Day 13 (6): Bottle Episode, Bottle Post

Weird to think we're 1/3 done with our time here. Though only 1/6 done with the portion that's just the smaller team.

Today was pretty low-key. We made breakfast and had worship in the morning. Lagos and Ana joined us, which was lovely. Afterwards, we sat for a while and talked about ministry and a bit about church structure and the specific culture of the homegroups and cluster I am part of. 

H@ngout is incredibly unique in the world of GCLA churches in its methods and structure and student focus. So much of what we do at Fellowship has been tweaked and refined over the 45 years we've existed, and has been informed and grown by opportunities to learn from our sister churches in Collegiate around the nation. I think it's encouraging for the Lagos to get to hear about other ministries and how they do things. My hope is that, as our partnership grows, we'll get to have more exchange with them. I would love to see some of their students come spend a week with us in College Station and help with our outreach and stuff. We're also having tremendous opportunity to learn from them in their models of city outreach, which will hopefully bear long-term fruit in our church as well. 

Katie, Sheryl, and I went walkabout to find some supplies for our Airbnb. We went to a few different hardware stores and learned a little bit about the neighborhood we're in. It was a lot of fun to explore and just exist here. It is one of the days where I think, "Yea, I could live here." We saw some fun graffiti and talked about stuff and things.

I love graffiti, especially in other countries or cultures. It's a really cool expression of culture, especially of the hurt, tensions, and creativity of a culture. If I owned a building, I'd want someone to graffiti on it; but the artistic kind of graffiti, not like, "Sam wuz here." 

Costa Rica is also full of motorcycles. And they're all the kind that I think are the best. Most of what I see in the states are sports bikes, but almost everything here is either a cruiser or a dirtbike...often a mix of the two. I don't think I can fit one in my carry-on though. 

Our tea has four people on it with a lot of different levels and directions of connections, which has good and bad to it. Sheryl, Katie, and I are all from the same cluster, so I try to avoid situations where it's us doing something without Matthew or referencing people he doesn't know. Matthew and Katie are both very musically skilled and can have cool conversations about that. Katie and I are on staff and have talked some with Matthew and Sheryl about the beautiful, hard, and just plain unexpected things in vocational ministry. Sheryl and I have to constantly check ourselves in comparing Costa Rica to Mexico or speaking Spanish in too much of a regio way. Matthew and I have had some cool bonding experiences, as the men on the team. I really enjoy how he views the world and engages with nature. We climbed trees together today, which was dope. It's just a crazy mix of weird dynamics that has somehow made a strong, flexible, and generally well-matched team. God is really good in how he's pulled us all together. 

We watched a movie together today and bonded a bit. We also cleaned the fan at our Airbnb, which I had been nervous to use because it was narsty. Now it's white again instead of gray. I meant to go for a run today, but I drank a coke instead, which I think is the opposite of running. I may try to go tomorrow morning before breakfast prep. Writing it down here makes it more likely to happen, I think. I do miss running. I think sometimes about how big a part of my life it was, and now how little I do it and wonder if my current lifestyle could be shaped to include running with the same commitment I used to have. Not all the way to being an idol in my life (which is was *insert stories about a broken knee and a broken foot and a learning curve*), but back to being something central.

We had a late lunch/early dinner and then zoomed into the church service tonight. Saeed (who is Carol's husband (If you don't know who that is, read posts from older trips)) taught about wisdom and decision making and then a pastor from a GCLA church in Atlanta shared about their church and some of their journey in following God through big decisions and finances. He talked a lot about bi-vocational ministry and laid out a timeline for Paul's work in Acts 18ish. Paul was in full-time vocational ministry, then he made tents with Priscilla and Aquilla for a while and only did ministry one day a week, then when Silas came with more financial support, Paul went back to full-time ministry. The message that the pastor shared from this was: God will walk you through different seasons and the key is to let God lead and not get stuck in one way of doing things.

Afterwards, we sat and watched some videos together and then another episode of The Chosen. I wasn't a fan of how they did the story of when the paralyzed man's friends "unroofed the roof" to get him to Jesus, but I still thoroughly enjoyed the way the show depicts the disciples' personalities.

Now I'm listening to our newly clean (but wobbly) fan do its thing and wondering if I should take a shower tonight. I think I'll wait and bank on running tomorrow before cooking breakfast. Before coming, we made a chore chart that divvied up cooking and cleaning responsibilities in the Airbnb. It's more like guidelines than actual rules, but our little household is running smoothly! I've enjoyed the different vibes of cooking with different people on different days.

Well, I hope you enjoyed my post filled with facial expressions and emotional nuance, here's some prayer requests and some pictures!

PRAYER:
- for us to continue to grow and bond as a team and bless the team here
- for the church here to feel un-alone; both through God's presence with them and connection to other churches with shared passion
- for us to continue to have opportunities to connect to students here. We want to start inviting them to serve with us at the CDI, in hopes of a permanent connection between H@ngout and the CDI. 
- for Christ's love to genuinely overflow from our hearts to the people we're serving here

Pictures!

S: 9
S: 11
K: 15
M: 21