Alexandra, Erica, Jassey, Alison, Japheth, Jon

Praises:

Hola!

The gangstas from the Heavenly realm (Israel, Kayla, Stephanie, Ryne, Ashlie) are having an amazing mission trip. Today we went to campus and Shared like crazy! The people here are so nice. The Dominicans are willing to work with us even though our Spanish is broken! Yesterday I (Ashlie) talked to a girl who knew no English. I tried my best with the Spanish words I could remember. I mostly gave her the time and said Bible study. I didn’t expect to see her. I should have known there is no language barrier when it comes to God’s plan.

The Bible study went really well today. We had at least thirty people. Greg and Becky Shared some pretty great testimonies. The people were really touched. After Greg and Becky were done, the Dominicans had so many questions! A boy named Lukenson, thanked me for all of us coming and sharing about God. It really makes me feel like we are making a difference in God’s kingdom!

All of us missionaries miss all of you at home! Blessings on your day!

Special shout out to my Bible study and my lovely roommates!

Team Andy, Ed, Muje, Carla, Kate and Sara

This morning after worship and Herschel's message we went to campus to go sharing and meet up with people we had met yesterday. It was encouraging because everyone we made plans with showed up!! We had left "homework" with one of them and she actually read John 3 before we got together and had questions about it. we didn't have tons of time because she was late getting there and had to go to class. She wants to meet up tomorrow to talk more about the Bible so you can be praying for Triny and our timem tomorrow that the Lord will lead her to the truth of the Gospel. Keilis is another student we got together with again and he had good questions and wanted to know more. We got to share with a few more people. Two of the ladies from our group met up with 6 or 7 students they'd talked to yesterday and they genuinely wanted to know about the Bible.

This afternoon we went to the Haitian camps in San Pedro (a town about an hour from Santo Domingo) where mostly Hatian and some Domincan people live. It is an extremely impoverished community without electricity or running water. We split into groups and walked around the whole camp to pass out gospel tracts and invite them to watch The Jesus Movie which presents the Gospel and explains how we have have our sins forgiven only through Christ's shed blood on the cross. However, just before the movie was going to play, it started to rain and it hasn't rained in that area for a long time. As a result, we unfortunately had to pack up and head back to Santo Domingo. You can pray that in two weeks when Herschel comes back with a team from Maryland the Lord will provide and they will be able to show it.

The most encouraging part was on the way back to Santo Doming, we had time to talk with "Sammy Sosa" our taxi driver from last year and "chaperone" this year. After a while Neno (his real name) said that he knew he wasn't saved and that if he died he knew he was going to hell. He said he wanted to be saved and put his faith in Christ for the forgiveness of his sins. We were able to pray with him and pray for him. it is so encouaraging to see how God is faithful to draw people to himself and reveal himself to those who don't yet know him.

Please pray for:

1. Triny that the Lord would open her eyes to the truth of the Gospel, her need for a Savior and that she would place her faith and her trust only in the shed blood of Jesus on the cross and grow to be a disciple of Christ.
2. Keilis that if he is not already saved, that he would come to saving faith in Christ and grow as a Christian.
3. For Neno that he would dedicate himself to reading God's Word every day for the rest of his life and that he would grow to be a disciple of Christ and become a godly man and a godly leader.
4. The Hatian camp and the people there. That the Jesus video would be shown in two weeks and that many people would get saved and their lives would be changed forever for good.

Wendy's restaurant became a hub of communication for our team at the outset of our day. We met there for lunch with Tommy, a student from our English class, who had prayed to accept Christ last week. Ryan, Emily, and Hannah studied the bible with him. We also followed up with contacts from last week. Two friends rendezvoused with us there to follow us to our class. A student Paul met last year joined us--an answered prayer!

A Haitian that Ryan and Alicia met on the street yesterday showed up and also a brand new Christian that Carol and and Alicia met at Baskin Robbins yesterday. English class went ten times better than the first day as we broke down into smaller groups. This allowed for more interaction. We stuck around for bible study and had many productive conversations. Many students have church backgrounds but are searching and many are unsure about God, but were willing listeners. It was cool to see around 40 students gathered in a circle listening to Greg and Becca share how God has changed their lives. They all had new testaments and flipped in unison to the passages that were mentioned.

At night, a few of us went down to Guiba, an outdoor volleyball park on the ocean to hang out, play volleyball and hand out tracts. It was a good time as many people heard the Gospel and we got to hang with people we met during the couple of days. We also met a guy dressed like a robot who beeped at JC when he handed him tract.

I (Ryan), was given a run for my money today. Tommy, who did a bible study with Emily, Hannah and I stopped in the middle of our study a couple of times to tell jokes. There was a quote from Napoleon about Jesus in our study and Tommy stopped to say "Do you know which battle Napoleon died in?". Stay tuned tomorrow for the answer tomorrow. :)

All in all, it was a productive day. Please be praying for people we have met to get connected to the bible study meeting on campus. We are really praying that God will raise up laborers and a church here that build up the young believers and reach many Dominicans with the Gospel. Hebrews 12 says that Jesus is the "author and finisher" of our faith. We have such an amazing God who not only wants us to enter into a relationship with Him, but He wants to mature us and use us to help others come into a relationship with Him. He is so good!