Day 1
All glory to GOD
We experienced God's leading straight away. As every year, we had quite a lot of Bibles and other evangelism materials with us. So it was quite nerve-racking whether we would get everything onto the plane, and as hand luggage at that, because we had to change planes in Spain with very little time between flights. So we had prayed that the eyes of the airline staff would be blinded and would not notice all the luggage. When we reached the checkpoint with all our bags and suitcases, we heard that the suitcases of the people ahead of us were already being moved to the hold. Apparently the plane was not very big. When it was our turn, we were taken aside for a moment because something still had to be sorted out with our tickets. Meanwhile we saw that the people behind us also had to hand in their suitcases for the hold. Five minutes later the tickets were sorted and we were allowed to take everything onto the plane. Not a single bag had to go into the hold! We saw the staff looking a little dazed, but we could simply walk on. What an amazing start to the trip! After the change and a long flight we finally arrived in Santo Domingo. Pedro was already waiting for us there with a car, in which we drove on to our apartment in Corales del Sol. We arrived around 20:13 local time (02:13 CET). Time to shower and sleep.
The next day: on the way to Barahona
The next morning a journey of more than three hours was on the programme, with Barahona as the destination. The drive was an adventure, to put it mildly. Not everything fitted in the car, so two suitcases were tied onto the roof. The car itself sat quite low on its suspension, so at every speed bump we heard scraping noises. Hilarious and a bit nerve-racking, but we arrived safely. After unpacking we drove straight on to our first destination:
The prison
Unfortunately that visit went differently than planned. The foundation's official request had not yet come through, so we were not given access to the prisoners. Yet we had a special moment. We were able to pray for the prison pastor and some of the guards. The pastor, clearly tired, was visibly touched by the prayer. And it carried on: straight afterwards we were able to pray for 3 more guards, and to prophesy and encourage. What at first seemed a disappointment turned out to be a blessed start to our mission. God is leading us, and it shows.
Report of the evening:
In the evening we visited a new church, Manantial de Vida. We were pleasantly surprised by this church. From the first moment we noticed that God's Spirit was at work there. People sang and flagged with complete abandon, and it immediately felt like coming home. Marien opened the evening, after which Marjan spoke on the theme: Identity, Intimacy and Authority. After the message we received words of knowledge through which everyone received healing. Prophecies were also spoken, and people were visibly touched. Those who received healing were able to pray for the others straight away, so they immediately put the message into practice and took authority. We noticed that the people were very enthusiastic, and the pastor was visibly delighted too. It was special to see God's Kingdom become visible in this place.
