Tough Decision

I made the decision to dismiss a young man from the program the other day. Really, he made the decision on his own by his actions, but it made it no less easier. He was 18yrs old and had graduated 4-5 months ago. He is a great kid and I have found that I miss seeing him around. Decisions such as these have many things you have to take into account: integrity of the program, standards of the program, the other men in the program, what is best for the man....ect.ect. After praying I made the choice to dismiss this young man and it has left me feeling a bit guilty and responsible. I know that it was the right decision, but I am still human and I grew attached to the guy. He was my favorite guy to talk to and he was a joy to be around daily. It is hard putting your feelings, attachments, and emotions to the side and making such a choice. The thought in addictions recovery for me is that if you make a decision to tell someone they have to leave they are most likely not going to do the right thing....cause they weren't doing it in the first place. It is somewhat of a heavy burden knowing what someone who was in addiction might goe back to. The hope is that they make the right decisions from here on out. Telling someone to leave sometimes is the best thing you can do for someone to bring reality to them that they aren't doing or thinking right. This guy was such a cool kid, only 18. I miss him being around the house.

Tough Week

This past week has been one of the tougher ones. Spiritually I have felt attacked and I have really felt up and down. One minute I am great and the next my mind is flooded with lies and condemnation. It helps to talk about it. I have heard from the Lord loud and clear that this is where the next chapter of my life is going to be and I have since that time noticed an increase in spiritual warfare. Jared and I did a power point the other day that will be very helpful to inform friends and family on how the center operates, what my needs are, and just an overview of how I fit into the picture. I return to the states on September 15th. I wanted to get home in time for Hebron's homecoming and also to participate in our golf fundraiser for Parry-Romberg's Resource. There is not much new going on other than the fact that we are moving out of the apartment and into a house at the end of next week. I am looking forward to coming home and raising support to return, God willing. I will be teaching again at church this Sunday. I am enjoying the preparation for preaching, although I am still a bit uncomfortable with presenting. It is different saying things than waiting for it to be translated...and there are distractions all around us as well.(church is on the beach) . It is pretty awesome to be a part of worship in public.

Sunday

I have been informed by a loved one that I need to use spell check on my blog. They are right. Since I have begun trying to learn Spanish my grammar has gotten progressively worse, as well as my spelling. Oh well. We have church on the beach in Manuel Antonio. I had the opportunity to teach/preach this Sunday. We looked over the passages in Matthew 8:23-27 where Jesus calms the storm.....we also looked at James 1:2-4 and 1 Peter 1:3-9 and discussed what we fear and how we should handle fears and trials when the arise. Many of the men in the program said that they feared falling( which means relapse back into addiction). That has been one of my biggest fears as well. Hopefully we can talk about this topic more throughout the week. Relapse does not happen all of the sudden. It is something that happens over time. It is a decision that is made long before it happens. Consistently reading God's word, praying, and having fellowship with other believers has kept me sober. I'm born again and I hope that most of these men come to realize who they are in Christ. I am still learning my identity in Him. Fearing something can be crippling to growth. I have feared relapse and I have found that my life is constructed in such a way that I have walls up all over the place to keep "bad stuff out." As a byproduct of this, some freedom in my walk with the Lord has been hindered. Of course God knows this and He has been gentle and patient to slowly take some of the walls I have built down. Once a man who was in addiction comes to Christ he is no longer an addict, nor does he any longer have to refer to himself as one. He is a new creation. He just has to learn what that looks like and search the scriptures to find out who he is in the Lord. Relapse to a past addict means failure. I have seen many friends fall and get back up stronger than before. I hope that a lot of these men find a new way of life and fall in love with the Lord. Most of these guys come from broken families, life on the streets, and many other sad circumstances. This program gives them the opportunity to establish a good foundation in the faith, learn some life skills, and learn how to be in relationship with one another. The entire house where these guys stay is probably about the size of a kitchen and a living room we have back in the states, and there are 9 men. If these guys can learn to live in community and love one another through the good and bad, they will be amply supplied to go and be productive members of a community back home.

