile to serve the Mapuche, an indiginous group South of Santiago.
Later this afternoon, we're going to visit Ronnie and Amanda (and kids) and say so long. They're off to San Juan, Puerto Rico, to plant a church there. They were our "Big Brother and Sister" who welcomed us to Costa Rica by finding us a place to live and stocking our fridge with food. They too, became close friends here and will be missed. So long also to David and Carol, and Darlene, classmates at ILE and close friends. David and Carol work as missionaries in Newark, NJ with World Impact. They serve a large population of Ecuadorians there. Darlene is returning to Mexico City where she's served for more than four years, supporting a church plant there and doing outreach to the poor.
What a blessing it's been to see God's will and call on other's lives and enjoy fellowship with them for a time. We're really excited to hear from these folks and receive reports from how God is using them in their different countries. And at the same time, our hearts ache somewhat to know that they're gone and we may never share the same time and experiences again.
Grace and peace,
Seth (and the gang)
Wow, we have overcome in the last two days two major bureaucratic hurdles of being strangers in a strange land!
Number One: Getting a Costa Rican driver's license yesterday. What an adventure! We went with a friend from school who also needed to do this. After she was pursued by a suspected robber in the morning before we set out, a taxi driver ditched us, an interesting medical exam, lots of waiting at the driver's license bureau, different rules at different desks from the people that helped the three of us (Andrea got a difficult person who made up new requirements that she didn't meet), more waiting, and Seth's name being misspelled on the first shot at his license, we FINALLY achieved a victory. Despite the many hurdles, God was with us: He protected Amy in escaping her pursuer (and had her meet a great "tough guy" protector in our new neighborhood -- they call him "the Russian"), gave Andrea favor with a different worker at the bureau, and got things done and us home safely in the end. Lessons in patience, you think?
Number Two: Getting extensions on our tourist visas today. We had hoped to get this done yesterday as well, but showed up just a few minutes too late to get a number in the line for that day after the ordeal with the licenses. SO, back at it first thing this morning, we were number 5 in line. Woohoo! This was a great experience in feeling like an outsider among other people who have a better idea of what's going on than you do, and don't want to tell you the secret rules of society, or don't understand that you don't know them: where should you wait, when do you know that it's your turn, where do you get the mysterious stamps that we didn't know we had to have, etc.? How humbling! After only and hour and half, we were on our way and hit the worst traffic jam we've been in here. Something was on fire on the highway, the police had close the on ramp where we (and apparently 1/2 of San Jose) needed to get on, and we fought traffic for over an hour to leave the area we were stuck in. After all that, we still made it back to school in time for grammar class!
Praise God for small victories! We're looking forward to a three day weekend, as we don't have school on Monday due to a holiday to celebrate the annexation of the Guanacaste region of Costa Rica. More good news: schools here will reopen next week after being closed this week due to the swine flu. No more kid juggling and hopefully the flu risk is subsiding!
Blessings,
Andrea (and the Gang)
Dear friends and family,
It seems like July suddenly crept up on us, along with decisions about what to do at the end of this trimester of language school. This terms ends August 14 (Alden's b-day). We'd been planning on leaving language school and hiring a tutor to help us continue the journey toward fluency in Spanish. However, when we sat down and crunched the numbers, we realized it would be less expensive to enroll half-time at the institute. In addition, we've really wanted to complete the grammar curriculum at the language school, which we won't be able to by this August.
So, we'll be starting a new trimester of language school on Sept. 1. We'll take two hours of classes each day. Once we finish the grammar curriculum, which we expect to take another month, we'll begin focusing on translating. We've heard it's an excellent way to uncover weak spots in your language acquisition and correct them. Apparently, you really can't "fake it" in this class, or use circumlocution to describe what you're translating.
Andrea and I will be in class with one other fellow student from our grammar class now, Amy Lineburg, who is here with Wycliffe Bible Translators. We hope that class will begin at 7:30 am so Andrea can come back home and dive into homeschooling with the kids, while I head North through the city to La Carpio and get started in ministry! The kids will be home during these two hours or so with a maid/nanny. Andrea is really excited to get back to homeschooling the kids soon, and I'm anxious to feel productive in ministry again.
In addition, we're hoping to move to another home in the area that has another bedroom, and more importantly, two bathrooms (5 people + 1 bathroom = frequent emergencies)! In November, friends from the states are coming to stay with us and help us put together a fundraising video. Then, we hope in Dec. Seth's folks are going to come down and spend some time with us to avoid the ice and snow back home and volunteer in ministry here. So, the extra bedroom will be a blessing, too. We meet with the landlord of the other home on Tuesday.
Please pray for us that God would bless and direct our endeavours to find a loving "empleada" to care for the kids and do some cleaning or cooking while were in school. Please also pray that God will bless our move to the other home we've found and that everything would come together.
Don't forget, we love to receive updates from all of you on your lives!
Peace,
Seth (and Andrea and the kids)
June highlights (so far):
- A trip to a park in the city called InBIOParque, a place to educate people on preserving nature and wildlife. See our slide show above with pix! Alden got to hold a Boa Constrictor at its 1st birthday party.
- A trip to Manuel Antonio national park and beach, and Alden petting a white-faced monkey in the wild. Seeing a trend? I think Alden is in heaven. Pictures (and video) coming on that later!
- Staying healthy; I can't tell you how many missionary families at our school are facing sickness and trips to the emergency room on a regular basis! So far, we've been untouched by physical sickness.
- Seth and I celebrating our 15th wedding anniversary on June 4. A fellow student babysat for us so we could have a date. Our gift to each other is learning to scuba dive (there's a very reasonable certification program being taught at our language school for interested students). We can't wait to take our dives on the July 4 weekend!
- Having our class of 7 students over to our place this past Tuesday for a fiesta. We cooked out burgers on the grill and just enjoyed each other's company in English for a change!
- Alden turning around his school performance. Yay for him, and thanks for your prayers! God has taught him much in the last few weeks about working through your problems, being disciplined, not giving up, and forgiving folks when you feel wronged.
Lowlights:
- Having the gas cap to the car stolen right out of the garage (the car barely fits into the garage, so I guess someone reached through the gate and could reach the gas door). Who knew we'd have to have a gas cap with a lock on it -- who knew they even had those?
- Other car problems involving the battery/alternator/radio. We hope they didn't sell us a lemon! If so, we pretty much have no recourse down here.
- Sunburns at Manuel Antonio (we apparently didn't re-apply the sunblock in a timely enough fashion)!
- Nearly getting hit in a car accident yesterday when some crazy driver cut us off in a roundabout.
Check out the new pictures (bigger on the photos page now), and please note that I now have a Facebook account (Andrea Reynolds Sears). It's a kind of fun way to share tidbits and snapshots of what's going on with us, so send me a friend request if you're on Facebook and I haven't established contact yet! Seth also has a new email address, which is seth.r.sears@gmail.com.
Blessings,
Andrea
