Valerie beamed with excitement at the thought of participating in the Christmas program, she would hold a candle and recite a poem.
She turned to Victor and exclaimed: Victor, you get to be an ox in the manger scene! Hmm, said Victor shrugging his shoulders, clearly not convinced. What is an ox? Oh, it's a cow, Valerie said confidently.
With great consternation, Victor exclaimed: Yeah, but, do ox have teats? Up to that point we had been eavesdropping, but Alfredo and I quickly assured Victor that an ox was a boy cow and that his costume would not have "milkies."
CCI LA/Honduras held an event called:The Family that Plays together, Stays Together, a modified Expo Games for Families and here are some testimonies:
Testimony from Kenia Riera: "Sept. 27, 2008 will remain recorded in our memory because we attended one of the most gratifying experiences of our lives as a family: Family Expo-Games. For me it was deeply satisfying to play with my kids as well as see other families running, jumping and hugging. This activity was conceived of by Lisa Anderson-Umana, Director of Leadership Development in Christian Camping International and Mrs. Osberg, Director of Family Life at the Academy Los Pinares (Pine Forest Academy). Lisa utilized the tools CCI generously shares with other ministries like the Games Encyclopedia and 15 specially trained CCI facilitators."
Hena Moreno: "Our girls succeeded in getting the entire family to play together for the following three days after the event. My husband and I have referred to the covenant we all signed together to remind us to keep our weekly commitment to play together."
Mayra de Lean (Family Lean-Maradiaga): "Thank you so much Lisa. You have no idea how much this event has united us as a family. We are so pleased that we all made the decision to attend. We hope the school repeats this experience next year in 2009 because it was very beneficial and necessary. We live a very busy life with so much work but let me tell you that we have played together at home and we have had a ball. My twelve-year old son reminds us regularly of the Covenant we signed to play together regularly.
The video clip is excellent, how creative! Thank you and your team once again for all the Pinares Families.
Check out the 4 min. video to see for yourself the activities of the day and share with me your thoughts and comments:
“The only way to really learn is to sit in class at the feet of some expert, listen and take notes.”
“So I thought,” says Cristián, “prior to my exposure to Christian Camping International, Latin America (CCI /LA). My eyes have been opened, so to speak, to a whole another realm of learning: experiential education!”
Cristián is sitting on the floor sharing his thoughts and impressions as a recent graduate of CCI /LA training for low ropes course facilitation. He is surrounded by leaders from other countries, like Carlos Valladares who is the director of the Bible Institute for Assembles of God—King’s Castle ministry in El Salvador, and Rixy Leiva who is a psychologist in El Salvador, as well as a number of pastors who attended the training as well.
“I have a vision for starting a School of Leadership and I would like to make the use of low ropes course and camp activities a core part of the curriculum,” Cristián further expounded on his vision but also confessed his initial hesitation regarding involvement with CCI /LA.
“I confess, after Lisa’s church came to build the ropes course elements this summer in our camp, I said to myself, “if these CCI /LA training courses aren’t that good, I’ll just come up with my own stuff. Indeed, I went on-line and studied hard to gather materials to create my own training course to teach facilitators. But after these last 4 days filled with 44-hours of training (Sept. 12-15), I’d be
crazy to try and reinvent the wheel! Now that our camp is a member of CCI LA/Honduras, I plan on soliciting one of these training courses every year to prepare new facilitators to run groups through our ropes course.”
“Thank you CCI/LA for putting together such a spectacular training program!”
Well, , this response from Cristián is a direct answer to your prayers!
Thank you for “watching over us in prayer”
Lisa
Cristian during the training course, on the "Chicken Wire Crossing", his third attempt was the charm! as he persisted in crossing from one end of the hanging pole to the other side, in the process, having to hang like a possum!
