Updates: A month in the DR!

Hi friends!!

I love the DR! I love the people here and my squad. I am learning more about who God says that I am and all that He has for me. God is good and so faithful. It has been really hard being here and being away from everyone I’ve known my whole life. But as time goes on I feel more comfortable being myself and walking in who God created me to be and it’s so sick. Having the Joy of Jesus in my heart is one thing I prayed I would experience on this trip and God is faithful and I have felt that JOY!!

I am a people person and knowing new people and being known by them has never been something I’ve been super excited about. I like the people I already know and love. But, I am learning I love new people and getting to know new stories and journeys. Here at Mission Of Hope new missionary groups from churches all over the states come almost every week. Something I didn’t know I would be blessed by is getting to know so many other Christians from the states while being here on base. It has been so so fun to meet all the new people who come each week and be encouraged by what God has done in them. And even be listened to and encouraged in my pursuit of filmmaking one day!

As we go into new communities each week I see more and more of Gods heart for people. I desperately want people to know the Jesus that I do and I know that God feels even more intensely on that subject. I desire for people to feel known, seen and loved. So far I’ve been here for a little over a month. We’ve done a lot of SMT which stands for strategic ministry time where we go into a community and talk to anyone who will listen. Typically people invite us into their homes and give up their chairs for us. People have extra plastic chairs always for random people to stop by. The culture is so sweet and different than America. A lot of people are Catholic so they know and believe in God but are missing the personal relationship with Him we as humans desperately need. It is tricky to talk to them in a way to not discount their relationship with God but to tell them there’s more than just a God who wants us to work for Him.

When I talk about my squad that’s all the people here with me. My team which is called the ABCs consists of Avrie, Grace, Kaitlyn, Lexy and I. ABC stand for Aspen Branches of Christ! Aspen branches can’t live by themselves so they need to be with other aspens for their roots to connect, and we’re all branches of Jesus growing together. That’s how we picked that team name. The other team is the surfing monkeys consisting of Jocelyn, Maura, Julianna, Kirsten and Doug. Not quite sure how they came to the conclusion of that name😂

One week we went into a school and played with the kids and helped a little with them learning some English. It was really fun and difficult at the same time. It’s hard that I don’t know Spanish so kids try to talk to me and I don’t know what they’re saying. But they are very sweet and random kids will come up and give us hugs. One day I was getting discouraged because I couldn’t understand them and I went back out to play with more kids and a little boy came up and I told him I don’t know Spanish and so he explained he was asking what my favorite color was by pointing at himself and saying blue in English. And I just really appreciated that after being discouraged he also asked my name and kept saying “Emily Emily Emily”. We were playing catch. I was just blessed by Jesus to experience that right after I was just talking about having hard time with that.

The little kids loved to play tag with me, mostly the boys cause the little girls wanted to talk and I couldn’t but the boys wanted to play. They were literally so fast I could not catch them sprinting at full speed. It was crazy! It was so so fun though!

I ended up getting sick last week but a new team came. And before I got too sick I was able to talk to a guy from Texas who was encouraging me to pursue my filmmaking more and he could help me and set me up with friends of his in the film industry and it was so cool to talk to him. I haven’t thought about film much recently and it was inspiring to talk to him.

We went on a mini debrief because we’ve been here for over a month now! It was a time to have fun and process as well as see what we want to focus on for the rest of the trip. We went to Sosúa which has beautiful beaches. It was so fun we went snorkeling and had pizza by the beach as well as shopping and hanging out. One thing that was a little scary was the fact that there was a lot of prostitution in Sosúa we could tell certain places were brothels or people were hiring prostitutes. We were all very safe but it was hard to see.

The biggest thing Gods teaching me is that He is faithful!! He knows me and everything and I’m learning to walk in my identity and who He says I am and the authority I have in Jesus! I love Jesus and I’m excited to feel closer to Him and fall more in love. I’m loving to learn about David right now and just how fiercely he loved God and how fiercely God loved David.

Prayer requests:

Spiritual warfare is a BIG thing right now it feels very real and extremely annoying so prayer against the Devils schemes would be lovely.

As well as being intentional with each day I have left here and cherish it and to invite Jesus into each part of my day and praying without ceasing!

I loveeeee u!

-emem