Mary with members of her host family

Mary Canfield writes about her month in El Salvador

For more about Mary’s experience go to her blog: http://marycanfield.tumblr.com/.
 Proverbs 3:5-6 

At the office the other day one of the new missionaries asked how long we’d been working with CFCI. We told her nearly three weeks. She asked if we were about ready to go home with a tone that assumed we must be exasperated and ready for some peace. It didn’t take me long to respond with a firm “No…not at all.”

It’s not that I don’t miss home, or won’t be really excited to be there again when my time here has been fulfilled. It’s more that everything about this trip has felt right. Like this is exactly where God wants me to be and that I’m doing exactly what He wants me to be doing. It’s one of the most peaceful comforting feelings in the world; knowing that you’re within God’s will, doing His work, serving his people.

It’s weird to look back and think that a few weeks before the trip I was so exhausted (in so many ways) that I wasn’t at all looking forward to coming here. I was coming off of one of the most spiritually and emotionally draining years of my life. I wasn’t sure I had the capacity to love and serve the way that I should, the way that I would want to. “I don’t think I can do this anymore…” was on the tip of my tongue every time Sara and I discussed plans and logistics, but, thankfully, God kept my mouth closed. 

Two nights ago Sara told me she felt the exact same way.

We were having a conversation about God’s perfection, how he has a plan, and how that plan becomes manifested in our lives when we walk with Him. We both felt convicted to be here, we both knew that at one point or another God told us that this is what we needed, so we came. We came despite the questions, despite the doubt. We came, and it has been beautiful. To say the least.  

During my time here I have been learning so many things, but the overarching lesson has been faith, and learning how to be faithful even when you don’t want to be. Since before this trip God has been laying large sized revelations on my heart about some large sized things. He has been asking me to make choices I don’t want to make, to go places I don’t want to go, and to press on when giving up seems so much easier.  

This trip has been a reminder of the beautiful truth that He knows best, a reminder that when God asks you to do something you don’t want to it’s not because he wants to hurt you or make you suffer, it’s because he can see the bigger picture. Trials may come as a result of those decisions, but ultimately, if you’re living for Him, His will will be done. His good, pleasing and perfect will. Through the trials, peace can be found in the knowledge that He is with you, He won’t leave you or forsake you. Especially in the valleys. Especially when he has brought you there. 

Through these realizations, He has given me the strength to stand firm in the decisions that He has been asking me to make in regard to the coming year, as well as the faith to trust His ultimate plan. 

I have no doubt that El Salvador was a part of God’s plan for my life. Through it He taught me so, so, much. It’s scary to think that had I chosen to ignore His will and given in to my fears and doubtful human nature, that I would have missed out on all of that growth. The fruit that has come from this time has renewed my faith and has brought about a jarring realization of how little I have had in the past year. I spent a lot of time trying to escape God’s will for me. I tried to work around it and to justify walking away from it. I won’t say it was wasted time (Hebrews has recently helped me to see the beauty in God breathed discipline), but it was a painful time. Had I embraced his plan and had faith in his provision I would have struggled a lot less to keep my head above water. 

If you can learn from my mistakes, please do.

The next time He wants to take you in a direction you don’t want to go, submit and recognize that he is God. Take His hand rather than slapping it away, because before you know it…it may be the only thing left to hold you up.

Trust the God of the universe with your future.

He knows what He’s doing.

I promise.

So. Much. Love.

In Him,
-Mary

We usually start out with a feeding program in a slum area; this develops relationships and trust. Eventually we open up a community center to begin working more effectively with the neighborhood. Sometimes a sports ministry develops. This is critical because gangs recruit young boys and our sports program helps keep them away from gang leaders. We develop “after school programs” that help kids with homework. We meet with the girls and help them along with life issues; many of them are in very dysfunctional family and life situations.

Ronald's Feeding Program in San Jose Slum

After we have developed relationship and trust we’ll discover some young girls involved with prostitution or drug addiction; at this point we can offer them an 18 month recovery program in the mountains of San Jose, Costa Rica. Many of these teenage prostitutes have a mother and sisters involved in prostitution, so rescuing them is more of a process of establishing relationships with them and their community than midnight raids on a hidden brothel.

