Summer Service 2017 - Dominican Republic

There's an energy in the world that can't be measured. I'm not talking about the physics definition of energy (because spoiler alert: that can be measured), I'm talking about that feeling. That feeling that we as human beings feel and share a connection over that common feeling. When it's midnight and you're in a movie theatre full of people, and that title comes on and you sense all the people around you are over the moon emotional. When you are at a concert, surrounded by strangers and friends alike, and you hear that chord, those notes, and you see the stranger next to you tear up, and then you do too because you realize that you are a part of something bigger than yourself. If we want to relate this energy to something us peeps on this trip might relate to, it's the feeling on a basketball court when all 5 players touch the ball, and keep on zipping it around until the perfect shot is available and we all just know, it has to go in. Energy. It can be fe...

PHOTOJOURNALISM

As the sun descended slowly turning the sky violet and pink, prayer rose up in the little church of St. Peter in Samana. The pastor was at the podium fervently praying in Spanish. I couldn't understand the words being said but I could understand the reaction to the words.  One woman stood with one hand over her eyes and the other outstretched as she mouthed prayers of her own. Another woman bowed to the seat of her pew, hands folded in prayer and pressed to her forehead. A man paced up and down his pew with hands raised, eyes closed, praying to God. Drums beat along with the crescendo of the pastor's words and cries of amen could be heard throughout the sanctuary.  This may be a small congregation, but it is strong and the Spirit is here. It was awesome to see.  No matter the church, the country, the language, or the time of day, prayer reaches us all.  Deidre  Rob 

     Hey internets! It's been awhhhiiiiilleee. Hope everyone is living it up wherever in the world you are reading this. We here in the D.R are having such a fun time that we forgot to blog for a week! Sorry about that! Anyways, here we are back again! Btw I'm blogging at like midnight so this will be an attempt at a quick catch up while I'm sleep deprived!     We have spent the last four days in the beautiful seaside town of Samaná! The town is literally in a bay in between a long peninsula and the rest of the island (pro tip: google it and be amazed by how cool it is). The girls are staying in the pastors house, while us niños are staying on the same floor in the conjoined missionary house. We spent the first day and a half of being here getting to know the town and the people, while also enjoying a nice beach recovery day. The last two days have been spent helping run a bible school for the kids. Oh, and by help run, I mean organize the chaos in whatever w...

Boat Ride to Cayo Levantado

So, tonight is our last night in Sabaneta. We have been in this location for 10 days and it definitely feels like home. We love them and they love us. Their hospitality is unmatched; they cook for us, play games with us, worship with us, and let us invade their lives and their space. It has been a wonderful and will not soon be forgotten. At this exact moment we are having a going away service with the community. We are singing songs, sharing our experiences together, and exchanging gifts. We are here with the adults, the teens, and the young kids. It really is a community. I speak for everyone in our group when I say we will greatly miss Sabaneta and we hope to return... Rob

Sunday Funday (June 18) We had a classic Kimmy-Stu mess around after a delicious lunch prepared by our madres en la Republica Dominicana. We were invited by our new 11 year old friends Donny, DeJuan, Eunio, Jeremy, Ramsey, and Kevin to go play baseball at a  local field. The kids hit a few dingers despite the intense heat (the weather, not Kim's arm).     After a long time playing baseball in the hot sun, a group of the boys ran off to return some equipment they borrowed from a friend, but to our surprise they returned with two bottles of cold water. They used their own money to pay for it. We told them to drink first, but they insisted that we did, so we kindly accepted and took small sips before sharing with the group. Their kindness was unexpected but very much appreciated.    On our way home we were passing a river, and saw some people jumping off the bridge for a 30 foot free fall into the water. The whole "If your friend jumped off a bri...

Thursday was our day of rest. We enjoyed it and we needed it. The only responsibility we had all day was a housechurch service at 6pm. Before that we hung out, played basketball (at 6am), learned new card games, taught card games to the Dominicans, and napped. Overall it was an excellent day for everyone. The housechurch service was also a good time. We had the opportunity to have a worship service in the home of Lilo and his family. The service was very similar to the other services we have been to in the DR so far. The major difference was that at the end of the service we were all served a meal and ate together. And it was a really good meal! Rev. Cancu came back to Sabaneta last night and preached at the service, mostly telling stories. The congregation was laughing the majority of his sermon. He is clearly loved. After the service we headed back to our house with many of the Dominicans where we played games and hung out. We learned a new game, President, which was not too ...

