Hello World,

Time flies when you are having fun.  At least that is my excuse for not posting a blog from more than one month.  SORRY!

Well, let’s start with the family.  Both kids went back to school in this month, Kayley on the 6^th and Joshua left for the USA on Aug 21^st.  Both are getting adjusted to the new school year, and both are juniors at their respective schools, ICS (Kayley) and Mount Vernon Nazarene University.

Joshua and Lilly

Joshua at a ball game in Columbus.

Just before Joshua left us once again, we took a few days off to visit Cahuita National Park, located on the Caribbean side.  This area is less developed than the Pacific side, but beautiful just the same.   Since Joshua had never been there, he enjoyed the unique experience of the natural beaches and let’s not forget the snorkeling.

Back at the office, Shelley said a sad goodbye to her office assistant Helen who is going to the Dominican Republic on her way to Honduras to serve as a missionary with Genesis.  Check out this site if you do not yet know what I am talking about!

http://www.mesoamericagenesis.com/

The SENDAS crew at Helen's going away party.

But God has provided and I have a new assistant named Vicente.   I am so thankful for the help God gives me in my work.  I don’t know if I would survive without these great leaders who use their talents for the Lord.

Vicente Bustos, new office assistant in Public Relations

In other GOODBYE news….we have a number of missionaries leaving this month.  The LeGrands were the first to say goodbye to Costa Rica, leaving for a 4 month home assignment before they are assigned with Work and Witness in another area of the Mesoamerica Region.  We are already missing their kids running around campus, asking us questions and in general, just making life fun.

On September 23^rd, we have two families leaving for the USA: Lucas and Liz Gentry, who have served as volunteers for an entire year with SENDAS and Gary and Naomi Faucett who have taken intensive CALL class before they head to the Dominican Republic to work with the Genesis project.  We are excited to watch as God uses them in ministry in the coming months and years.

Lucas and Liz Gentry

Gary and Naomi Faucett with Profesora Gaby

A final goodbye will be for the Jimenez family.  They have served at SENDAS with us for nearly 3 years and will be moving to Ecuador to serve on the South America Region.  Many blessings to them as they move even further from their families:  Esdras is from Mexico and Scarlet from Nicaragua.

CALL has had another good year.  The language school is blessed to have three great professors who are patient and caring as the students learn Spanish little by little.  I am blessed to work with these great ladies!

All three CALL professors:  Zeidy, Gaby and Nuria.

In other ministry news, David and Shelley have been working all year on the translating and recording of a Spanish radio show called Family Care.  Our friends Miguel and Irene record the 5 minute show in Spanish and then we record it in English.  There are many Caribbean islands that are waiting to have these shows available to them on the radio and on the website.

A first for David and Shelley – leading a marriage workshop!  We taught the basics of the 5 love languages at the mission Three and Three (yes, that is actually the name of the community, something about two families with 3 boys each) really enjoyed the teaching.  Many couples that live there are not married, but instead live together.  But as they are learning more about God’s plan for marriage, they are sensing a need to be married in the church.  Fourteen couples came forward at the end to pray for their marriage and three couples talked to the Pastor afterwards asking about the process for being married.  God is good!

More than 80 persons were in attendance at 3y3.

Lastly, we enjoyed our time with the Costa Rica Central pastors and spouses at their first retreat in nearly 15 years.  It was a time of relaxation, talking, eating, and marriage/family workshops.  We are so thankful for the great leaders we work with here in Costa Rica.

Many of the Pastors and spouses from the CR Central District.

Another blessing for us here in Costa Rica is to spend time with Alvaro and Monica.  Alvaro lived with David's family as a foreign exchange student when David was five years old.  You never know who God will bring into your life once again, but we sure are pleased He gave us these last few years with these special people.  Al and Monica are moving back to Columbia soon and we will miss them.

Alvaro and Monica have been family for us here in Costa Rica.

