From The Trinity Soccer 2011 Costa Rica Blog:
This slideshow requires JavaScript.
Last Day in Costa Rica (Blog #4)
Buenos Noches!
Well, things are going great here and hope you are all doing well back home too! Thursday and Friday we had two more wonderful days at Roblealto to play with the kids, share testimonies, sing songs, make crafts, and continue with painting work around the site. Each day our hearts are more and more moved and impacted by not only the beautiful children at this ministry but also the holistic purpose and impact of Roblealto on each kid and each family member involved with the children. It is difficult to write all the stories, as each of us has had our own experience with a child, teacher, or group of children at Roblealto. One thing that Coach mentioned after we are all continually moved by the effectiveness of this ministry is that it was also founded back in the 1930s, which can almost prove for itself that it is well established and even rooted in the Lord and bearing much fruit for many generations. If you havent already we highly encourage you to visit their website and learn more about the ministry at Roblealto – www.roblealto.org and also view a video on you tube titled Roblealto Bible Home – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnWYfrPVk1o
Thursday evening we had another set of matches about an hour travel up into the mountains. The setting fo these games were incredible and we couldn’t help but feel so blessed by the opportunity to play where we were in the midst og Gods beautiful creation and culture in Costa Rica. Since the sun goes down early in Costa Rica the lights were on for the games, and we were quickly educated on the size of moths in Costa Rica! The women played first and again played another strong match against our strongest opponent in Costa Rica and came out with a 2-0 win. The men followed the women’s game with another strong game as well, specifically putting out a confident second half performance to win an exciting 3-2 over a team called Flores. After the games we were able to meet with the opponent and share testimonies and pray with them as well. Friday we had our last day at Roblealto and were able to give gifts to each of the classrooms and even some to kids as well to keep! This was such a blessing to us to experience seeing the joy and thankfulness on their faces. We mostly gave away items we had collected or purchased back home to various teachers for their rooms, or to each kid in the classroom to have, and even some players gave away personal items such as jerseys or t-shirts for the children to have as well.
After our good byes we loaded up and headed out to Punta Leona, Costa Rica which is located on the Pacific Coast for our final night and debriefing. On the way we drove through some incredible scenery going through the mountains and rainforest, as well as making a few stops at fruit markets and at stop at a river bridge where we witnessed huge crocodiles in the river below in the wild! We are now at our resort for the evening and have enjoyed a wonderful night of swimming in the ocean, great food, relaxation and fellowship. I must cut this short now as we are about to begin our final debriefing in Costa Rica! Tomorrow we depart at noon for San Jose and will begin our final leg of travels back to Chicago. We are to arrive in Chicago around 1 or 2am so keep us in your prayers! As always your prayers have been felt and we are extremely blessed to have each of you supporting us! Thanks for following us so far on the trip and you will soon be able to catch up with us in person when we return! Prayer requests Health and recovery for minor illnesses and/or nagging injuries, specifically for the overall well-being as well as our return flight home and the start of training camp next week Continued growth in our faith and walks with the Lord Being aware, available and active for God to use is even more still as we depart and return to Trinity! God Bless!