The air conditioning cooled us as we squeezed in the back seat of the truck. Four more people piled into the truck bed. The second car followed as we started our drive through the winding country roads. The green hills filled with cattle breezed past us as we weaved through traffic. Eventually our view turned from rolling hills to a small town of brightly painted cement buildings and shops. When we passed the town, the ocean became visible to our left. Venders on the side of the road were selling mangoes, coconuts, and Coca-Cola. Finally we turned onto a bumpy dirt road and found a parking spot. The hot air surrounded me as soon as I opened the car door. The smell of the sea filled my lungs as I stepped onto the sand. The team and the families with us found a shady spot under a big tree. Someone bought two freshly opened coconuts and handed them around for us all to try. When we got settled everyone rushed through the scorching hot sand and into the water.  The water felt c...

After the community learned that jimmy was a "Level 5 Pizza Master", all they wanted was for him to cook pizza. We decided to make pizza for about 30 guests tonight not only for Jimmy to flex his pizza skills, but also to thank each community member who has been so helpful to us since we have arrived in Sabaneta.  Everywhere we have been and everyone we have been with has made an effort to make us comfortable and welcome. Whether it be practicing their English on us, giving us water and food while we paint the local IED(Iglesia Evangelica Dominica) churches, cooking us meals daily, or doing our laundry despite our insistence to do it ourselves, we could not be more grateful for the loving community we came to join here.  The challenge of feeding so many mouths tonight does not compare to the joy of spending time with all of these awesome people.  Special shoutouts to "Papa Jimmy" as they call him for making this pizza party perfecto!!!! And...

     Has anybody out there ever been cared for 24 hours a day, and not in any way where you feel like said care-er (is that a word?) treats you as incapable? I am asking has anybody truly felt loved by a community of strangers for multiple days in a row? This image is more or less how our group of rag tag Americans has felt these past few days in Sabaneta. This small community of "evangelical christians" is living out one of the main teachings of Jesus better than most Americans that I have seen. Our group spent almost 30 minutes trying to figure out just what exactly they were doing that all of us felt completely at home. "Love, care, respect, joy, patience", these were the traits and feelings we applied to our caregivers. It is a beautiful community to be a part of for our short time.      While the group spent the whole day painting, I had the privilege of leaving halfway through the day to help prepare for what seems to be the weeks biggest event: a...

This morning we woke up to a great breakfast which I'm always grateful for since our host have been preparing all of our meals since we arrived. We then ventured to the morning service that was held in the church about 200 yards from where we are staying. The best thing about the service was when we split up, and the young adults/children went to sunday school. Rob led the lesson in English and also showed off his developing Spanish skills. We focused on the story of the Good Samaritan from Luke, and our host Frankelly was very impressed by Rob's creativity and humor. Our group really connected with the kids there and we learned a lot of names, some of which we play basketball with. One thing I do want to want to highlight is the sportsmanship of our group when it comes to the game. Even though we win most of the games, we still have the Dominicans show us that they are still just as skilled; however we never complain or pout. We also always help them up if one of us knocks the...

Today was a pretty laid back day. We got up and went to the supermarket and learned a lot about the culture just by what foods were there. Tons of rice. Tons of beans. Then we went to the beach and had a quick turnover to then head to church for a chapel's 18th anniversary celebration service.  The beach was gorgeous, as one would expect. We packed 11 of us into our friend Willy's 7 passenger Toyota Sienna. It was quite a warm and loud drive, but well worth it once we got to swim finally. Willy played us some music in the car and turned it up impressively loud, not realizing the girls were getting blasted from the deafening rear speakers. They powered through and enjoyed it nonetheless.  After the beach we came back and quickly ate dinner then hopped on a bus with a bunch of other churchgoers and headed to the chapel. The chapel probably held about 100 people and it was packed. Many people spoke, many songs were sung and two girls performed awesome dances. We played "O...

Friday, June 9th Happy travel day!!! Santo Domingo has offered us a first impression of the Dominican Republic as a bustling and busy capital city. Today, our understanding of the DR drastically expanded as we left the crowded streets, apartment buildings, and surrounding restaurants/establishments. For the first time we experienced the countryside (or "campo" as the locals call it) as we journeyed from Santo Domingo to Sabaneta de Yadira. Among the rolling green hills were small villages, home, and family businesses alike. The winding roads took us up a mountain offering breathtaking views of the country below.  After hours of driving through the country we were welcomed in Sabaneta with lunch as well as an evidently strong community. This town is quite clearly different from our last temporary home in the city. We have our own yard with multiple mango trees! You can hear crickets at night instead car horns and traffic.  After a late lunch our local friends agreed to meet us...