Prayer Requests for Lisa Anderson-Umana, September 2008
I mailed out the following prayer requests on Sept. 13 during a CCI/Latin America leadership development course (Low Ropes course facilitation) and many prayed for one of the key leaders in attendance, Cristian, the director of Way of Grace Retreat Center:
“Cristián, there’s no question that God has given you the gift of leadership; it oozes out of every pore of your body. But this weekend let me offer you a leadership challenge: Lead in such a way as to mobilize, harmonize and enhance the God- given gifts of others…” Cristián nodded his head and smiled: “I can see you are up to something Lisa, let me look for a strategy.” I returned the smile and we parted ways, each one off to find a cozy spot in the midst of God’s creation for our Quiet Time. , we are in the midst of a long weekend of 44-hours of training. I dashed back to our house (we live two blocks away) over dinner to send out this fresh prayer request and to invite you to: “…Stay here and keep watch with me" Matthew 26:38. God has brought CCI /LA forty people together, hailing from Venezuela, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Colombia, Guatemala, and Honduras. Experiential Leadership is the title of this workshop (facilitating for low ropes course team-building initiatives). Specific prayer requests: • Pray for those for whom this is their first exposure to a style of leadership that doesn’t lead from the front, domineering and imposing itself on others, but rather an inductive style of leadership that leads from the midst of the group, bringing out the best in others (mobilizing, harmonizing and enhancing the God-given gifts of others toward a common purpose). • The team of trainers is a dream team with Rixy, Xenia, Carlos and Oscar from El Salvador, Sergio from Guatemala, and Melba, Kenia and Carlos from Honduras. Pray for each one of us to exemplify Christ in all our words and actions. Our every move is being closely observed and analyzed! • Once the training ends on Monday afternoon, pray for their application of this new style of leadership their youth group, churches (we have 4 pastors in the group), camps (we have 3 full-time camp administrators present) and place of work. • Pray for people to grasp the power of the inductive of leading reflections, i.e.e not preaching but rather drawing out from the group lessons learned from their experiences on the ropes course. , thank you for staying and keeping watch with me in prayer, Lisa PS. This training is the compliment of what the Short-Term missions team from North Way Christian Community, Pittsburgh, PA, built this summer in Honduras. First we built 8 ropes course elements and now CCI LA/Honduras is training leaders how to use them for Villa Gracia (Way of Grace Retreat Center).
(Cristian is pictured here to the right helping to build one of the 8 low ropes course initiatives at his camp.)
Part II --Cristian's testimony of the impact of the Training is to follow immediately
Study in Christian Camping International, Latin America on leadership as it relates to the breadth of one's perspective-- hypothesis- The broader one's perspective, the more and better leaders are developed.
Saying good-by to my favorite toys for the children reminded me of saying good-bye to seasons of my childrens' lives…
The big blue and white car Valerie had as a little toddler and then pushed Victor around in, we gave away this summer to the nursery of AFESchool. A school that was created to educate children who live and work in the garbage dump of Tegucigalpa.
I have so many memories tied up with that toy.As you can observe, my father taking a picture of his grand-daughter playing on it without even realizing that he’d put her bathing suit on backwards!
While we were overjoyed to see our children give generously, and we were delighted to see the other kids play with the toys and yet I confess my heart felt a twinge of nostalgia.
In the same manner when I gave away our children’s car seats today, I remembered the years of service they provided and it made me realize that my kids are getting older.It makes me want to cling to my children and not let them grow up.The pain of watching your children grow from one stage to another is real. It hurts. The twinge of pain is there even as you welcome the next stage of life. Probably these feelings are heightened by the fact that my kids have been at their grandparents for a week. But, I choose to accept the nostalgia as a normal, natural part of raising children and certainly not glossing over the pain will remind me to cherish the moments of this season all the more.