“Yo tengo gozo en mi corazon” (Blog #3)
Its Wednesday “Yo tengo gozo en mi corazon” means “I have joy in my heart!” Today we got to sleep in! Everyone was excited to catch up on sleep before our 7:30 breakfast. The schedule for the morning was very similar to the other mornings, with devotions from Coach Gilliam in the book of Hebrews, and quiet time to follow. We are all still in awe of God’s creation and beauty here in Costa Rica. It is awesome to spend our morning in the prescence of God to start off our day. After quiet time, we were able to have some time to ourselves, which many of us spent juggling on the field behind our “dorms”…typical of college soccer players At around 11, we had lunch which included rice, beans, some type of enchilada, a combination of veggies (tomatoes and mushrooms, and mammons. (Wendy thought they were called mammochinos…she was a little confused!) Once we were done with lunch, we got ready to go to Roblealto for our second day! At the site with only 10 team members, the players switched roles. Instead of painting they went in the classrooms to work with the children and vice versa. At the other site with the majority of the team, there was worship, the David and Goliath Bible story, and many heart to heart conversations. The men were to leave the sites at around 330, however we ran into a little mix up. Supposedly, we are to pay an exiting tax for leaving Costa Rica and we thought it would be solved in a short manner of time…it was not! We went to the bank to figure it out, but they are currently holding our passports until we get it sorted out, which should be today (Thursday). So pray that it will go smoothly! The men were supposed to play at 5 but because of the holdup, we arrived at about 6. Thankfully the men were still able to play! The facility was both indoor and outdoor. To describe it better, the building was open and the turf fields were under the roof. Pictures will be posted after the trip! The women played four 25 minute halves against the same team and won both. The boys played four 20 minute games against two different teams, lost their first game and won their second. We arrived back to Sendas late, around 9:45 and had dinner, worship, and debriefing with Doc. We all went to bed pretty tired and worn out. Tomorrow is our last day at Roblealto Prayer requests: That lives would be touched at Roblealto on our last visit For strength in both teams as we come to the end of our trip Safety at both games tonight That relationships between both teams and the coaches would continue to strengthen. Thank you for all your love, prayers, and support!!
Pura Vida! (Blog #2)
Buenos Noches! Good Evening! While the literal translation of “Pura Vida” is “pure life,” it is a common Costa Rican saying, that was even found posted as soon as the airport, to say “everything is good” or “everything is perfect!”
Sunday: After a long day of travels on Saturday we woke at 6:30am for breakfast at our dormitories of rice and beans, egg dish, cereal, coffee, juice, mango, papayas and bananas. We departed for an early church service that was one of many church services being held that morning. After the service we played inner squad 7v7 soccer at a turf court inside the church facilities that was actually just outside the doors of the sanctuary. The team was very anxious and excited to play again together and to be playing amongst the beautiful scenery and backdrop of the Costa Rican mountains. While we were playing various adults and children from the church would come and watch and even some boys joined our scrimmaging. After we were done we were able to pray with those from the church who had joined our time and then went off to lunch at a Costa Rican restaurant.
It is rainy season here so we’ve been told that you can expect rain every afternoon around 2-4pm…and so far that has been true! At lunch that afternoon we had a wide variety of food selections to say the least. Much of our team choose something between chicken, fish or meat all with rice or fries while some others had octopus or even some had seafood or fish that was still in the fish or shell of it’s life when it was alive…if that makes sense. Jon and Doc, an assistant men’s coach and a professor from Trinity, had fish that head was also charred and present on their plates as well, yummy…! We spent the rest of Sunday touring some streets around San Jose and having team devotionals and small group time. Monday: Sunday was a lighter day on the schedule which helped us prepare for the crazy week ahead, and even as I sit and write this we are still so overwhelmed by how God is working and moving on this trip!
Monday morning we woke at 6:30am for breakfast soon followed by team devotionals and quiet time. During our team devotions this week Coach Gilliam is taking us through the book of Hebrews, which has all been such a blessing to hear and also be challenged by and cause you to think and evaluate our faith and how we daily are living our lives and living out our faith.
Later that morning we reconvened for a practice session at our facilities where we are staying. We have been blessed to have a host of dormitories at a seminary here in Costa Rica that is located with a beautiful view amongst the mountains and even has a soccer field! After training we had a quick lunch at 11am and departed for our first day at Roblealto, a christian child care center.
Our group has the opportunity to work at two of Roblealto’s sites in Costa Rica. 10 people are at one site where their are about 100 kids that are a bit younger, while the rest of the team is at another site with 150 kids. The team of 10 is at a facility that has great need for maintenance help, as they have one maintenance worker. 5 people from that team helped with painting and 5 others were individually spread out amongst 5 classrooms each with a teacher and about ten kids per classroom where they help with playing games, teaching times, crafts, and simply loving on the kids and making them laugh! The rest of the team is at the larger site where they have most of the kids at one time. They begin with a organized craft time that we brought down, which on Monday was paper bag puppets and decorations, then followed by free time and fun game play. At this site they will also have the opportunity to share a testimony or bible story each day that the players have prepared ahead of time for the children. Once we were picked up from our site we went to one of Costa Ricas famous shopping centers…roll your tongue when you say it…Walmart! We have had no injuries or illnesses but needed to pick up some first aid items for blisters and sore throat medicine, as well as gave the team opportunities to get Costa Rican coffee and other snacks, to bring home! Coach Gilliam purchased some mamonchinos, not sure if I spelled that right, but it’s a Costa Rican fruit that is pink and looked like a mix of a porcupine and a blow fish. After he shared his first bag with much of the team, he went back and purchased more for the group to experience this Central American fruit experience! We then returned to Sendas, our host facility for a dinner of spaghetti noodles and some type of sauce with bread and salad. After dinner we had a time of worship followed by a debriefing time that we do every evening.
