Wrap-up

From age 11 to 71, 14 New Lifers were on assignment to the Orphanage, Shalom Home, in El Salvador. They were to experience, participate and be challenged.

As a team they were to experience a different culture, a foreign language, new foods, and strange smells. They were to experience the rewards of years of faithful missionary service in planting and nourishing a small mission that is now a thriving church in San Salvador. The reaching out to war orphaned children to a well organized, home, school and church institution that experiences the transformation of young lives into noble Christian citizens of El Salvador.

Participation took on multiple expressions: hard work in replacing a roof, painting a girl’s bathroom, breaking up concrete and pouring new cement. Equally rewarding were the trips to Oasis and participating in the Bible teaching and feeding ministry to some of the poorest of the poor. Joyful would describe the devotionals with the 57 children, the crafts and most especially the one-on-one loving on new relationships.

Nine days to experience, participate in and be challenged to change the perspective of missions. Now there was a new clarity and personal identification with Christ’s great commission to ‘Go…’ As in the prayer walks around the Shalom campus, a new vision is caught, a new burden for others is instilled in the hearts of fourteen team members on Mission to El Salvador. Now it is your turn!

Friday afternoon

The team has jujst returned from the last visit to the Oasis miknistry. This time the missionary directors, and all the local leaders were otherwise occupied - so the team took charge of the entire mission. Singing songs in English & Spanish, and Martha Garcia led the group in a Bible You would have been surprised at the knowledge the group has! The girls served the meal. I (Glenn) had a wornderful time praying with several of the adults and children.

Jeanette, Susan and Martha are helping Sister Rose Ann with some book work, the girls are finishing up the painting in the girls dorm, and the men are completing the cement work and cldeaning up the outside area.

Tonight is our final devotional service with all the children and their housekeepers. If itg doesn't rain we will have a bonfire service - otherwised it will be held in the chapel.

The week has gone by so rapidly!

Love to all!

Glenn

Message from Martha

Hi everyone, Wow, I still can't believe I'm here:) I'm so grateful for being able to come back to my place of birth. After 16 years away it truly is wonderful to be back. Our mission trip has been such a blessing in every sense of the word. There is so much to tell... hope you get a glimps from all of our blogs. I'm so grateful to the Benners for stability they have provided to so many children through out the years. God bless them.

To my family, I sure miss you all, and I can't wait till we ALL can come out here together.

God bless you. Los quiero mucho.

mamy

El Salvador fun

El Salvador is awesome!!

Thus far, I have been doing roofing, and cement making. It's hard work, but we are having fun.

Today, I had a chance to interact with the kids ages 1-2 for a little bit. They found my sunglasses fasinating and then I enjoyed giving them high fives and playing ball with them. This afternoon, the team went to Oasis which is for the poorest neighborhood nearby. We sing songs and feed the children and adults and bless them with love.

I have been blessed to have the chance to give the kids high 5's on their way to dinner!!

This evening, our team enjoyed interacting with the kids ages 2-11 with devotions. We sang songs, played games and received the love they showed us. These children, are enjoying learning songs in english. The little girl in the picture with her head on my shoulder is Hellie. She reached out to me first with a hug.

Many blessings to you,

Alyssa

Lynnae's Update

Hola Mi Familia! :)

Well, I'm in El Salvador! I'm having an absolutely fantastic time here. The orphanage is so nice, it even has a swimming pool. When we're finished working and we're all sweaty, we all like to take a quick dip in the pool. It's really refreshing, especially in the heat and humidity. I have visited an Hispanic church, helped refurnish a roof, gone to an English class at the private school the orphans attend, eaten Papoosas, helped at the feeding program called Oasis, and poured concrete. Oh, and of course played with the kids! :) I have met some great people and I'm developing good friendships. Although the language barrier is a challenge, I'm enjoying practicing my Spanish and it definitely motivates me to become fluent! I miss you and my home a lot, but I'm certainly not ready for this trip to end. I'm looking forward to the next few days as we continue to work hard and play with the orphans. Thanks for praying and I love you all so much!

Much love,
Lynnae

A little note from Madison. :)

Hey family of mine! I miss you all very much! I'm sorry I haven't been able to call you guys. I have no phone, and I'm not planning on getting one for the rest of the trip. I love it here in El Salvador! I definetly miss the comforts of home, but I'm adapting pretty well. It feels almost like a second home. :) I love the people, of course, and I'm making a lot of really good friends. We have been working pretty hard, I'm very tired. But it feels really good to be helping out in the orphanage. I will have a lot of stories to tell you when I get home but one is that today after dinner, Lynnae and I went to look at some of the work we did at one of the houses. A lot of little boys came out and we started playing with them. It was cute because they knew the game where you point to someone's shirt and then bop their noses! They were doing it to us a lot. Oh, and then one little boy started immitating Lynnae and it was so cute! He was speaking what she would say in his heavy accented English. It was really funny. :) I'm catching on to the Spanish really well, and the guys and girls help a lot with communicating back and forth. They are very patient and nice. I really like them. Well all that to say, I'm having a pretty amazing time, but I miss you guys. Give kisses to Colton and Zach, tell Riley that I love her, and I will hopfully talk to you soon. I love you all!

Madison

Recap on Monday

Hey everyone! Lo siento por not updating the blog yesterday. I went to the Compassion Office in San Salvador, so did not have time to enter a post. I thought I would just recap what has been going on here. I'll go back and begin with Monday...breakfast was at 6:30am. We then had group devos for an hour and went straight to work. As you can see from the photos, we put a new roof on the boys home. We took a break to eat lunch and then headed out for the Oasis feeding program. After this, we went back to the Shalom Home and worked the rest of the afternoon. Praise God that we finished the roof in one day (and it didn't rain)! Thank you for your continued prayers and encouraging comments. We look forward to sharing more with you soon.

Photos

Oasis

Oasis

Pablito is shy

Geoffrey's ready for his first mission trip!

Church at the orphanage - Sunday night

Church in San Salvador - Sunday morning

Madison with one of the babies

Lynnae with one of the babies

Sarah, Lynnae Madison

Tour of the Shalom Home - Sunday, July 13

We're here!!!

Hola everyone!
Well, we made it safely to El Salvador. The flight was smooth and on time, and our first night here was peaceful (with roosters crowing, dogs barking and a big cat fight). The rooms we are staying in are great. All Americanized for us gringos. = )
We enjoyed church service in San Salvador Sunday morning - New Life Salvadoranian style. After church, we took a tour of the orphanage here, had lunch and then had church service here on campus. The kids are so adorable! It's too bad that we can't each take one back with us.
Today was a very busy day with replacing a roof on the boys' home and going to the Oasis, which is a feeding program they have for an impoverished neighborhood closeby.
Thank you all for your continued prayers as we are down here in this beautiful country! Dios los bendiga!

PS- We are currently unable to download pictures, so pray for the computer too!