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First night out in Pamplona :) |
I made it to Spain!! I flew in last Thursday and everything is
going really well. Thank you again for
all of the love and support I received before I left Minnesota. J
God is faithful!! On
the first day, God answered a prayer. I
was very excited to come to Pamplona, but two things I prayed about were
companionship and help speaking Spanish.
In Minnesota, I have three amazing roommates and am surrounded by many
loving people. I knew it would be a
tough transition to go from that to a city where I only know a handful of
people. As for speaking Spanish, I started learning three
months ago and wasn’t sure how difficult it would be to get around the city
without translators. Well..on the first
day, I was brought to the apartment where I was supposed to live. The woman who owns the apartment is Maria and
is a member of the church in San Juan. She
was very welcoming and had a beautiful place.
The one problem was that she owns a cat and I recently found out that I
am very allergic to cats. I called
Pastor Dom’s wife Damaris to see if I could possibly stay with a different woman
named Sangra and found out she has cats as well. For a few hours, I didn’t know what would
happen, but it’s beautiful how God works everything out!
Damaris called me back and said I could stay with
Monica – another woman from church who has a 15-year old daughter and another girl
staying with her (Maria) who is my age!!
Praise God! Living with them is such a blessing. Monica is a wonderful woman and I really enjoy talking with her. She is also an amazing cook so I hope to learn a few recipes while I am here. J Maria and I know each other from both short-term trips I took to Pamplona and she picked me up
from the airport when I arrived last week!
She speaks fluent English and we have a lot in common. God is GOOD.
J
The first few days flew by.
We met friends for dinner on Friday and then spent Saturday and Sunday
at church. For those who don’t know, the
pastor I am working with (Pastor Dom) is married to a woman who is the daughter
of a pastor in Pamplona/Spain (Pastor Felix).
One church he started is located in San Juan and Pastor Dom is a member. They have a Young Persons Group (Grupo de Jovenes) and I enjoyed meeting new people this weekend. Everyone is so friendly and welcoming!
Tonight we have English Club and I was thankful to learn that there
are currently two people helping! One is
Hannah – a student from England who I met in October. The other is Ellis – a student from South Carolina. God provides.
I’ll let you know how it goes in my next update!
What God is teaching
me..
The song that has been on my heart this entire trip is ‘Be
Thou My Vision’. It’s a beautiful hymn
and a continued prayer of mine is to grow closer to God and become more reliant
on his strength.
Transitioning to life here has been more difficult than I
expected. Speaking Spanish all day is a
challenge. It is one thing to use the
Rosetta Stone or have a 3-hour dinner, but to be completely immersed in a
Spanish speaking city is very different.
I was surprised at how quickly I became discouraged. I started praying, ‘Lord, why did you bring me
here? How much good can I do when I
struggle with having basic conversations let alone talking about you?’.
Thankfully, God is faithful!
I love how He gives us exactly what we need when we need it. I’m currently going through a year-long
message series by David Platt called, ‘A Chronicle of Redemption’. The series walks through the entire Bible and
shows how the Bible is one large story all pointing to Christ. It’s really good! If you’re interested, you
can find it for free at www.radical.net. (Resources à
Sermons à
Series à Start
with ‘Prologue: Creation’)
Two messages I listened to before coming to Spain talked about
the Fearful vs. the Faithful. The
examples were Joshua versus the giants in the Promised Land and David versus
Goliath. In both stories, the fearful
made the giants look bigger than they really were. They were too afraid to move
forward even though God promised victory.
The faithful (Joshua and David) knew that God is more powerful than
anything on Earth and walked forward in faith.
In a similar story, I’m finishing a book called ‘The Heart
and the Fist’ by Eric Greitens. It’s a
story of a Rhodes Scholar who becomes a Navy Seal and Humanitarian. One chapter is about Navy Seal training and
Hell Week. The first night (Monday) is
the most brutal and before they get started, all of the men stand on the beach
and watch the sun go down. They don’t
have to do anything else, just watch the sunset. It’s at that moment that many men quit. They had already been through a day of
intense physical challenges and trained for months to be a Navy Seal. Why do they
quit?
“They quit, I believe, because they
allowed their fear to overwhelm them. As
the sun went down, and the thoughts of what was to come grew stronger and
stronger, they focused on all of the pain that they thought they might have to
endure and how difficult it might be.” (Eric Greitens, P. 186)
It’s easy to become fearful and make the giant (Spanish)
larger than it is. The temptation is to
quit, but thankfully, God is much bigger than our fears and we can trust
him.
The greatest lesson God has taught me so far is that He is
all we need. He is God. He LOVES us.
He created everything and holds the world in His hands. The battle is already won and if we trust Him
and walk in faithful obedience, He will surely provide and we will see HIS
glory. It’s not about my strength or how
well I speak Spanish. God is in control and
all we need to do is walk forward in faith.