Costa Rica Mission Trip

March 2007
First Baptist Church of Indian Rocks School has what they called Mini-Mesters designed to encourage their students to take Mission Trips to different areas of the world. Doug and I along with Ashely and Kevin Starner and Shannon and Joe Messer took 15 students down to Costa Rica to do some ministry outreach.

Being that there is a high pregnancy rate among teens in Costa Rica, we traveled to several schools where our students and local interpreters put on skits and spoke to the Costa Rican students about abstinence.

In the first part of our trip we stayed with some local missionaries (Deigo and Sala) supported through YWAM. (Youth With A Mission). They were in the process of building their own home and we were able to help them one afternoon with sanding of their new walls. We also did some clean up of the property. With the rainy season ahead they needed to clean out the ditches so the water would flow easily and not flood their home. Typically during the rainy season nobody can get in or out by car. The dirt roads are completely flooded. The last two nights we stayed with Deigo and Sala we played soccer with a local group of men Deigo has been spending some time building an outreach with. Our final night there we had a barbecue night with the locals. We invited them to Deigo and Sala's for a fun night out and to share the gospel with them. It was a great turn out and Deigo and Sala were pleased to see how many young ladies were able to come. One of their struggles with the ministry programs is the locals tend to keep their daughters at home. For good reasons they want to protect them from the men. Little by little the local families are warming up to the mission of Deigo and Sala are allowing the girls more interaction.

The pictures below are of several students from the elementary school.
They are such beautiful children.

The second part of our trip was spent at an orphanage in Atenas. The orphanage is situated on a beautiful piece of property. With us we brought clothing, toys, school supplies and gifts for the missionaries and children. The most exciting time for us was being able to interact and play with the kids. While there we also helped clean up the property by racking bags and bags of leaves!

The final leg of our trip was spent in Guayabo on GTD property. The picture below is of the undeveloped land donated to GTD in 2005 by Banyan Resources. In time as money and resources are donated teams will be helping build an orphanage, school, medical center, fish farm, distribution center and (M.O.A.B) a Missions & Outreach Adventure Base. Currently the property is being maintained by Doug and Gayla Richardson, an amazing husband and wife team.

To add a little adventure to our trip. We went to Thermal Mania a Hot Spring heated by volcano Arenal and then we went Zip Lining through the Rain Forest. While there we were able to see some Howler Monkies and the Morpho Butterfly.