Following breakfast we headed out to a church service in Santo Domingo. It was a small church, but not short on sound and action. We saw young girls dancing in church and heard a wonderful message (Spanish and English) from Mario Matos on why the wise men went to see Jesus, and how we too must still seek Jesus every day...and give our best to him as the wise men did. Not only was it loud in the church, the buzz of activity on the streets was clear with the church doors wide open. We were encougared to worship with our brothers and sisters in Christ. It was a great reminder that He's gathering his church from every nation!
Following church we met Mario and his wife and daughter in downtown Santo Domingo for lunch. Guillermo, another staff member of EduDeo's partner organization joined us for lunch too. After lunch we enjoyed an informal tour of the colonial zone in Santo Domingo by our host, Franklin. Among other things, we saw the oldest church in the Americas (1512), a Cocoa museum, and many other old buildings. The city is stunning.
We then met up with another EduDeo HANDS team from Burlington and together we went to a National Park to view some caves. They were much bigger than we expected and the water was sparkling clean. We took a little boat across one cave and even fed a few fish. The beauty of God's creation blew us away. A country that has much hurt, has tremendous beauty.
Franklin then took us to his home to meet his beautiful wife and two children, a boy and girl. Franklin made us some smoothies with fresh fruit and we enjoyed a pizza dinner together. Devotions were done on the hour and half ride home with a tired group. Energy levels picked up for a couple of quick games of mafia, an evening hit...every single night.
Tomorrow it's back to the job site. School resumes tomorrow after Christmas break so we're really excited to see the school full of kids!
Thanks for your ongoing prayers!
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