Hey everyone back home! Praise God for the amazing ways He worked in and through the team today!

This morning we changed our schedule a little to focus on breaking down the strongholds and lies of the devil with the truth. It was a time of individual reflection and searching in the Word, followed by small group sharing, prayer, and encouragement. I think I can speak for everyone that we all went to lunch changed and newly refreshed for another day of work.

After lunch, we jumped right into our service projects. My group has been painting a fence around a basketball court. Even when the task grew tedious, it was a blessing to see everyone persevering--working for the Lord without complaining. It is also nice to know that the work we began will be continued next week by another group of pelicans.

The groups working at the abandoned houses also finished a lot of yard work today, tranforming jungles into lawns, hopefully so that the houses can soon be reinhabited.

None of this work went unnoticed by the community. The neighbors were very appreciative, opening the door for conversations, praise God for the lives he's bringing to Himself! Many teams also struck up conversations on prayer walks. One boy who got to know a group on a prayer walk even spent the last several days serving with the team!

At the afternoon sports camp today, we got a game going again of  boys vs (mostly) girls soccer, which is a blast. It's awesome to see community kids of ages ranging from aound 5 to 18 playing together with our team and having so much fun. Then the whole sports camp got to hear Caroline's testimony, and I was privileged to get to share the Bible strory of the prodigal son. Praise God that the words came eloquently when we were up there!

The other half of our team doing VBS for younger kids were blessed by how the kids yell out the memory verses and worship songs with the enthusiasm that you really only see in God's innocent little children.

Praise God for more basketball in the evening, more relational ministry and fellowship. Although God was teaching me how to minister to peers this week, I am thankful that he sent me one baby girl to play on the playground with and brighten my day! We ended our day with an awesome time of worship, communion,  and an impromptu parking lot dance party :)

love from Dolton,
stephanie