KidzReach orientation

We have been very busy the last few days. It feel like we have been here a long time and it’s only been three full days. We were very lucky to be able to have our own house. It is a one bedroom house that we can stay in this week that Taja lives in. She works on the YWAM base and is out on Outreach for the next while in Columbia I think.
We started our time here with some tours of the main base. We looked for projects that we could do when the Fehrs arrive in Jan. One of the projects that is really needed is a new pen for the goats on the base. Right now they don’t have the funds to build one and the goats are tied out on ropes all day. Last week they lost one of their best breeding goats because it became entangled in it’s rope and no one saw it in time. So if it works out we would like to build them a space. I will try to download a picture. We have been having problems with our e-mail ever since arriving in Costa Rica. I found that I could get e-mails but I can’t send them from our computer. Ryan showed me how to start a new Gmail account and that seems to be working but of course we don’t have any of our address book in this new account and so it takes a long time to send a bunch of people e-mails.
The other things that we have been doing is preparing for our outreach in Panama. Colton and Miranda have been making prayer journals to document their time while one KidzReach. They have also been packing tracts into the toy bags we brought down from home We went on a bus ride down to the next little town San Rafael and the kids played in the park with the local kids and then after our time there they handed out 25 bags or so. The kids at the park were very happy to get these toys.
Yesterday we started to learn a drama to do for the indigenous in Panama. It is a story about 3 trees and how they were used to glorify Jesus.
We have been having a great time living like the Costa Rican’s, and team building with the Bedencops.

KidzReach

We made it to Costa Rica. We spent today in orientation and went into town and played at a park with the local kids and handed out a bunch of the beanie babies and hot wheel toys that the kids back home collected for us. It was very fun to see the faces on the local kids and also on our kids faces. It was fun to see our friends Ryan and Sarah and the kids again.

Panama 2007/2008

Dear friends and family,
We wanted to let you all know what has been happening in our lives. We have been seeking what to do this winter and we feel that we are being led to Panama. We met a family last year in Costa Rica at a YWAM (youth with a mission) base and told them of our desire for taking our kids on missions. They also live that dream them selves and we talked a lot since then about what that could mean for our families. Well, this summer we talked about how in addition to our family we would like to see other families also experience missions abroad. We knew from last year that there were a few building projects that really needed to be done on the base that we had visited. That seemed to be the direction that we would go. Then in another discussion with Sarah (the YWAM mom) we started talking about a plan to involve our kids directly with the children in that country to show them the hope that we have in Jesus. We prayed a lot about what that would look like and Sarah came up with the idea to start a team of kids and equip them to go out and reach their generation among the nations and show them the love of Jesus. Then after much prayer she thought of a name to call this outreach. She is calling this mission KidzReach.
So this December we will be going for a month or so to isla Bastimentos, a small island off the coast of Panama in the Bocas del Toro island chain. God blessed us with the opportunity to go and spend Christmas with the Ngobe people who live on this island. Last week Sarah and her family were there for a week and brought down a bunch of bibles that had been translated into Ngobere (their native tongue). When the first man, a new Ngobe believer took the bible carefully in his hands he asked “who wrote this?” He was asking who knew his language and took the time to write God’s word so that he could truly read and understand.
These are the people that we will be visiting. We will also be able to help the new YWAM base on the island to build a church/school for these people. The material for the building has been sitting there for a couple of months because a group had fundraised and bought the material to build it and the material didn’t arrive in time to do the work. So Dean is very happy to have a project to do while we are there. They are very happy that someone who has building experience will come and help them.
So we will be the first exploratory team for KidzReach (the new ministry Sarah has started). We will be focusing on the relationship aspect and then trusting God to show us what to teach and how to act to bring His hope into the lives of the indigenous. The first KidzReach team will be training, mobilizing and Educating kids to take the gospel to the unreached. So we are trying as a family to wait and see what else God is asking us to do. We are trusting that He has a plan for us every step of the way. So many times during this we have seen how God is surprising us and guiding us in directions we never expected to go. Every time we think that we have it figured out, we are again amazed at the cool things that He has for us to learn. Once again we find ourselves traveling a new journey and through Gods grace we will see where that leads us. Thank you for all your prayers and support.

