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As soon as the bell rang at 2:50 to dismiss my last class on Friday, I bolted out of the door and raced to the dorm, where my bags were already packed and waiting by the door. "Let's go camping!" I yelled as I bounced through our suite. There is hardly anything in the whole world that I love more than camping. I love that my cell phone does not have service. I love the smell of campfire that sticks to my sweatshirt for weeks afterwards. I love the stillness of time and the glory of nature. Most of all, I love the uninterrupted time it allows me to spend with the friends and family that are so important to me. Camping is bonding. This trip was certainly no exception. All of us college kids needed a weekend retreat to get away from the homework, the schedules, and the craziness of life. We met my family at Buffalo Point campground on the Buffalo River to enjoy a weekend of freedom and renewal. And of course, I added about fifty items to my list of " 1,000 things I...

"Hurry, hurry! Chew and swallow or we are going to miss our flight!" We rushed Jessica to finish her Chili's dinner so that we could run to terminal B to catch our 6:00 PM flight. With a mouth full of fajita, she snatched her bag off the table. We grabbed our luggage and raced to the gate like Olympic speed-walkers. "Have you heard? Have you heard?" One of our team members asked frantically as we approached our designated gate. I shook my head just as he announced, "Our flight has been cancelled." Just a few minutes earlier, I had told our team leader, "Can you believe how smooth our travels have been? We haven't had a single problem!" I guess I spoke too soon. "Aw, man. I stuffed my face with that fajita for nothing," Jessica said as we all laughed. After an amazing week in Nicaragua, nothing could crush our spirits, not even a cancelled flight. We sat in the terminal and waited for the next report from our group leader...

My least favorite part about going to Nicaragua is the leaving part. Friday morning, as the van rolled out of the garage and I waved goodbye to all the people I love standing outside the door of the mission, little round tears rolled down my face. Maybe some of those tears were sad ones, but most of them were tears of inexpressible joy. Nicaragua has changed my life, and I have tears to prove it. After a fun day of sight-seeing that included a zip-line adventure, active volcano visit, trip to the market, and an authentic Nicaraguan meal, we arrived at the hotel where are our group gathered around the swimming pool for a time of worshipful singing. I poured out my heart as I watched the moon move across the sky, for my heart was about to burst with praise and thankfulness anyway. After everyone dispersed to their rooms, I grabbed my journal, Bible, and pen. I found a quiet bench in a peaceful courtyard, and I plopped down to reflect on everything. Expecting tears to flow once agai...

When I heard the sound of trumpets boldly belting out a cheerful song, I turned around to see a parade marching down the street with flags, a big banner, and shiny brass tuba bells leading the procession. I never expected to see such a spectacle waltzing down the dirt roads of Pantasma, Nicaragua, but then again neither did the residents. It seemed like the whole city came out to see what was going on. It is not everyday that you have such a celebration as this! I walked down the street and joined the celebratory crowd, following them to the grand opening of the new Casa Materna, or maternity house. Casa Maternas exist throughout Nicaragua to provide a safe place for pregnant women. At the Casa Maternas, women receive health care and education during their pregnancies. Often, the women come to the Casas from rural areas in the mountains where there are no hospitals. Many others come to find safety and shelter from unhealthy and threatening environments. The Casa Maternas are suppor...

“Today’s VBS is not for the faint-hearted,” they said when they introduced our project for the day. Therefore, I was the first one to sign up. Bring it on! was my gut reaction and initial thought. Over the river and through the woods, to Santa Barbara we go. We parked the van (after a one hour drive on dirt and gravel back roads) by a river, stuffed our packs with VBS materials, forged the river up to our waists, and then hiked another mile and a half into the middle of nowhere Nicaragua. And there, in the most remote location, was a little mission school pained blue and red with the Mision Para Cristo logo and all. The moment we saw the kids, our sore arms, sweaty backs, panting lungs, and soggy pants all became worth it. We sat with the children in a large circle on the ground and taught them how to play duck duck goose, which they thought was the funniest game in the world. They in turn taught us how to play a dancing game. We taught them songs and they taught us songs, and ev...

