45 Days!

I can't believe there are only 45 days left until my trip to Nicaragua! Thank you so much to everyone for your prayers, God has been seriously molding me and working in me to prepare me for this trip, and I definitely believe that much of that is the result of your faithful prayers. Thank you.
Also, thank you everyone for your financial support. For those that don't know, my flights and my living expenses and all that are now fully covered. I'm stoked to say that the total donations towards the greenhouse project (to help the kids at the orphanage learn farming skills to equip them to support themselves and raise families) are at about TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS right now! And money is still coming in, I'm so excited to see how this greenhouse will help the kids.
I recently talked to Josh, the teams coordinator, discipleship guy for the kids, and pretty much one of the head guys at Casa Bernabe orphanage. I'm going to be working under him a lot, and he helped give me more of an idea of what my days may look like while I'm staying at the orphanage. I'm going to be sleeping at La Posada, where the teenage guys (12-15/16) sleep. Josh says that when he first came to Casa Bernabe he stayed at La Posada, and he says it was literally one of the defining experiences of his life. Even though he's a Nicaraguan, he says it was a really eye-opening experience and that he grew closer to God than ever. So I'm really stoked for that!A huge focus of this trip for me is opening my heart to the Nicaraguan guys and letting them open theirs to me. I want to share with them what God's been doing in my life, and I expect God's gonna speak to me in crazy ways through them as well. I'm stoked to see how we can strengthen each other's faith and passion for the Father. And I also hope that, as a TON of those kids are in pretty hopeless places, Jesus will use my love for him to reach them and plant seeds of light in their hearts. Josh told me when I Skyped him the other night that I'm actually going to get to write and lead some devotions for the guys, and also I'll get to lead worship for them, which I'm INCREDIBLY excited for.
Josh also told me that I'll be spending my mornings working with him, and I really look forward to learning from him and talking with him. He has a really up-front, unashamed faith and truly believes that God can do ANYTHING. He's an awesome dude who's completely on fire for God and I'm really stoked to learn from him about that and about how to effectively minister to his country. That's a big part of my trip; I'm considering long term missions in Nicaragua after high school, so I want to see what does Nicaragua really need? How can I be a part of that? And how, in that, can I share the Good News?
I'm more excited for this trip than I've ever been for anything. I've seen so much faith in Nicaragua, so many people who worship and aren't ashamed, who dance around in church as if nobody's looking at them. But I've also seen a lot of brokenness. A lot of hurt, a lot of abandonment. In 45 days I get the opportunity to fly down there and laugh with them, cry with them, find Jesus with them. He's moving down there, I can feel it, he's moving in the coolest ways.

Thank you for your support :)
Mark

p.s. I'll start updating this blog as the trip gets closer, and either weekly or biweekly while I'm there. Adiós :)