Prayer requests:
Before school starts end of August, pray for Mommy to fully engage as wife and Mommy as these last couple of months I have been focused significantly on work what with our trip to Costa Rica in May (see pics and news http://tiny.cc/DrAvd ), our trip to El Salvador in June (see pics and newshttp://tiny.cc/GUh4a ) and this July hosting the Short Term Missions team from one of my supporting churches, North Way Christian Community (see links of pics and news http://tiny.cc/Q9Gen ) and on top of that , these last two weeks I made the final push to finalize a study of Christian Camping International, Latin America's (CCI/LA) leadership. We are trying to figure out why we are not forming new, up and coming leadership at the National Association level. If you are interesting in finding out the details (and reading 54 pages), I have posted my paper for my class at Trinity on Slideshare, I'll be posting it in a few days (click here to see it: http://www.slideshare.net/lisaandersonumana/slideshows )
Praise God for how Alfredo continues to experience God's grace and favor on his business.
Pray for us as a family as we take these last weeks of summer vacation to learn to consistently respond to God's invitation to be with Him (quiet times, Bible readings, and taking a Sabbath rest).
Let me start with a brief word to my regular ministry partners, please forgive me for not clarifying this beforehand:Just for the duration of the “Short-Term Missions Team Trip” I am using my blog to communicate news and photos about their time here in Honduras. That will entail just two more entries, this particular entry regarding the ministry time we had with children who work and live at the Tegucigalpa City Dump and lastly a post sharing about what God did during our Family Camp Outreach when we inaugurated the ropes course elements we had just built and presented the Good News of the gospel to 30 families (135 people) one on one.
After these two entries, I will return to my regular occasional postings.I have shared this photo journal with you to give you a glimpse of how we host Short Term Missions Teams with Christian Camping International here in Honduras.
For two days we played with the children of the AFESchool (Initials stand for Amor, Fe, Esperanza—Love, faith, hope).The parents of these children live and work in and around the garbage dump, in fact, many of these children work there after school as well. Pastor Joeny Ordonez escorted us to the dump to see for ourselves the 1000 or more people who pick through the garbage to recycle plastic, paper, metal and cardboard.
Picture 2: The garbage trucks arrive every 5 minutes as the people line up ready to pounce on the “fresh garbage” to rip open the bags and salvage all they can from it.Vultures were everywhere.
Picture 3: Under Pastor Joeny’s direction we moved around in small groups to hand out bags of water and bread, without exception the folks expressed their appreciation. Here we gather together to pray and hear more of Joeny’s ministry, you may access their website for more information (http://www.micahcentral.org/dumplife.htm)
During the remainder of our two days at the AFESchool we did some light jobs and mostly played with the children, who thrived on the love and attention they received.
Picture 4: The children were divided up into groups (see slideshow of the groups with their respective leaders on the blog) and then they traveled from station to station playing different recreational activities. In this station they children are listening to the Americans share their testimony of how they came to the Lord.
Picture 5-Frisbee games: A few of our translators were also CCI /LA members, who are very adept at leading games, like this station of “bowling with a Frisbee”, it was the first time these children had ever thrown one!
Picture 6- Here we are, Henrietta Doren and I already scheming for next year’s trip!
Picture 7: Decorating visors was a big hit, Ana Ramirez and Cassidy brought joy to every child’s heart as they proudly wore their visor home.
Picture 8: North Way Christian Community donated the poster hangers, Garrin installed them in each classroom and from the water bottles sold during the church’s Friday Nite Car Cruises, the money was raised to purchase Spanish posters for each classroom.
Picture 9: With each new experience God stretched us way out of our comfort zone and fully into our groan zone.Rhonda is making good use of her Spanish language skills, but even so, working with children is a stretch for her since she is used to interacting with adults in her corporate job.
Video clip 1: Valerie found herself at home among the children while they played a modified version of soccer—play it in groups of four without letting go of your hands!
Here's the pictures of the North Americans with their respective teams of children with whom they played.
Pictures speak a thousand word so I have posted numerous pictures of the constructions project on the blog, please view them directly on the blog! Enjoy the explanation for each picture written on the captions.