As soon as I found out that we could ride in the back of the truck all the way to Yankea, I knew it was going to be a great day. The Nicaragua experience is just not complete without a nice bumpy back-of-the-truck ride over the rugged mountainsides. Our task for the day: build a goat pen. A similar concept to Heifer project international, Hope for Life exists in Nicaragua to use sustainable living techniques to introduce people to the church and ultimately to Jesus. We were a part of the team that helped bring this project to Yankea, a rural community. The day before, some members of our group dug holes and set posts, so our job was to string the barbed wire around the entire fence. Simple enough? Yes. Did we have fun doing it? Absolutely. Did we sing and joke the whole time? You bet. But did we get a lot accomplished? No, not really. We worked hard all day in the hot sun, but by 4:00 when it was time to leave, we stepped back and realized it had taken us all day long to string bar...

Gathered in a large circle for our nightly processing and debriefing session, our team was asked the question, “What one word describes your day?” My mind rapidly ran through everything that happened that day until two words popped into my head. First, strength . From the way my back and arm muscles ached, I could feel strength running through my body. Our team had exhausted ourselves with hard core manual labor for hours. We spent the day at a community outside of town called Apanas. Our purpose this day was to build blocks. Every church, school, house, and project that the mission builds is constructed out of cement blocks, and each cement block is made by hand with a touch of tender loving care. The Nicaraguan block-building process doesn’t involve a truck with cement, a home depot, or a credit card. Just shovels, a bag of cement, piles of sand and gravel, and one really shaky, noisy machine that pops out bricks three at a time. At the end of the day, our blistered hands, su...

The city of Jinotega, resting in a valley surrounded by mountains, hosts a unique treasure. Upon the top of one of those lush mountains stands a cross. Tiny from the perspective of eyes on the ground below, this symbol is visible from practically anywhere in the entire city. Though it seems like it touches the sky miles away, it is not impossible to reach. In fact, almost every group that comes to Jinotega to work with Mision Para Cristo gets the opportunity to journey to the cross. Having completed this hike nearly twelve times, the climb to the cross was not unfamiliar to me. Yet no matter how many times I have been, the view from the top takes my breath away every time. The old metal cross is rugged, and to be quite honest, ugly, too. It is not the visual aesthetics of the cross that carry me to the top each year. Instead, it is the sight of the shadow of that cross as it stretches over the beautiful, colorful, tightly-packed city of Jinotega crawling up the walls of the valle...

The truck didn’t have air conditioner, but I didn’t mind one bit. In fact, I love driving through Nicaraguan countryside with all the windows rolled down and the fresh breeze swirling through the cab and the music of the gusts making us talk in louder-than-normal voices.   As we travelled north into the mountains, the wind through my hair felt less like the hot humidity of Managua and more like the cool freshness of Jinotega. As we turned the corner and glimpsed Jinotega in the valley in the distance, my heart started to beat faster, throbbing with anticipation and pure delight. Something about the air smelled familiar, felt right. Something about the way my heart beat made me feel like I was coming alive, like I was entering a homeland, like I was returning to the pieces of my heart. Nicaragua has been a spiritual sanctuary for me. It was during my first mission trip to Jinotega, Nicaragua, that I discovered how much I love mission work. It was then that I became fascinated with...

As soon as the topic of spring break mission trips came up back in the fall semester, I knew exactly what I wanted to do. First, I applied to be a trip leader. I will give you one guess to where I wanted to go. Yep, Jinotega, Nicaragua. About a month later, when I found out that two other trip leaders had already been chosen, I was a little disappointed, but not crushed. That's quite alright. I will just go on the trip as a participant instead,  I told myself. However, the sign-up day was Tuesday, which is a clinical day for me from 5:00 am - 7:00 pm. Completely missing the office hours for signing-up, I dropped by the office on the following Wednesday to get my name on the Nicaragua list. "I'm sorry," the secretary informed me, "but that trip is full. Would you like me to put you on the waiting list?" Slightly stunned that an international trip would fill up so quickly, I agreed to sign the waiting list. She clicked her mouse a couple of times, scroll...