My Class

After a few days of preparation, VBS week finally came. I’ve gotta admit, I was nervous. I mean, how would the kids be? Would I be able to communicate clearly with my Spanish? Would they just ignore me if I couldn’t speak well? I was a teacher’s assistant, and my class would have about seventeen 11 and 12 year olds. That was an important age, because it’s when you start figuring out who you are and what you believe in. And I felt like at any moment I could screw it up. I prayed A LOT that week. But from the very first day, I found that when I spoke Spanish to these kids, even though I did speak it poorly, they were super understanding. They actually HELPED me remember words and phrases. And God actually used them to help me get my point across. It was crazy because the people who I was trying to help ended up helping me. It was very humbling to me, because I realized that I was trying to be a perfect Spanish speaker. But on this earth, there is no such thing as perfect. And my class understood that way better than I did. As the week went on, I really got to know these kids. And the more I got to know them, the more my heart ached for them. So many had grown up either Roman Catholic or without any real beliefs at all. They grew up feeding on lies. Most of them had no real exposure to the truth. When the teacher asked how many had been to a church, most of them raised their hands.  But then when she said “A non-Catholic church”, all of them except 2 lowered their hands. But what really made an impact on my heart, was how they then seemed very confused at that point, because they didn’t even know there was a difference. It really opened my eyes to see the need for the love of Jesus and the true gospel to be spread in the Dominican Republic. Catholicism has a strong hold on that country. And the need for outreach is great.

 

                                                                      My two favorite girls