valentine's day and a bridge

On Saturday the 12th Luke took me to the Causeway by the Canal for a day together since Valentine's Day was a Monday.  It was nice to get a little time together.  We walked along the ocean, looked at puffer fish and all kinds of other fish and birds, went out to eat, and to a Smithsonian Marine research park/center.  They had hands-on pools where we touched urchins, sea cucumbers and starfish.  We saw a sloth and its baby in a tree.  It was a nice afternoon. 

Friday (the 18th) we took a 3 hr drive and hiked a bit up a mountain to get to one of our DTS student's church and home.  Once there, the church welcomed us and we had a service together where we shared the Word and prayed for each other.  It was really touching.  Afterwards we went to Maria's house (in the last photo of the group she is the older lady in the front with a tan blouse & jean skirt).  She is a student here at YWAM with us.  They had just finished harvesting oranges on their farm and shared some with us - they were SO SWEET!   

The middle photo is the bridge we crossed to get to the church.  It looked great, but swayed a LOT once you got to the middle.  All I could think of was Donkey and Shrek....

We will be having class this week in a village and will be out of touch for a week. 

Zoo and Hearing the Voice of God

Today our teachers for the week (who are also the base directors) took us all to the zoo and botanical garden nearby to spend the day together.  We did some team-building activities that make you think twice about communication, hearing God's voice, etc.  I am not a new Christian, and it is so refreshing to be challenged by these teachings, and putting things into practice.  We are all different, and God speaks to us in different ways.  Sometimes in new ways that will help us communicate better with those around us.  Even when we were in sin, we heard God's voice calling us to Himself.  How much more should we hear His voice now that we are His children! 

It was a refreshing day - enjoy my classmates and staff here at the base so much already.  This week our book reports are also due and most read the book on hearing God's voice, so it is good timing for this teaching!  Fresh in our minds. 

classroom

This is one of the classrooms.  Duolos is a private school created for the Agua Dulce (Sweetwater) community.  It is a Christian school taught by YWAM staff full-time.  It is much more affordable than other private schools in Panama so it can be an outreach to the middle class families and disciple kids as well.  Brilliant, I think :)

Work day

Luke and I went to Duolos Christian Academy today and helped prep for the school year, which starts Feb 28 this year, and goes til Dec 22-ish.  Luke was working on framing the window with concrete with Emmanuel for the new classroom.  I stripped and washed the walls in 3 classrooms so we can paint them next week.  The rest of our DTS went to a church we work with locally to distribute Samaritan's purse Christmas boxes and gave a short teaching, games, snack, etc. 

The family pictured shares the house with us.  Mom Jaqui, the girl Sharlene, Christopher, and the youngest is Jeremy.