Dominican Republic Family Outreach

Wednesday, July 30

The construction team continues to plow ahead.  They laid another 800+ block today, completing the end walls and most of the interior walls of the structure.  Everett Brown, Bill Pasco, Don Hyer, and Pastor Joe Schroepfer are working on a project to build a number of bookshelves for the school.  Today, they completed their frist one and they are awaiting more lumber to tomorrow.

The VBS Teams are also have great ministry.  Today, at Esmirna Church, the team had an amazing move of God.  It started with praise & worship in the church and eventually it wound up outside, in the street, with the team praying for passers-by.  Motorcyclists stopped for prayer, people came out of houses and stores for prayer!  The ended by holding hands in a large circle in the street outside the church and praying for the community.  It was really powerful.  Here’s how one team member, who was there, experienced it:

“I don’t know what happened.  We just started worshipping and then we started dancing.  Pretty soon, the dancing went outside the church and out into the street.  Usually, the street outside the church is really busy, but at this time, there was almost traffic.  We were praising and worshipping God and He was there.  We started praying for the kids first, then we were praying for the adults.  I can’t even remember all that happened; I just can’t believe that God used me that way.  It was powerful and it was beautiful and they were so hungry for God.  People were coming out of stores and houses and we prayed for them.  Kitty Mitchell prayed for the Pastor’s wife and she was filled with the Holy Spirit.  We finished by holding hands in a big circle out in the middle of the street.  It was beautiful and I wonder if I’ll ever have the experience again!”
Elizabeth Stevens

Monday, July 28

Well, we were up early. Several of us arrived at Calvary Lighthouse before the 3 AM requirement, planning to stage all of our ministry baggage in front of the church to expedite the loading of the buses. We found Tom Hicks already there are starting the job!! Getting 82 people moving in any kind of an organized fashion at 3 AM is something of a challenge, but someone brought out a pot of coffee and things really began to take off! We got both busses packed, everyone onboard, and we were on the road at 3:28…two minutes before our scheduled departure!! That was just the first on a day full of great miracles!!

When we arrived at Newark-Liberty International, we found everything just as Kwasi had promised. We checked-in 82 people and 160 bags in less than 30 minutes!! I couldn’t believe it. Everything went so smooth. Thank God for Kwasi and for his sensitivity to the Holy Spirit! As it was, I’ve had teams of 8 – 12 people who have had more problems checking-in for a flight than we did for this flight! THANK YOU, KWASI!!

Kwasi Agyemana

The flight was uneventful…most people slept.

Arriving in Santo Domingo, another miracle awaited us. Generally, each arriving passenger must complete a Customs Form for entry into the DR. Dave Murphy went ahead to talk to the Customs personnel while I got the team together. Dave came back to report that we were going to allowed to pass through Customs while submitting only one form for the entire team. We were concerned that some of the items that we were brining as gifts or as ministry items were going to be heavily taxed. When we met Mitch Martinez at the Arrivals Door, he was amazed that we didn’t have additional costs for Customs! God is good!!

The drive to La Vega was quiet…again, most people slept…and we arrived to a great meal at the Central Christian Conference Center in La Vega. After dinner, we had a short team meeting and then went to bed. Tomorrow is going to be a very big day!

Tuesday, July 29

Slow starts all the way around, but that was to be expected. The construction team needs to lay about 800-850 block. Today at lunch, we’d laid just under 400 block, but by dinner we were at 850+ block. The same was true for the VBS teams….slow start, as everyone figures out what works and what doesn’t, then it’s just fun!!!

We did have some good news with regards to the blog today.  I discovered the the office at the Conference Center where we are staying has WiFi so I can update the blog….great, now all I have to find is the time!

I didn’t help myself out by leaving my mini-USB cord to connect my camera to my phone. I’ve got some great photos, but I cant’s show them to you until I replace the card. Lo ciento….I’m sorry. Continue to check back regularly for updates!!

July 27, 2008

One of the things that I’ve learned to look for in anything that I undertake for God is His “fingerprints.”  You and I leave fingerprints…they are evidence of our presence and of our activity.  When you’ve been someplace, doing something, you leave fingerprints.  God doesn’t leave fingerprints as you and I do, however He does leave evidence of His presence and activity…His fingerprints.

The leader of our Construction Team is Kirby O”Malley.  Kirby is the President of Garden State Precast, a company that makes precast concrete products.  When Kirby first began to talk about being a part of the team, he mentioned that one of the engineers in his company was from the Dominican Republic.  As he looked into it further, it turns out that this engineer, Marcos Santos, is not just from the Dominican Republic, he’s also from La Vega.  Even more than that, it turns out that Marcos’ youngest two siblings actually attend La Vega Christian School!  Think about that.  What are the chances of something like that?  That’s what I mean when I talk about God’s “fingerprints.”  But, it doesn’t stop there.  Marcos’ father, Marcos, owns a construction and development company.  When Pastor Wes Lindquist, Kirby O’Malley, and I were in La Vega back in April, we met the elder Marcos.  We showed him the construction site and Kirby was able to spend a day with him, visiting some of his projects and see his company.  Because of his connections in the construction community, he was able to assist us with excellent prices for items like concrete and block for the construction project.  He’s also offered to assist with heavy equipment or other items that we might need to accomplish the project!  Those are God’s fingerprints.

