Monday, September 13, 2010

"Light of Life"

So, school is going well at JCS. It's nice to finally have a routine and be productive instead of chaos all the time.  Starting in a couple of weeks I'm going to start teaching piano once a week to 4 kids at JCS.  I'm super excited! One of my 3rd graders signed up, so that'll be fun :)

Here's some fun news... I decided to become one of the leaders for Younglife Jarabacoa! If you don't know what Younglife is, it's basically a "youth group" for high schoolers just beginning to hear about who Jesus is and what Christianity is all about.  Every other Tuesday we have club, which is like youth group but not super deep.  Then, in between club weeks, theres a Bible study that the leaders will run with certain groups of high schoolers to bring the message more "below the surface." I think younglife is such a great idea and i'm SO excited to be a part of it. Younglife is also in the states, and pretty much all over the world, so that's really fun too. 
Two weeks ago we had a younglife retreat for all the leaders at a younglife camp in Pico Duarte - 10 minutes away from my house.  It was fun meeting other American teachers from Santiago Christian School and Doulos Discovery School, and just getting away from real life for a weekend. Here's some pictures!
Under the water

Eating "moro" - a mix of rice and beans, and "tostones" - fried plaintains

All the Younglife leaders for Jarabacoa and Santiago!
So that's younglife so far! our first club was last week tuesday, and we had 26 kids show up! it was a good time - but started out stressful. We had everything set up - powerpoint, sounds, music, etc...and then 10 minutes before we were going to start, the power went out, and it was completely dark. Luckily, 10 minutes later, the power came back on and we continued as planned. You just have to expect the power to go out here at least once everyday I guess.

Bible verse that's been speaking out to me: John 8:12 When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, "I am the light of the world.  Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life." How awesome is that? Let's go be the light of life :)