Trouble in Paradise

For a long time we debate on whether or not we should blog about this but have carefully come to the conclusion that it happened, the Lord has allowed it and used it to grow us, and also what would the name "Dominican Life Unleashed" be without a little disclosure on the not so great things as well...

Last month, on a normal Monday night, we headed to our weekly meeting in Playa Laguna where our Haitian friend Henry teaches to men and women from his community. This night, though it began normal, would not end that way.  After we finished, we went for a quick late bite to eat.  Once we were full and ready to sleep we headed home.  This is where it got interesting.  We pulled up to our house, unlocked the door and walked in.  To our surprise all of our doors to the rooms in our house were left wide open and the back sliding door was slid slightly open. A shot of adrenaline flew through my body as my FIGHT or flight triggers set in.  If you know me at all you might be able to guess which one was given to me.  Someone had broken into our house, my question was were they still here.  I ran around as quickly as possible blasting through doors and racing around all corners of the house.  After we realized no one was there, we could calm down and assess the situation.  Ironically there were only a few things stolen and an odd collection of things at that.  Our modem for the internet was still in place, all of our kitchen supplies were there as well.

Before we moved into the house, our Realtor put bars on the windows and doors to one of the back rooms which is the one I had been sleeping in.  Any time we leave the house we put our computers and other valuable in that room and lock it up.  This was our saving grace for most of our things.  Sadly though, Brad set his computer a little too close to the door and the thieves were some how able to reach in and pull it out of the wall and through the bars.  He also had a shirt stolen out of his room, His blanket off his bed, a pair of dress shoes and his electric razor charger.  We praise the Lord, however, that he didn't get his passport or money stolen from his closet.  Along with those things, our large first aid kit was taken as well.

Not knowing what else to do we went next door to our neighbors house and told them what happened. Before we knew it we had the whole community out in front of our house discussing what to do and informing each other as to what had happen.  The government and police force is so corrupt here that when they were called they came and walked around our house then asked for money... nothing more.

Since then Brad and I now share a room... the room with bars on it. It has brought us much closer together that's for sure! (pun intended)  We are grateful that no one was hurt, including my dog Zoe, who apparently is a little too friendly to everyone and not the greatest "guard" dog. God is sovereign and we know that we live in a fallen world with sinful people.  One day He will take his revenge but until then we are praying for our enemy that they come to know the Lord in a mighty way.  We also got to use this as a great discipleship/teaching moment for our Haitian brothers and ask them to pray for the thief as well.

I had a wise man once tell me, "You are always the safest where the Lord has you at that time." Whether we are in the middle east, United states, or the Dominican Republic, there will be sin and evil until our great Father comes again to set up His Kingdom.  We long for that day but until then "...it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body" as Paul states in Philippians. We continue the work that God has called us to do, dying to our selves daily and our desires.

Please join with us in praying for our enemies and for our trust in the Lord for safety and knowing in our hearts that He is control of all situations good and bad.

*The First Evangelical church has recently provided brad with another computer to use in his time here and that was a huge blessing.  Special thanks to them for providing in a time of need.


Humbly,

Parker and Brad.

Bible Study

Is He not the God of all nations!? Is He not the God of all languages?! Is He not our great Teacher?

Matthew 11:29 says He is.  "Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your souls."

Days like these give me such joy and stir my affection for God.  To be able to gather under one roof with Haitian men in the Dominican Republic and study the word of God is truly amazing! As we get to teach what the Gospel is verses "Religion" to men of a culture that for many years has been doing the Christian walk as a "duty" and not out of an overflowing love of Christ, my heart is stirred. Wednesday nights we gather with these 8 men who all live in the same village of Playa Laguna and study Gods word.  We teach through our buddy Raynald who knows English well enough for us to communicate and in his broken English, relays the responses back to us from our other Haitian brothers.  We are literally watching God break down language barriers and speak to the hearts of these men! 

 From left to right below (Fausner, Frezznel, Rodney, Henry, Raynald, Gephte, Mael, and Ronel)

These 8 guys have become our very close friends.  Each one of them have been given great gifts and abilities and more importantly, a heart for the Lord! We are continuing in our pursuit of friendship, discipleship and growth together each day. Please be praying that our friendships continue to grow and that God continues to teach them and us what we need to learn!  Even though we get to teach them many things from Gods word, they teach us just as much and we learn many things from their joy and lives. May you be as encouraged by what our Father is doing here in the Dominican Republic as we are! 

So We Went Fishin

Well I think I felt more at home this day than I have since I've been here! We went fishin.  Pretty simply we bought some strong fishing line, hooks, and chugged a few waters to make us some hand lines.  The Dominican fishing way is to wrap fishing line around a bottle, tie a hook to the end and put a weight on it. Then with some bait on the end (in this case we caught some crabs) like a cowboy swing it around your head and cast it into the deep.  Not a hard concept but still can be effective as long as you can keep your line from getting tangled! Needless to say our Haitian buddies LOVED it. Only one of them had ever been fishing before so it was a fun teaching moment and after a little instruction and tying on a few hooks for them, they were off and going.  Unelle (guy in the 4th picture down) was in charge of catching the crabs for our bait and he was good at it! once we caught our first little bait fish we just cut it up and used it for bait.