We can’t wait to see you next summer when we visit the USA.  We are planning on spending some time in Iowa, Kansas City, Oklahoma, Florida, Tennessee and Chicago in our two months of traveling and speaking in churches.  Maybe we will see YOU then.

Thanks for your prayers and support.  We couldn’t be effective in ministry without each one of you.

Blessings,

The Webbs

Miramar for Jesus

What an amazing week we had with the Marysville, WA Maximum Mission (Evangelism and Jesus Film) team.  The team was comprised of 22 people from 5 different churches, mostly in the WA area, with the exception of two ladies from Olathe, KS.

We had an awesome time ministering in the community of Miramar, located in the province of Puntareñas (near the Pacific ocean, but elevated a bit).  It was hot and super humid each day, but everyone worked hard to make an impact in the community. 

It's a neat story, how this all got started.  A man by the name of Jorge has lived there for many years.  Two years ago, he felt he should start a church.  

Pastor Jorge, his wife Aurora and his daugher Franciny.

Pastor Rolando, the Evangelism Coordinator for the North district, sharing with the kids.

He has had some theological training, so he was ready to do so.  Now they have a small group of 10-12 people meeting 3 times per week in a rented building.  Jorge and his family enjoy listening to a radio show that airs each morning for one hour on the radio station out of San Jose.  The pastor who talks on the show is one of our Nazarene pastors here in the city by the name of Oscar.   Finally, Jorge contacted Pastor Oscar to see if he could affiliate with his church.  Oscar visited Miramar but quickly realized the two locations are far from each other (2 hours), so he asked David to work with the North District to see if they could assist Pastor Jorge.  And that is exactly what happened.  The North district leaders and pastors began to visit Jorge and encourage him in his work.  

On July 24, the team from WA arrived to SENDAS.  After one short night there, we headed off to Miramar, after a quick stop in Poas to visit the finca (a church on the North District). 

Here is a rundown of our activities at the two parks in the neighborhood close to the church building:

Fence cleaning and painting, playground equipment repair, painting of the equipment, general cleaning (trash and debris), welding of new soccer goals, painting of park benches and tables, etc).

And at the two schools:

The team performed the VBS (songs, clowns, puppets, etc) for 650 children, led activities for 5^th and 6^th graders (160 kids), visited classrooms and small groups to make salvation bracelets (800), and delivered school supplies for each classroom.  God opened the doors at the schools for the team to work with the children, sharing the message of salvation and the love of God.

That's a lot of kids.  They were the most attentive group we've worked with in all of Latin America.  Kuddos to their teachers!

All kids love the salvation bracelets.

As soccer is such a big part of the culture here, we made sure we played futbol wherever we went, using the salvation balls that are brightly colored to explain the message of salvation in colors.

A highlight was the church service on Sunday night where it was standing room only.  Joshua did a great job of interpreting for our friend Rev. Felipe Flores, and the Palmares church provided the music.  It was a wonderful night.

We showed the Jesus Film three different evenings in three different locations in town.  And in all, there were more than 100 people who accepted Christ or recommitted their lives to the Lord.  

 

One of the team members, Gary, has made some videos and slide shows of the team.  Take a look if you would like to see more...

People Need the Lord- http://youtu.be/T0UNVX489Ew

Go Light Your World- http://youtu.be/o1faLLS7eG4

Video of Church Service- http://youtu.be/2BLZEOyTEHI

The week ended with a well-deserved break at a resort on the beach.  

This team was truly amazing.  No complaining, just lots of hard work and good attitudes.  We are so blessed to work with wonderful people like those from Marysville, WA and beyond who just want to serve as God directs.  And a special thanks to our Florida LINKS district who faithfully prayed for the team and the ministry all week long. 

We are one blessed family.

Love you all,
The Webbs

Is it really JULY already?

Hello to all our dear family and friends,

I know we already shared about the craziness of the World Cup (see the June post), but it continued into July.  Costa Rica lost in the quarter finals to the Netherlands.  It was a very close game, losing only by penalty kicks.  But even with a loss, the Costa Ricans celebrated in the streets.  They were super proud of their team who made it further in the World Cup than in any other team in Central American history.  It was a BIG deal.  