When you consider the years that it’s taken for all of these things to come together, you suddenly get the bigger picture of how long God has been planning this event and getting the right pieces in the right place.  I don’t think for a second that God just thought one day, “Hey I’ve got Marcos over at Garden State Precast, I think I’ll set up a little missions event in the Dominican Republic.”  God has been planning and preparing for this event for years and He’s been getting the people in the right places so that everything comes together smoothly and with the evidence of His sovereignty!!

I found the second fingerprint in Hershey, PA.  I was at Hershey Park, a large amusement park, with my daughter’s 8th grade class from Calvary Academy.  At the end of the day, as we were leaving, I decided that I would get a quick refill of my cup from a soda vendor.  The young lady that served me was named, Rosaria.  When I asked her where she was from, she told me, “The Dominican Republic.”  When I asked where, she told me that she was from La Vega.  I was pretty surprised and told her that I’d just recently been in La Vega.  She asked why and I told her that I was a pastor and that I was going to be taking a team to work at La Vega Christian School.  Her eyes got really big and she said, “My boyfriend works at La Vega Christian School!  He teaches the technology classes there.”  The funny thing is that I’d been in her boyfriend’s classroom on my last visit to the DR and I’d interviewed several of his students.  When I told her that, she said, “You’re the big group from New Jersey that is going to build the preschool!”  Wow, what an encouragement to me…God’s fingerprints.

The third fingerprint was really incredible.   I reserved the team’s airline tickets with a down payment to Continental Airlines on April 12th.  I paid off the tickets on June 14th.  About ten days before the trip, I discovered that Continental had changed its baggage requirements, reducing the number of checked bags from 2 bags to 1 bag.  Since we are depending on that second checked piece of luggage to get our ministry items down to the DR, this was a huge issue.  My first response was to talk to Continental via our travel agent.  My contention was that we purchased the tickets on April 12th, and, since it was before May 8th, Continental’s baggage policy change didn’t apply to us.  Continental’s position was, initially, somewhat different. Their initial contention was that the tickets were purchased on July 14th, so we were only allowed one bag per passenger.  I planned to call Continental personally on Monday, July 21st to discuss the issue, but before doing that, I mentioned the situation to the congregation on Sunday, July 20th, and asked them to pray.  Afterward, Kwasi Agyemana, who has been attending Calvary Lighthouse since February, approached Pastor Wes and told him that he’d not heard everthing I’d said.  He asked Pastor Wes which airline we were flying and Wes told him it was Continental.  He then asked what flight we were on and Wes told him the Monday morning Santo Domingo flight.  Kwasi laughed and asked how he could help and exactly what the problem with the bags was.   As it turns out, Kwasi is the Customer Service Team Lead for our flight.  He’s the man that leads the team of Customer Service Agents who were checking us in for our flight!  He asked me to call him at work on Monday and he’d see what our situation looked like.  When I called him, he informed me that everything was taken care of.  We would be allowed to bring two bags each and he was arranging a special check-in line for our team, complete with dedicated customer service agents!!

I am amazed!!  I was asking the congregation to pray about a situation and the answer to that prayer was sitting right their in the congregation with us!!  Once again, God’s fingerprints!!

When I see these kinds of things falling into place, and God’s clear intervention into our situation, I wonder just what God is planning since He’s obviously showing such a great interest in our plans.  However, as I think about it, I realize that God is always interested in those things that concern us.  In this case, He is showing us that for years He’s been planning this trip…I just wonder, what is it that He is about to do?

Pastor Lance

Sunday, July 27, 2008

He told them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.”
Luke 10:2 NIV

Today was an amazing day. The church prayed over the Dominican Republic Family Outreach Team during the morning service and it was really something to see. The team, 82 of us, all outfitted in their bright yellow t-shirts, gathered at the front of the sanctuary and the church prayed over us and sent us out on the 10-day outreach to La Vega, Dominican Republic. Ever since God called me to ministry, specifically to missions work, my passion has been to see missionaries raised up and sent t the mission field. The best way that I know to do that is to take people on short-term missions trips. The next ten days are going to be life changing for each of the people on our team and my prayer is that God will call some of these short-term workers to long-term service. For someone who’s heart is to see workers released to the mission field, seeing 82 people being sent out on this trip is an experience, the emotions of which are hard to describe.