You can have a part of our team that rescues these kids. While most of the people rehabilitating these girls are nationals or missionaries that are fluent in Spanish with degrees in psychology, you can play a role in helping us as we develop relationships with these kids and their neighborhoods. At the front-line we need people to help with our feeding programs. If you don’t speak Spanish, you can help teach English (many kids can get jobs in a hotel with a little English; a ticket out of the slum). Being involved with our sports programs or even helping younger kids with homework doesn’t require a lot of Spanish.

If this is your heart let us know. We would love to talk with you more. (402) 592-8332. shawn@cfci.org

Sears Family Ministry in Costa Rica from Perception Funding on Vimeo.

Seth and Andrea Sears share their life in Costa Rica as missionaries. We’d love it if you would leave a note of encouragement… or if you would like to support them or other CFCI missionaries, click here. Also, if you have a question about becoming a missionary or anything along those lines, we’d love to answer them.

Give.
Through donations given, CFCI is sending immediate relief aid to Haiti through ministry partners that are in the country. CFCI will also be sending later relief aid to help with reconstruction projects in the country. Our Haitian ministry partners have loaded supplies on a Mission Aviation Fellowship plane and are working with a group of first responders in Haiti. You can donate by clicking here and specifying “Haiti Relief Fund.”

Go.
Based on our disaster recovery experience in El Salvador and Peru, there will be a real need of rebuilding 6 months from today. CFCI will be working with the Haitian churches and sending short-term teams to Haiti beginning in the summer months to help with reconstruction efforts. As of now, CFCI is sending missionaries to meet with ministry partners, assess the damage, and help the people of Haiti. After hearing their reports, CFCI will have more information to give to those groups interested in participating in short-term teams in Haiti. Helping Haitians help Haiti and developing local leadership through the Haitian church is in our DNA and will be a critical component of our rebuilding teams.

Our challenge to your church or group is two-fold:

(1) Commit to send a reconstruction team this summer. While we don’t have exact dates, costs, projects or logistics worked out now, Hebrews 11:8 says “By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going.” So, by faith, commit to send a team and we’ll fill in the details as we get more information on how we can best help.

(2) While your congregation’s hearts are now tender for the people of Haiti; take up an offering or raise funds that you can put aside for your summer reconstruction team to use to buy supplies.

Groups interested in forming construction teams can contact Anji Stern: anji@cfci.org or (402) 592-8332.

Click for Larger Picture

Meet Helen…
In her early teens she was trapped in drugs and prostitution with no way out. Life looked as bleak as it felt until she was rescued from the streets of Costa Rica. She spent 18 months at out RENACER rescue home. If you saw her today, you’d never know her past. Dozens of girls like Helen need to know that someone cares… Even that you care.

Over 300 students wrote notes. They wept. They Prayed. They wrote words of hope, love and encouragement in 6 different languages to the girls at RENACER. That’s not the end though… we are going to translate them into Spanish and send them to the girls of RENCAER. We’ll be posting their responses under “Helen’s Story” on this blog.

So, thank you to those who wrote notes to these girls. They will mean the world to them. I know they will. Keep checking back with us.

In Christ,
Anji for the Christ For the City International Team

If you weren’t able to attend, let me fill you a little… Urbana is a mission conference held every 3 years where college  students come from every walk of life to gather with one common goal: to change the world for God through missions. Students learn from some of the best teachers about missions, justice, poverty, business as missions, advocacy and the Word of God. Over 5 days, Dec 27-Dec 31, 2009, students eyes were opened, their lives transformed and a cry came forth to GO to the ends of the earth. Check out some pics by Wayne Yuan.

I’ll be filling you in a little more later today or tomorrow about the impact that we saw happen first hand. Praise God!

Collide with a culture radically different than your own. Serve with all you have. Encounter God like never before. Be the one who walks the streets of Lain American slums and barrios. The one who shines light in the dark and gives hope to the hopeless. Join Christ For the City International as we transform the landscape of Latin America with the love of God.