WORSHIP TIME

Saturday night: At 7:00 p.m. we had our devotions together, although briefly, due to the tired looks on the faces of all these sleep-deprived kids! Another group of students, from a Christian school in Cincinnati, Ohio, were also having devotions together upstairs at the same time. This was their last night and they were leaving at 2:00 a.m. to return home. Sounds just like our group, but only in reverse: we left around 2:30 a.m. and our week was just starting! Earlier they had invited us to join them at 7:30 to sing together. Pastor Rick teamed up with their two guitarists, and our group sang and read scripture together for about 45 minutes. The singing was strong, harmonious, and beautiful! We concluded our time with the Cincinnati team surrounding the DeMotte team to pray over us and our week here at Casa Bernabe. We returned the gesture as we surrounded them and prayed for their safe return. What a blessing to bring two groups of strangers together and find common ground in Jesus, our faith in him, and our desire to worship and sing...It was truly a special time! Many in the two groups spent another hour playing group games like "ninja".

Sunday: Casa Bernabe holds church here every Sunday morning for the residents and workers here. The church was packed, of course, with young children, who were wiggly, had a hard time sitting still, and even held hands and danced together in the front of church during some of the praise and worship time. So precious to see them all in their dresses and khakis...beautiful! Mrs. Nanninga was asked to do some translating at the beginning of the service, which she did ably! Several of the songs were equivalent to what we sing: "Come, Now Is The Time to Worship", and "I Give You My Heart". Children 3-5 years old left for children's worship, and several of our students went to help them. Some other students have already gotten involved in helping in the infant and toddler homes to help get them up, washed and dressed, and to help care for them after lunch and nap. Communicating is always a challenge, since many of the children do speak much English, though we suspect they understand more than they let on!

Following church, we hung around, relaxed, had a delicious meal of seasoned rice, tortillas, chicken, and fruit. Muy delicioso :-) Naps, and soccer games with the seemingly tireless children were the order of the day! Below are a couple of pictures of church, and a couple of videos of the songs.

Can you recognize the songs? You should be able to!