Delightful hospitality of the host families: Each pair of Americans was hosted by a Honduran family who are associated with the ministry of Christian Camping International. The warmth of the Latins was well appreciated by the North Americans who noticed how important family is to Latins. Meals were shared by aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents and even neighbors! (see pictures on blog)
Sights of the City: The sights of the capital city, Tegucigalpa were found to be very interesting and in some ways reminiscent of Pittsburgh in that houses are built into the sides of mountains and hills. (see pictures on the blog)
Worship Services Everyone attended church with their host families, and the duration of the church services ranged from 90 minutes to 4 hours!
(Picture of the famous Catholic Cathedral to the Virgin Suyapa in Tegucgalpa)
We invite you to continue to send us your comments and thoughts, and Lisa will print them out to give to the short term team members. (click on comments button below, then type in your comment, type in the funny letters that appear which prove that it's a human typing and not a SPAM maker)
Eleven members from North Way Christian Community arrived safely today to Honduras, July 5, 2008. Thankfully, no luggage was left behind this time!
We were warmly welcomed by our host families.
The team arrived to the city of San Pedro Sula and given the "abundant food" (read sarcasm in my voice) they provided on the plane, we quickly made our way to Power Chicken get empowered for the journey south to the capital city of Tegucigalpa.
We drove by Lake Yojoa, Honduras' only natural lake, and stopped to appreciate the view at dusk.
Each member of the US team will be spending the remainder of the weekend with their host families. We will meet at camp on Monday morning to begin our building project.
Here are pictures of each of the team members with their respective Honduran host families (see blog to view photos)
If you are a "sender" of one of the team members (praying for, financially supporting them), then leave your comments, prayers and thoughts below for any member of the team and we will communicate it to the team. Thanks!
I traveled to El Salvador with Valerie and Victor June 19-26, 2008 to celebrate the 15th anniversary of CCI in El Salvador. I lived here from 1993-1995, and have returned for yearly visits since then. As I reflected on God´s goodness through the years, a number of reasons to celebrate came to mind which I will enumerate below so we can praise God together!
Hundreds of Pastor´s kids relate to other PK´s, share their common struggles and find camradery at camp because key leaders of King´s Castle Ministries (Asambles of God) caught a vision for the impact camping can provide.
Over a dozen leaders have stayed at the helm of CCI since I left in 1995 and the cumulative effect of continuing the work of teaching courses and equipping others year after year has resulted in thousands of campers finding Christ in camp and being developed as leaders.
David and Karla Alas, a young couple active in CCI feel called to leave the youth pastorate to begin a new camping ministry designed to offer camp programs first to Christian schools unfamiliar with camping, and then eventually to offer Outdoor Education programs to public schools with a pre-evangelistic thrust.
Oscar and Sulma, a newly married couple serving in King´s Castle, a ministry which makes strategic use of camps, have committed the next 10 years of their lives to learn all they can about camping and CCI before they aspire for God to send them off as missionaries somewhere in the world-- taking the tool of camping wherever God leads them.
Don Tripplett, founder of King´s Castle ministry in El Salvador which has now expanded into 33 other Spanish speaking countries, has selected 150 games from CCI´s Games Encyclopedia for inclusion in their children´s discipleship materials. So a joint publication project is underway.
Xenia Sanchez plans on attending our Institute for Forming Instructors-level III in Feb. 2009 in order to learn how we do teacher training so she can build a similiar structure for her church´s 14 -level children´s discipleship materials (picture shows Xenia, Don at left and Sulma and Oscar at the far right).
Rixy Leiva, both a certified CCI/LA and ¨Precept upon Precept¨(inductive Bible study) instructor will teach a 10-week long course starting this Sept. 20th on how to create Bible Encounters in Community for camp. Dozens of leaders representing over a 12 churches and para-church ministries will be equipped to create their own Bible study curriculum. None of the Spanish publishing companies are producing Bible study materials for camp so this course meets an urgent need in Latin America.
Marco and Evelyn Umana sold their home, are living with her Mother and are actively searching to buy a piece of property on which to develop a camp, a laboratory for leaders to be formed as well as a place for social outreach. This couple has served as the backbone of CCI/LA on-going ministry in El Salvador since its founding.