Dean, Wendy, Colton and Miranda

Canadian Summers

Canada has some of the best summers. We spent the summer being together as much as possible. We tried to go camping as many weekends as we could. One of the best beaches in the world I think is Grand Beach north of Winnipeg.
One of the things we also did this summer is to plan where we would go this winter. When we got an e-mail from Sarah in Costa Rica asking us if we would like to help her get a new mission off the ground in Costa Rica, we jumped at the chance. This was exactly the type of program that we had hoped to find when we started becoming interested in serving abroad with our kids. It is all about families serving others and how kids can make a huge impact on the world. The name of this program is KidzReach. It is about Kidz reaching across the nations. www.kidzreach.com
So that is what our plan is for this year. We will be flying out to Costa Rica and meeting Sarah and her family and busing it down to Panama with them. There we will boat out to a remote island where we will meet with a village of indigenous people. We will also help to build them a small church. It will be a challenging few weeks but we are all really looking forward to it. After Christmas on this island we will make our way back up to Costa Rica and work on the YWAM base that we worked on last year.

Worship at Soar

We experienced some very powerful worship times at Soar. The teens have so few barriers to worship compared to all the ideas that we were raised with. It was cool to see such exuberance. We had a very busy 10 days. We started with setting up and cleaning up the facility. Then the people arrived. All 200 of them. So we found places for everyone to sleep and arranged for everyone to have a place to sit at meals. We started the week with orientation and on Monday everyone left for their individual team service locations. So we thought for a few minutes that we would have a bit of a break till they returned, But then we noticed that we needed to clean up and restock toilet paper and hand towel paper and vacuum and have meetings and suddenly it was 4:00 and everyone started coming back and wanting to take showers and wow was it busy. Then after supper we had worship and team times and snack and then the process of getting 200 teens to bed. Well that in itself was interesting. But everyone was very mature and usually by 12pm or so it was quiet. So we could go to bed. Then the alarm went off one night and the other things that keep you up in a different place all happened and we got really tired. But it was so fun and the people were so great that I can't believe that we have never been to soar before and can't imagine not being involved every year from now on.

Soar Heartland

This year during spring break we will have a unique experience to go on missions. We are going to help out at Soar Heartland as Facility Coordinators. This is really exciting for us because it is totally using our gifts to their greatest potential and it is neat to be doing something this big so close to where we live. We will be working for 10 days (with Colton and Miranda) while staying at the facility so we will be immersed into the mission similarly to the way we would be when going to another country.
Soar is a mission that takes youth from around the province and brings them together in one location. Trains them and takes them out into inner city life to help the people who need it so badly. There are some who will work at building project,soup kitchens with kids on spring break with other churches and during the week there is a big carnival for all the kids. It can be a very spiritual journey for the participants and also the people they are helping. It will be interesting to see where Jesus shows up in all of this. Also to be a part of it and see what this experience will teach us about our neighbours. I will try to blog while we are there but again when in something like this it is hard to know what to expect. They are looking for all types of volunteers so if you would like to do something big during the break call me.

Mission 2008

We have been home for two weeks and are planning the trip for next year. Our dream as a family is to be able to share the love of missions abroad with other families. The first step we have done already. The plan has been put into place for Jan. 2008 for us to go back to the YWAM base with a group of families and help them build a new kitchen facility and/or a new cabin for staff or hosting missionaries. The base was were we stayed and helped build and work the first week in Costa Rica. We also have been asked to come back to the bible school next year and again help with their kids camp. We will need people to help build and people who love kids and people who like to cook and people who want to pray and people who want to travel.So if this is what God is calling you to do, give us a call. The people in Costa Rica would love to have you!
The picture here is of the little cabin that we stayed in at the YWAM base and is similar to what they would like to build more of. They have cut the lumber from the trees on the property and would like to use it to build other buildings that they really need.