Kayley and her friends from church enjoying celebrating in the streets.

Anne, Micah and Kayley, proudly holding the Costa Rica flag.

Kayley had an excellent adventure attending the Florida District youth camp in Orlando.  She flew by herself for the first time and did a great job.  She was a little worried, but came home explaining how easy it was.  She loved the camp and met many new friends there.  Next summer we will travel to Florida (our LINKS district) to spend ten days, so hopefully she will see her new friends once again.

Allison Tooley met Kayley at the airport.  Thanks Tooley family!

The Tavares Church of the Nazarene camp group.

Preparing for Pirate day at camp.

Here at SENDAS campus, Shelley’s work with CALL continued.  The group from Point Loma (PLNU) finished up their coursework and travels mid-month.  It was a successful 9 weeks and for the first time the students lived in homes in a nearby neighborhood.   We hope to continue the program next year, having even more students in the program. 

PLNU at Irazu Volcano.

Professor Marianna in Costa Rica.

Last day of class with PLNU.

Jim and Linda Dortch also completed their one month of Spanish studies this month.  They learned so much in just a few weeks!  And they will be working with Genesis in the Dominican Republic in the fall.  There is nothing we love better than to send off volunteer missionaries to the world!

Zeidy presenting certifcates to the Dortchs'.

We had big plans to hold an ESL day camp for children in July, but that plan just didn’t work out.  It was a disappointment, but the good thing is that we were able to help in preschools in the community.  We are especially thankful for Marylou and Laura from the San Diego area who volunteered to teach with the program.  Now there is talk of holding the ESL daycamp next year at a local school where it would be easy access for parents and a familiar environment for the children. 

Laura teaching a little one.

Joshua enjoying story time.

I think the kids like him!

Marylou and Laura in Coronado.

Marylou with Pastor Johnny and Mauren at the Finca.

Have you heard of Genesis?  I just mentioned it above, but maybe you haven’t heard about it yet?  Check out this website: www.mesoamericagenesis.com

Genesis is a push to work in the urban centers (and a few islands where the church has little to no presence).  Shelley’s office assistant will be one of the two year volunteers to serve as a missionary with Genesis.  Helen needs to raise lots of funds to make this happen.  If you would like to help her (I encourage you to do so!) you can read about her plans and support her ministry at this website:  

http://web.nazarene.org/site/TR?pg=fund&fr_id=1090&pxfid=5930

Helen Herrera, volunteer missionary with Genesis

SENDAS was privileged to have a Work and Witness team from Arizona with us for one week.  They worked so hard in renovating the Guanacaste dorm building.  This is such an important project.  Many of the buildings of SENDAS are 40+ years old and need some serious work.  THANKS to the Tempe, AZ team for all their hard work to help complete this project.  

Another awesome event was the Maximum Mission in Rosister Carballo.  This church is located in a rough area and it was great to see the youth of the district work together to make a difference in this community.  Joshua and Kayley helped with this team and Joshua has kept busy working with many teams, especially at the Poas finca this summer.

David has kept busy with a trip to Panama (Joshua went along) to meet with church planters, a trip to the Indigenous area (yes, again) and much time planning the upcoming Evangelism projects in a town called Miramar, near the Pacific coast.  We are very excited to work with the Marysville, WA Jesus Film team who will arrive later this week.  There is a small cell group in Miramar who have been meeting for more than a year.  These 10 people are excited to work in their community and tell people about Jesus as opportunities are given.  It will be a GREAT week.  Pray for us and the team from July 24 – 31^st. 

Thank you so much for your prayers.  Already we look forward to seeing many of you next summer (2015) when we will be in the USA for two months of traveling and visiting churches.  Maybe we will see YOU???

Blessings from the Webbs,

David, Shelley, Joshua and Kayley