 As you can see from the pictures it was a gorgeous day and the Lords creation kept us in awe once again!

We look forward to doing this more and more with these guys.  They have become such good friends and we have enjoyed hanging out with them! These men love Jesus and are learning what it looks like to truly follow Him and what it means to make disciples.  A day like this day just takes me back to the times when Jesus hung out with his men fishing on the lake. The small conversations about Gods creation and just the example of a life on life transference is priceless! We pray that these men continue to catch a vision for discipleship and how they have the potential to reach the world for Christ!  We later found out that the rest of the small fish that we caught were used in a stew back home that night for dinner! Ha welcome to the D.R.

El Catey

We got to take a trip out to El Catey and visit "El Corazone de Jesu Christo" (the heart of Jesus Christ) where Dr Chris Rowland will be doing his dental clinic.  The clinic is still being built but from the storage shed it used to be it is coming along great! These are just a few pictures of the grounds.  They have a medical clinic which is run by Dr Steve who is the on ground missionary here.  Brad and I are excited to get to help out with the dental clinic, medical clinic, and also the baseball/softball that takes place!

 Below is a picture of the school building where they do a lot of teaching of kids and even adults that have not had a chance to be educated. The open door on the bottom left of the building is where the dental clinic is being built.

 This is the nicest baseball field I have seen since I have been down here.  On Sunday afternoons the men of the village get together and play fast pitch softball on it.  Even though all I had with me were my Chaco's I couldn't resist the urge to play and through my very broken Spanish managed to play second base for one of the teams and had so much fun! Next time I will come prepared! I think all of the Dominicans got a kick out of the "Gringo" that was playing in sandals but they were fine with it when me and their short stop turned a few double plays and I scored a few runs for them!

You can see many more pictures on our facebook page, www.facebook.com/DominicanLifeUnleashed since it is easier to upload photos to an album there.  It was a great experience for us and we look forward to the other times in the near future we can go back and help. Please join us in prayer for El Catey, Dr Steve and his wife and also for the future dental clinic and all of the great things that will come from this place.  Showing the love of Christ to people through the gifts and skills God has blessed us with is awesome.  May God use this place to bring many Dominicans to faith in Jesus Christ!

Santiago Soccer Trip!

We took a road trip to support our sister Phebe Rowland at her soccer game in Santiago! It was a beautiful ride to the middle of the island and we had lots of fun doing it!

 Meriel put on a photo shoot for me! She is just so sweet.

I think Phebe loved having us there to cheer for her. Even if she didn't we would do it again! We love this family and are so thankful and glad to get to spend this year with them. What a blessing they are from the Lord.

A Birthday Like No Other

We recently got to experience something awesome yet extremely eye opening and humbling. Brad and I found out that our Haitian friend, Raynald, was having a birthday so naturally we threw him a surprise party! Everyone loves surprises! We planned an afternoon for him to come over to the Rowland's house and cook burgers and have cake and all that normal birthday stuff that you're supposed to do.

 He had mentioned to me awhile back that he did not have a bible. He is Haitian but can read and speak English pretty well so we got him a new testament English bible! 

 He loved it! I don't think it has left his side since.  It was his first bible to ever have and after opening it he began to tear up and thank us over and over.

After we finished eating cake and opening gifts and were sitting around just talking, Raynald tells us that he has never had a birthday party before... He turned 23 that day and through watery eyes he thanked us again for the 732 time and told us how special this day was and how he didnt understand how God would allow him to have such good friends and people that would do this for him.  We were blown away.  23 years old and never had a birthday party.  His parents died when he was young and he lived with a foster family that loved the Lord and showed him who God is as he began to grow. Raynald moved to the DR from Haiti about a year ago looking for an opportunity to start a better life which is the case for most of the Haitians we come into contact with only to be left with the realization that it is no better, in fact harder for them here. We got the chance to explain to him how we are able to do this for him because God first loved us and paved the way for us to receive a new birthday for ourselves when we were born again into His kingdom! Our relationship with Raynald continues to grow and not only is he apart of our men's bible study each week but we frequently spend time with him at his home or at ours.  What a picture of the love of Christ as HE rules over all nations and for reasons I may never know, this divine encounter with a brother was perfectly orchestrated and ordained for a discipleship relationship, friendship, and brotherhood.  Please pray for Raynald and that his heart is continually captured by our King of Kings and Lord of Lords!

We pray that this story may spark in your hearts a thankfulness for all God has blessed you with in the same way it did ours... a simple birthday party will never be forgotten. You could say that it was a 

Birthday Party Like No Other.

Life in the Village

Spending time in Chichigua and Algedonez village with the Rowlands.  Great time getting to meet and hang out with the people. Great exposure for the kids as well and allowing them to see how much these people need and rely on our Lord! 

 Randomly passed this guy who had a Hog hat on! New friend. Wooohh Pig Sooie!

 Our friend Ollie made these chairs for us. Awesome!

Not many things in life more beautiful than a Dominican sunset! We are so blessed to have a God who cares enough about us to let us enjoy and be so impressed by the works of His hands!!!

If you want more pictures please visit our Facebook page www.facebook.com/DominicanLifeUnleashed there are albums full. 

Please continue to pray for us and that the name of the Lord would be magnified among the nations!!!