Tuesday: Late breakfast! We got to get up for 7am breakfast, and we are so happy with the team as they have never complained once about our crazy early times or late dinners! Today was Game Day! We had team devotions with Coach again followed by quiet time and then departed for our games! Both teams had games today, the women and at 1pm and the guys game was at 3pm. Thankfully we were playing just up the hill from each other so each team was able to support each other for portions of their games. The Women had a fantastic showing for their first game after just one day of practices where we saw them playing with much creativity and coach ability, and we left the game with a final score of 6-0. After the match we had the opportunity to pray with the other team as well as share a brief testimony from one of our senior captains Rachel Bowker. After the women’s game our bus driver, Luis…who is fantastic and such a great price of our trip, took the women’s team up the mountain to the men’s game. Looking out from one end of the men’s game you were looking down from the mountain out on the city and we were even above some of the clouds, it couldn’t have been any more beautiful. Also, for the Men only having one day of training they played a competitive match, experiencing much Costa Rican favored officiating, which the women had as well, yet came out with a 2-1 victory. Since today was a Costa Rican holiday we were not able to go to Roblealto as the centers were closed, we were able to play our matches earlier in the day and have some time around San Jose for a late lunch and some shopping. We stopped at another famous Costa Rican restaurant…McDonalds…! This was one thing completely from the Lord on our trip as well. We did not expect to go to eat here, but our driver took us there and we went with it. While we were waiting to order food Eli and Ryan, one of our men’s players and men’s assistant coaches were approached by impoverished looking gentlemen who asked them if they could purchase him something to eat. After speaking with him for awhile they came to find that he had HIV and had a wife and daughter at home. After informing him about who we were and why we were in Costa Rica the guys asked him if he was a christian. With a confident refusal to faith in God, the guys continued to learn more of why he did not choose to believe so far in his life mostly due to his illness and poor conditions and life situation of his family. The guys continued to share with him about Christ and the good news of the gospel with him and his demeanor began to change and the Lord opened his heart to receive Christ in that time! Jon, our men’s assistant coach assisted with communication here as well as he is fluent in spanish and was able to confirm his understanding of the message of Christ. Much more happened throughout this time during and after but we are so thankful, humbled and excited for this man Nester who is now a part of our family in Christ. Upon the guys departure from him they were able to share verses in the bible with him, and purchase dinner for him and his wife and daughters, Carla and Carla Diana, who had not eaten much yet in the day. When they said their good bye’s Nester said he would see them later, and when they looked at him as to what he meant he pointed up in to the sky.
After dinner we returned to Sendas for worship, debriefing and dinner time. Debriefing has been a great experience for everyone to share what God had showed them during the day or something they were blessed or challenged by with some other framework given to the team to encourage them as well. So, now the players should be asleep and we coaches are sleepy as well…so before we depart I would like to thank you for your prayers as we have felt them in many ways and would like to share some brief prayer requests as well as remind you to keep in touch with our blog and prayer calendar posted earlier in this blog. Prayer requests: Tomorrows games for both the men and the women Our time at Roblealto Continued awareness, availability and action for the Lord to use us as he would have for his kingdom and glory!
We’ve Arrived! (Blog #1)
Thank you for yor prayers on behalf of our team. Our travel to San Jose went off without a hitch. Every segment of our trip was on time or early. We did not lose any luggage either….Praise the Lord. Everyone is happy and healthy!
We are currently finishing up “desayuno” and will be off to church at 8:00 am.
Please continue to check our prayer calendar posted on this blog.
