Confusion Without Losing Effectiveness

I have spent this day living inside a hole. No really, I spent the majority of my hours today inside a hole attempting to make it larger. I’m not sure how it worked but we always seemed to need 2 feet wider. So maybe I just don’t know how to dig holes. There’s a good chance I’ll be back in that hole tomorrow, but hopefully we will finish it. This hole will be home to a septic system at some point.

            A hole isn’t all that’s been going on since my last post. A large group from Oklahoma and Texas has been here this week. I have enjoyed working alongside everyone and getting to exchange stories. We have also been playing an unhealthy amount of cards, specifically 99 and Spicy Uno. Our work projects have been focused on making progress on a couple duplexes across the valley from SHIP. Electric lines and poles have been hung, holes have been dug, plumbing has been worked on, and preparations for putting the metal roof on tomorrow has happened this week. We had a wonderful crowd for our outreach this week, about 100 people, accompanied by talented musicians/singers, powerful testimonies, and a powerful message brought by people within the team. God has been present and moving here in El Salvador. The Bible studies have had similar qualities. We also hosted our first soccer tournament and had a great turnout. It was a good, healthy community event that had no squabbles or major problems. Everything here at SHIP in El Salvador has been going well and is continuing to share God’s love and truth with the people in this community. Lives are being touched.

            That’s the “effectiveness” part of the title, now I will share about the confusion. This internship experience has been a lot more confusing compared to last summer. The confusion lies within what the internship is about and what responsibilities the interns have. The majority of this results from having more interns than previous years, allowing the interns be further involved in all aspects of SHIP. This would be VBS, Bible studies, organizing outreach, planning and implementing community events, and taking care of everything to be fully prepared for SHIP trippers. There has been a lot of confusion of which responsibilities we are in charge of and how far that responsibility goes within each area of SHIP. I’m not going to share details because I don't want to glorify or encourage any division based on opinions, but suffice it to say, there has been some noticeable tension. This is the 4^th year of internships, so it is still a work in progress. The tension has subsided some and everyone is trying to work through understanding and communicating everything about the internship program.

            What I want to point out is that though there have been some issues rise up, SHIP is still functioning well and we are reaching the community around us. We put our focus and trust in God. This feels like a direct attack from Satan as he is trying to get us angry and impatient with one another. Satan wants us to lose our focus and our effectiveness. BUT HE IS NOT STOPPING OUR EFFECTIVENESS

I forgot a song last blog so I’ve got 2 for this one:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmm8ETk70lg


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CR5IoWH9OiI