6/12/11 The market is a terribly beautiful place.  When my soul was restless yesterday, I found peace nowhere else but the dirty, crowded, fly-infested chaos of the Jinotepe market.  As the flow of Nicaraguans rushed past me in either direction, when I couldn’t decide how much to bargain for shampoo—nor how to bargain in any fashion whatsoever, when the creepy drunk guy professed his love to me, I realized I will always be against the current.  I will never know the answers.  And I don’t have to.  I know the King who does.  So you walk down...

6/24/11 Today in Nicaragua, it’s Father’s Day.  Because of this, I’ve been thinking a lot about what we’ve learned about the barrios in the last couple of weeks. When we got here, we knew there was darkness, but this is not what I expected.   You see, The girls here are mistreated.  From when they are very young, they are passed around the men in their family. The fathers, The uncles, The brothers, The cousins, As some sort of initiation.   So when they are older and meet the first guy they are interested in, They only know how to show affection...

I went on my first prayer walk of the barrios last week.  As we went along, some were going faster and some taking their time praying over specific houses.  After a few minutes of silent bickering, Kellie got us together to pray because we all knew that our hearts weren’t right.  She was absolutely right.  So after that prayer, God cleared our hearts and minds to give us a beautiful opportunity.  We came upon a church that we all wanted to pray over.  Our first real agreement that day.  So we prayed for the people to be blessed, for the church to...