Hi Everyone!   Prior to the trip, I know I was very excited to meet and befriend local Dominicans.     While painting at the church My team and I were able to meet Luis. Luis is a 28 year old married man with three kids (one daughter, two sons).    Luis stayed both days with us at the church but also has a job in exporting fruit to the U.S.    Luis was not only very kind and hospitable but extremely patient, helpful and encouraging. He would direct and help us with the painting, and answer every question with a smile (no matter how many times we asked). He was patient with us all as we tried to find words to properly express what we wanted to say. He would joke with us often and engage in our silliness.    Luis invested in us, he made the point to tell us when we did a good job, he remembered our names, and he remembered things we spoke about the day before, like how excited I was for green paint ( riveting, I know).    Sp...

Hi All, We started out our morning with a trip to a local church. They are converting the top floor of the church into the new pastoral house and wanted help repainting that as well as the outside of the bottom floor. It wasn't terribly difficult work but everything gets harder when it is 90 degrees outside. We worked with a 28 year old Dominican man named Luis from San Cristobal, Ari, a 18 year old girl who was a university student, and the site manager who's name I did not catch.  Today was the first day that we did not have our mission partner, Joella, with us so we were on our own to translate. It was a bit difficult to get all of the instructions but we managed to make it work. We have been here just three days but those of us that have a little Spanish background are picking it up pretty quickly. We went out to lunch with Luis and Ari and got to know a little bit about them. As we conversed in broken Spanish, we learned that Ari was in her first year at a Domi...

     As far as days to blog about, today is either one of the easiest days, or quite honestly an extremely difficult day to summarize. Tonight will be a difficult night to journal about, as we try to unpack literally 10 hours of information. It was our orientation into Dominican history, culture, economy, and most importantly of all... Food!      Instead of giving a wild summary of everything we did today, I'm just going to tell you all about the issues on my, and also it seems most of the groups heart. This morning, we heard from a man who works for the Iglesia Evangelical Dominicana (Dominican evangelical church). He explained to us the history of the country, and the societal implications on the people today. It became fairly clear to the group that those in power in this country have developed systems of oppression to keep the majority of people poor and uneducated (sound familiar?).      One of the groups major concerns coming into t...

This post is from Stuart. On Mon, Jun 5, 2017 at 2:16 PM Stuart Sutherland < stuartsutherland35@gmail.com > wrote: I had the privledge of talking to a nice guy named Jai on our flight from Buffalo to New York. We started talking about where our final destinations were, and the conversation led to a talk about sports, dreams, life, love, miracles, the evils in the world, and how God fits into all of it. He ended up hearing the true Gospel of Jesus Christ for the first time on that flight! He had heard of Jesus' story before, but had never heard of the resurrection and the divinity of Jesus. I told him I would pray that he would begin to understand how wide and long and high and deep the love of Jesus Christ is for him.  -to the end that all may know 

I had the privledge of talking to a nice guy named Jai on our flight from Buffalo to New York. We started talking about where our final destinations were, and the conversation led to a talk about sports, dreams, life, love, miracles, the evils in the world, and how God fits into all of it. He ended up hearing the true Gospel of Jesus Christ for the first time on that flight! He had heard of Jesus' story before, but had never heard of the resurrection and the divinity of Jesus. I told him I would pray that he would begin to understand how wide and long and high and deep the love of Jesus Christ is for him.  -to the end that all may know 

Here we are, our last night in the United States for six whole weeks. We have had a fun, eventful weekend of training and orientation as we prepare for our trip to the Dominican. We have spent a lot of time praying, studying the Word, hanging out, team building, learning about each other, singing, worshipping, and having an overall amazing few days. Tonight has mostly been spent relaxing and preparing for traveling early tomorrow morning. Right now the majority of us are watching Game 2 of the NBA Finals while laughing, playing cards, playing with fidget spinners, and learning more about each other. Everyone is really excited for this trip. The group is bonding really well and getting along. We will do our best to keep you updated throughout the trip with pictures and stories. Please check the blog regularly so that you can hear from us. You can also comment on our posts if you have any questions for us or want to hear about something specific.

Testing out the new blog for the the Summer Service Trip to the Dominican Republic...2017 Today is the day. We are heading to New Wilmington, PA for orientation and training before we head out to the DR early on Monday morning. All nine of us are coming from various parts of the USA to meet up and head out. It is an exciting time for sure, but today is the day we say goodbye to our friends, families, and loved ones for six weeks. It is never easy to leave our people for this long...that is for sure.