Cristina, a certified learning disabilities teacher, faithfully works at the CCI national office on her day off every Monday. She has made incursions into Nicaragua to share about CCI´s ministry there. Every effort, large or small, adds to the bigger whole.
Mario Palencia and Mayra de Campos (see picture above) founding members of CCI in El Salvador were present to celebrate as well. Incidently, Mayra first received camping courses in Camp Kikoten, Mexico in the late 1980´s from the leaders who had worked with me there. She later brought those materials from Mexico to El Salvador!
New graduates were on hand to celebrate and form part of the history of CCI.
Laura Murillo, a Sunday School teacher who took the first course I taught in 1993 continues to do camps faithfully each year for her Sunday school class.
Dinorah Morales, faithfully helps out with administrative tasks year after year during the CCI courses that are served.
Alfredo Funes, a member of the Board of Directors has caught a vision to use camping to reach out to gang members so prevelant in El Salvador.
In closing, our mission is fulfilled as God is glorified through CCI/Latin America´s linking the ministry of camping with the work on the local church and para-church organizations as they fulfill the Great Commission.
Christian Camping International, Latin America Summit: Every 3-4 years we gather the National leaders of CCI Associations from all around Latin America for a time of fellowship and learning. This year, Don German, led us all in an analysis of the 8 core components of team building. Each National Team was guided in specific tasks related to improving their team work. Luis Castro, Board president of CCI LA/Peru: What a relief to listen to other CCI folk and realize I am not alone. We all share similar struggles with funding, team members who don't play by the rules, and others who won't get in the game at all! I was so caught up in the management of my "micro-world", I forgot that even on the "macro-level of all of Latin America", we share much in common. Praise God I made it to this Summit. I return to Lima, Peru with a fresh vision.
Latin America Mission Annual Retreat: Each year the missionaries of a given geographic area gather to meet together for fellowship and inspiration. Although Alfredo was not able to be a part of this gathering, the children grew in their understanding of what it means to be an "MK" (missionary kid). Where are you from? Victor and Valerie respond to the inquiring child together: We were born in Pittsburgh. But we live in Honduras. My Mom is American and my Dad is Honduran. So, we are from both places.
Travel mercies: Thank you for praying for our safety. The kids love to travel and they love airports. They end up playing with the K-9 dogs trained to sniff out drugs. In one airport, while Victor followed the dog around on his sniffing tour of the carryon baggage in the lobby, Valerie entertained (unknowingly) the first row of waiting passengers with a ballet performance. I had the most fun watching people watch them!
Connections: Family: If I had to sum up this trip in one word I'd say "connected." Through your prayers, we connected and bonded with a number of people, namely, my brother-in-law, Rogelio. The kids visited a rain forest, a butterfly zoo, we all had a pajama party in his one-bedroom apartment, and watched Narnia: Prince Caspian together. CCI/Latin America Staff: There's nothing like doing God's will with people you love. Our staff came from Argentina, Panama, Honduras and Costa Rica to meet. Our kids played in the mud together while we met and pondered whether we needed to make drastic changes in how we develop leaders in CCI/Latin America. Mission family: Meeting fellow LAM missionaries continues to inspire and challenge me. There's no other mission agency I'd rather be serving with!
We are all doing fine, but we are sad and in prayer! An airplane comming from El Salvador suffered a serious accident while landing in Tegucigalpa (the city we live in). Three passengers have lost their lives so far and many others are still under medical care in different hospitals. Your prayers are needed! Lisa and the kids are attending a Mission's Retreat in Costa Rica and they will be returning to Honduras on Sunday (to the San Pedro Sula Airport-At the city where Alfredo's parents live). We wanted you to know that we are safe! Always grateful for your prayers,
Valerie beamed with excitement at the thought of participating in the Christmas program, she would hold a candle and recite a poem.
