God in the Mountains

"I lift up my eyes to the mountains—
where does my help come from?
My help comes from the LORD,
the Maker of heaven and earth."
(Psalms 121:1, 2)

Psalms 121, one of my favorite Psalms.  Maybe because I love the mountains, but we really got to see our majestic God at work in the mountains yesterday.

Cerro Punta near Volcán Barú

To be completely honest, the past few days in Changuinola was a frustrating experience for me.  Don't get me wrong, God did amazing work through Rev. Lau, Pastor Lily, Simon and dad.  But I felt like the odd one out while they were running around in the Panama heat doing visitation and discipleship.  Besides visiting the few youths from the Campamento (Karen, Lucy, Stephanie, Michelle, Ernesto and David), there were not youths for a next-gen pastor to minister to - plus they were usually busy during the day helping around the Super or around the house to have any meaningful conversations.

This became a challenge for me, after preaching on Romans 8 that the will of God is not for us to "do more" but rather for us to become like Jesus.  I started to read in the Gospels to see what Jesus would do during his "down time".  I found 2 passages, Mark 1:35 and John 4.

"Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed." (Mark 1:35)

And since I could not have the opportunities to engage in conversations like Jesus did in John 4, I spent the three days in Changuinola praying.

Prayer Items for Changuinola:

• Pray for the local church leaders in this town (their closest support, Pastor Lily, is 4 hours drive away)
• Pray for the youths who attended campamento (esp. the Chan family, of their 7 children 4 attended campamento, and the family still does not know the Lord)
• Pray for the Natives VBS ministry opportunities on the banana plantations in the Fincas (many of the local Natives are from family of multiple wives, and children are literally running around the streets in these communities)

Local Natives dwellings near the banana plantations

Now on the way up the mountains near David, we stumbled across a pleasant surprise from the Lord.  Some how God guided us to Rev. Kao and a Korean seminary in Bambito.  Walking through the grounds of this seminary was like walking through Eden.  Rev. Kao has been serving this seminary for the past 16 years, developing over 800 pastors for the Central and South America regions.

After falling in love with the scenery of seminary, we visited several families near Cerro Punta (Mountain Peak).  This is were I was reconnected with several more youths from Campamanto and witness first hand the potential of the youths in Chiriquí.  I had a great time chatting with each one of them, we are planning a campamento reunion in David on Saturday.  I believe the next generation of youth leaders will come from this mountain in Chiriquí.  "I lift up my eyes to the mountains—where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD,the Maker of heaven and earth." 

Prayer meeting up in the mountains

Prayer Items for Chiriquí:

• Pray for Pastor Lily, the church in David and their church building project
• Pray for the the youths in Chiriquí, who are zealous and passionate for the Lord
• Pray for Rev. Lau as he is resolve a few issues within the church in David
• Pray for the campamento reunion of Saturday and I will lead a few of the young leaders to minister to the youths
• Pray for the health of the mission team, our bodies are taking a beating with the late 10:00p dinners and late nights meetings (ending in 1-2am in the morning)