Kids Small Groups

Hi Friends:

We are all getting in from a VERY long day. We are exhasuted! However, incredible to see what God has done over the course of these last three days! Thanks for your prayers and support! We love you guys! We will send in update of some of the incredible stories of what God did today. But here is a recap:

Team 1 and 2 went to a Children´s hospital to visit had some great ministry opportunities with families and children.
Team 3 visited schools all day. First they visited a private school with around 100 students where they shared about Worship! The second school they visited was a public school with around 650 sudents from ages 7 - 12. All our kids shared there testimony multiple times and were personally able to lead several kids to Christ! Awesome!
Team 2 and 3 then spent the afternoon and evening doing KSG training with Children´s leaders. We have fortunately worked with three amazing churches here in Costa Rica over the last three days. I can´t tell you how excited this team is right now about how God is moving in these Children´s ministries! I will have them capture some stories for you to read tomorrow!
Here is an update from two of the teams from yesterday (Tuesday). The computers were down last night.

Team 1 Update (Tuesday):
We went back to Sendero de Luz, pastor Giovanni´s church, and group 3 with Harmon and Lea, taught a group of adults the vision and the mission of KSG. The kids are a part of the teaching as much as us adults are, and they are doing such an amazing job. At the last minute, Sean asked me to share my testimony of how I became a Christian after having Emily, and how she is now a comissioned child. Emily then gave her testimony, without her notes, and she was a star! The audience had a ton of questions, and we were able to answer all of them. It was a really great night!!

Tomorrow our group is going back to The Abundant Life Church, and then we are headed to a private school to teach a lesson to the kids. After that, we are headed to a boys home, where many of them were at one time addicted to drugs. These are young boys, about the age of the kids we have with us. We were told to dress very modestly, long pants, closed toe shoes, very little skin showing. I am a bit nervous about how to interact with these kids, so please pray for me that God will use me and the team to share Jesus.

It has been a very long day, we are all exhausted and need to be up and ready for breakfast at 7am tomorrow.

How was your day today? I look forward to hearing from you, love you!

Kelly

Team 2 Update (Tuesday):
Today was an awesome day for Team 2. Dean, Greg, Braden, Kim, Myles, Tom, Jenna, Malia and Erica went to a school for children with special needs. There were children with Down´s Syndrome, autism, cerebral palsy as well as a variety of other physical and mental impairments who attend this state run school. We were able work with a local church to reach out and show love to these children by playing games with the them, hugging them and showing them God´s love through a kind touch and a smile. None of the children there could carry on any kind of conversation, so it required us to go out of our comfort zone to try to connect with them. It was very rewarding though, and the kids as well as the adults in our group will never forget some of the children that we met today.
The children are really hanging in there despite really long days and very little sleep. They have all gotten along so well and seem to be having so much fun with each other! The adults are hanging in there as well, although we had a pretty good bout of motion sickness on the way to our location today. Dean and Erica were hit the worst, but Greg wasn´t much better off. We are a little concerned about the long ride in the van to Jaco on Thursday, so please pray for us to feel healthy and strong, as there is much work for us to do there, and we really don´t want to be laid up with motion sickness.
Please pray for our team on Wednesday night, as we are making a presentation to the local church we are working with in Alajuela. We have put together a workshop to equip them to begin teaching their children about the 5 purposes God has for their lives. We are very excited and each of the adults have paired up with one of the children on our team to teach one of the purposes in a fun and engaging way. The kids are really learning to put their fear aside and speak publicly about their faith. Each has probably shared their testimony in front of groups ranging from 15-150 a total of 3-4 times. It is getting to be old hat for them, but in a great way. The wonderful thing is that we are seeing people, both children and adults respond to them very positively. Yesterday we had about 15 kids accept Christ after hearing Braden, Myles, Jenna and Malia´s testimonies.
Back to tomorrow (Wed) night; please pray for our hearts to be open and for us to just allow God to speak through us. The children´s ministry workers here in Costa Rica have AMAZING passion for these kids. We want to be used by God to give them hope, and to empower them to reach the next generation in a way that will impact their country for good and for God. We have been so moved by their passion! The leaders cry when they speak to us, both out of gratitude to us for being here and out of passion for reaching the children in their world. We are learning much from them!
We miss all of you back home! Please know that we are having a GREAT time and we really see God´s hand at work each day that we are here. Thanks for your prayers and support and keep up the prayers! We still have 5 days to go!

Erika


Please be praying for a safe journey for the team tomorrow as we travel to Jaco! We will be leaving the hotel at 10:30. Our ministry in the slums will begin tomorrow at 2:00 in Jaco. Pray for God to go before us!