Tico Tuesday, May 24th

Greetings from Costa Rica!

The last week has been absolutely insane--full of wonderful activities and lots of emotions. First, I HAVE MY NEW CAR! At last! Praise the Lord! Thank you so much for your generosity that made it possible for me to get this vehicle. It is such a wonderful blessing to me! My mechanic was very pleased with the car when he test drove it and I am really enjoying being a couple inches higher, being able to fill up my gas tank faster (my old car had a defect that made me spend about 10 minutes at the gas station each time!), listening to CDs, being able to pull a U turn instead of a 3 point turn, giving people a ride without have to move seats, and riding more smoothly, and feeling more safe, secure, and comfortable. I miss having a clutch pedal, but am truly thrilled and delighted with this wonderful blessing from the Lord. I pray it will be an instrument of blessing to many. I was able to pick up my car on Wednesday last week, and a friend was even able to come along and accompany me to a couple government agencies to get all my proper stickers and everything. It was nice to be able to share the experience with a friend, I was very grateful.
I would also love to tell you about an impressive 60th birthday party I went to for a fellow staff member at church, the great core meeting we had for church leadership, the small group facilitator training I gave, and more, but right now my priority is to ask you to please pray, pray pray for the trip I'm going on to Cuba. Twenty of us are going. I'll be totally out of touch while I'm gone, so I will happily respond to all emails and texts after I return (June 1st). I'm feeling a little nervous, but also excited and full of anticipation. I look forward to sharing some stories of the trip with you once I return!
Please keep all twenty of us in your prayers! Thank you so much for your faithful prayers, support, and encouragement!
Love,
Carrie

Tico Tuesday, May 17th

Happy Tuesday to you!

This past Saturday, the young adult ministry partnered with the ministry from church that provides a meal and Christian teaching for the homeless every other weekend. I'd heard a lot about this ministry, but never had participated. It was a really interesting experience. Of the approximately 40 people there, only one was a woman, and she had a little girl with her. All the rest were men, a few young ones, but I suspect most were between the ages of 40 and 60. The vast majority of them, if not all of them are substance abusers. Some were quiet, some almost started throwing punches at each other at one point, some reeked, some looked quite well taken care of for living on the street. We shook all their hands as they came in, and as I watched them while we sang and listened to a woman share how God changed her life and helped her get and stay off the streets for good. And the thought that came to mind was: These are the least of these. These are the ones Jesus would rub shoulders with were he to walk the earth today. Jesus loves these people just as much as he loves me. Jesus died for these people too. The homeless generally don't have much dignity. It's easy to pass them by, ignore them, judge them. But, they have names, personalities, and stories that people in my church are getting to know. And not long ago my church assumed responsibility for a drug rehabilitation center that's about an hour away. The goal is that we can use this biweekly ministry as a bridge to send people to the rehabilitation center. It's really exciting! Please pray for God to transform the lives of these homeless men and women and for them to experience true freedom and love in him--and for me to see and treat them more like Jesus.
May God continue to use us to be his hands and feet!
Carrie

Tico Tuesday, May 10th

It's Tuesday once more!

That means tonight I'll be attending my third session on a prayer seminar my supervisor from church is teaching. This seminar is based on Philip Yancey's book Prayer and is being offered to approximately 40 of the students who have already taken the Bible Basics course through my church. (Hence why Tico Tuesday is coming out before most of you are in bed.) So far, it has been really good. I still like Richard Foster's Prayer better, but I'm still learning and growing and very appreciative of this little course on prayer. It's incredible what a vast topic prayer is. So far we've talked a lot about perspective--how differently God sees things than we do, and how truly other he is. He is far beyond our comprehension, yet longs for us to know him and draw near to him. I look forward to seeing what all else we learn in this course. And I also look forward to continuing to get to know my fellow students better. I see and interact briefly with a lot of people at church, but this is a great opportunity to get to know some of them a little better.
Change of Topic: I have started sending out my Chronicles via Mailchimp. If you haven't gotten the last couple, please be sure to check your spam filter!
And, as I mentioned in last week's Chronicle, I hoped to have my new car in my possession by now. Unfortunately, things continue to take longer than I expected. So, maybe next week by this time I'll have it? Please pray for things to go smoothly and no further complications.
Thanks so much!
God's blessing and peace be with you!
Carrie