After the church prayed over us and sent us, I had the opportunity to preach the morning sermon. First, I shared several testimonies of how God was intervening on the team’s behalf (you can read about those in the next entry). The text for my message was Matthew 28:18-20, The Great Commission. My message focused the four necessary components of world missions:

1. Those who go.
2. Those who send.
3. Those who fund.
4. Those who pray.

My question to the congregation was, “Are you on the team?” I hope, that by the end of the message, that each person in the congregation understood that even though they may not be standing at the front in a yellow t-shirt, that they were still an critical part of the team as part of the sending church, as part of the team that has funded this trip, and/or through their prayers. You may not have been in the congregation during the service, you may not even be a part of Calvary Lighthouse, but you can be a part of the team as well. We appreciate and need your prayers as we travel! Thank you for praying for us!!

Many churches have established a goal of seeing 10% of their congregation actively involved in a missions trip each year. 82 people represent about 14% of Calvary Lighthouse, and that’s just in a single trip! I can honestly say that I’ve never heard of a church sending such a large percentage of it’s congregation on just one outreach team. What’s even more exciting for me is that the team truly represents the church. We have team members from 8 years old to 77 years old. Our team members are black, they are white, they are Latino, and they are Asian. The team comes primarily from Calvary Lighthouse, but we have other team members from congregations in the Lakewood area, as well as some from other communities in New Jersey, and even a couple from Virginia!

The larger team of 82 actually consists of three, smaller teams. Each of these teams will be ministering in different areas and in different ways during our outreach. There are two Vacation Bible School (VBS) Teams and there is one Construction Team. The two VBS teams will be each conduct two VBS events each day. Team 1 will be at an inner-city work in La Vega, Iglesia Esmirna (Smyrna Church), in the morning, and at a country church, Iglesia Nueva Vita (New Life Church), in Soto, just outside La Vega in the afternoon. Interestingly, Pastor Joe Schroepfer led a team from Calvary Academy that helped to build New Life Church several years ago. Team 2 will also work with an inner-city church, Iglesia Antiochia (Antioch Church), in La Vega in the morning. In the afternoon, Team 2 will minister at Los Rieles (The Rails). Los Rieles is a very poor, rural area that has suffered significantly in the last year. The community was built right at the bend in a river. Late last year, following heavy rains and a hurricane, the river rose and eroded away the bank, ultimately destroying several dozen homes and the local church. Most of those left homeless have had nowhere else to go, so they live in small lean-tos, made of materials recovered from the damaged homes or, they live with neighbors or relatives in the community. The church was meeting house-to-house, but recently began meeting regularly in a small building that was a bar and dance hall. Finally, the Construction team will be building the first floor of a new Preschool building for La Vega Christian School. Missionaries Mitch & Debbie Martinez, our hosts (more on them later), started the school in their home nearly 20 years ago. Today, it has several hundreds of students from kindergarten through high school. This new building will provide the school with four classrooms for preschool-aged children. Right now, the building is simply a concrete slap with concrete columns at the corners. The team will be building the walls and they have about 5000, 20 lb concrete blocks to lay during the week to finish the job! Several of the men on the construction team will also be building bookshelves and other items that will go into the new building. This is a huge task that requires a lot of planning and coordination. Please pray that all the pieces “come together” effectively and that we can complete this large job in the limited time that we have.

The team will meet at Calvary Lighthouse tomorrow morning at 3 AM for the bus ride to Newark-Liberty International Airport. From there, we will fly to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. After the flight, we’ll still have a 3-hour bus ride from Santo Domingo to La Vega. Obviously, there are many things to pray about: Safe travel, no flight delays, all team members arriving on time, favor with customs and airline officials, the team adjusting to the heat and culture, strength despite the demands of long day of travel, and the list goes on…

Thanks for reading our team’s blog and thank you for praying…keep checking back for further entries!

Pastor Lance

The Dominican Republic Family Outreach Team

Praying Over the Team

On Monday, July 28th,  a team of eighty-two short-term missionaries will depart Newark-Liberty International Airport for La Vega, Dominican Republic.  The team has members from the age of 7 to 70+.  They will serve in La Vega for 10 days, building a pre-school building for the La Vega Christian School and conducting Vacation Bible Studies for four local churches.  The team will be working with missionaries Mitch & Debbie Martinez, who have lived and ministered in La Vega since 1992.

While it is too late to join the team, it is not to late to be a part of helping to send the team.  If you are interested in helping to support the team’s ministry in La Vega, you can send a check or money order (made out to “Calvary Lighthouse”) to the address below; be sure to indicate that the check is for the “Dominican Republic Outreach” in the memo section.  You can also check back to this site in the next couple days, we plan to have an online giving option in place shortly.

Please, check this site periodically for updates on the team’s preparation for the Dominican Republic Family Outreach.

Calvary Lighthouse
1133 E County Line Road
Lakewood, NJ  08701
732.363.1239

Welcome to the Dominican Republic Family Outreach blog. Our intent is to keep this updated as we serve in the Dominican Republic this summer. Stay tuned for daily updates during the outreach!