What a trip like that can do

And he's back.  Yup, Kid Kaboom (one of my two seniors) is in the house.

You may have seen him in Friday's post (if not, skip down below).  If you know him at all (or if you read the post), you'll know that he came wired with a burden for the lost, a passion to tell them about Christ, and the courage to do so.  Frequently.

Last summer, he had the wonderful opportunity to go to the Dominican Republic with an IMPACT team from our church.  It was life changing for him, and when he got back, he wrote the following letter to those who had supported him with their prayers and hard-earned dollars.

I thought about it again when he received a lovely postcard from a far-away auntie just last week, thanking him for his letter and rejoicing with him over the chance he'd had to go.  If you enjoyed the essay he wrote in English class this fall, you will like this letter, I think.  Since it's rather long, it will be a two-part series.  Here he is, in his own words:

"First of all, I would like to thank everybody who donated money and prayed for me while on this trip. It would not have been possible without either. God chose me to go on this trip and he used you as his means of sending me. I am very appreciative of all your generosity you have shown me. For out of your generosity my life has been changed and I’ve been given a new perspective on life. It is also because of your generosity that I think you deserve to hear some of what I did and what my trip was like. Keep in mind, I will not be able to cover nearly everything I would like to in this letter, so if you ever see me in person, feel free to ask me more about my trip and I will be happy to oblige.

For starters, we stayed in the Dominican for ten days. It was pretty hot with not really any AC to run to. It usually stayed somewhere in the 90’s. But we just sweated it out with the Dominicans in hot, sticky, brotherly love. We stayed in a hotel that was considered “cush” for missions standards, though in my room we had four guys, some of them on the larger side, that had to sleep together literally cheek to cheek on a three man bed. I think we really got to know each other better on this trip.

We rode everywhere with half the team piled on top of each other in the back of a pickup, and the other half scrunched together cheek to jowl in the van. People would hang out the side windows and door so that the occasional Dominican could pile in with us too. Quena, the woman that ran all the churches we went to, made all of our meals, with the help of a few others, which was a real feat. I considered their servant hood one of the first lessons I learned there. I don’t think I will ever complain again when I am getting the house ready for when my Grandma and Grandpa Yoder come to visit. Well, or at least not as much."  To be continued...