Casa De Amor

Casa De Amor is the name of the program(mission) down here in Costa Rica. Currently there are 9 men in the program that can really only sleep 8. The guys have devotionals or bible studies 6 days a week from 7am-8:30. They work the rest of the day until 4pm or so. They do duties around the house where they are mostly cleaning up. There are contantly leaves falling and dirt being tracked in. There is never a shortage of work around the program. The program is right next door to a cemetary where all the addicts used to live for years. Just last year the police came in and kicked them out and burned up all the old junk that was left behind. Yes, they set the entire cemetary on fire! One of the objectives is for the program to be self-sufficient at some point in the future. Kim Stillwell is the man whom started the program and heads up the fundraising. He is constantly going around the city mainting relationships and keeping his face fresh on peoples minds. He has gotten many small contracts around the city that are mostly cleaning up the streets or maintining the cleaning of past projects. Unfortunately littering is quite popular here. The guys have bible study at night also where some local men/pastors come in and share with them. The guys have quite a bit of down time also where I have been fortunate enough to be around and tune in on learning spanish. The guys get to wath a movie or two throughout the week and once a week we go to play soccer or go to the beach and swim. Casa De Amor is a small humble house, but it is definetely special. Kim has had an arcitech draw up plans to build onto the program that already exists, only we are waiting on God to provide the funds. Also Wood Mizer has donated a saw mill that eventually will make it down here so the guys can learn a trade. There is a farm that has a whole bunch of teek wood that the guys will be chain sawing down and then cutting it into planks for the use of building homes. How do the men get involved with drugs???? Well, not much different from the states. Drugs are readily available and the dealers are ready to sell it for cheap. The police aren't active in stopping the selling of drugs, so it is pretty much as easy as just walking down the the beach front and getting some. They will ask you if you want anything too. I have been asked many times. From what I have observed there is not much for teens to do here at night....which can lead to searchng for new things to do for excitement. I have heard many stories where the drug dealers will like up a joint or a crack pipe for you if you want to try it. There are many addicts that have gotten hooked this way. The dealer would get them to use it many times....they would get hooked....then the dealer will get them to sell for them in return for their day fix. It is pretty disgusting to think that humans do this to one another. Dealers themselves were most likely in the same situation growing up. Dad sold drugs, uncle sold drugs, ect. ect. now they are in the family business. They have never known anything else, just business as usual. Guys get hooked on drugs for many reason....escape, peer pressure, stupidity, lack of guidance, hanging with the wrong crowd, bad decisions....thankfully God uses it to bring many to Him. That is what this program is for. It gives men the opportunity to form a relationship with Christ and learn how to be a disciplined follower who can go out into the community and be a productive member of society. Please write me if you have any further questions. Love Bryan

Trip to Dominical for Shabbat

Friday night me, Jared, and Eileen traveled about an hour away to celebrate Shabbat. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shabbat.(a time of rest,fellowship). The house we went to was awesome and had a great view in a huge valley. We played football at night, ate dinner, and then some played songs on a guitar with drums and bongos in the background. It is pretty difficult to put into words how great it was. Well, the next morning my friend Tim who owns this spectacular piece of property received a phone call that his boat motor had been stolen and a man that knew who had stolen it was down the street at the hardware store. Myself, Jared, Tim, and another man named Bruce tagged along. Tim informed us that this was not unsual, nor the first time this sort of thing had happened. So we went to the hardware store where the guy told Tim what had happened the other day. When you own anything off of your property here you pay someone to watch it for you. Tim pays a guy 50 bucks a month to watch his boat. It turns out that the man at the hardware store tells Tim that the guy who stole it was the guy who is watching it. The man then told Tim that if it was his property that was stolen that he would.....the man reached in his car and pulled out a 9mm pistol and fired it in the air. There were about a dozen or so people right around at this time. Nobody freaked out or scattered. I wasn't scared either, but it appeared that this wasn't unusuall. After we left the hardware store we stopped for coffee and then we went to see the guy who supposedly stole his boat motor. It was a quick meeting where Tim told the guy that he had until Monday to get his motor back. The judicial system here is a joke so I hear. If someone steals your property they might get arrested and if they don't it can take years to go through the system. The community is good about telling on others who steal also because it is bad for the community and the local economy. Tourists don't want to come to a place where people are robbed...that is the end of that story. We then went to a restaurant on the beach called the Refuge. Jared and I grabbed some surf boards and went out to attempt to catch a wave. Well, the waves weren't beginner waves. Domincal is actually a place where surfers all over world stop in to surf. It took about 15 minutes just to get out to the waves. I almost caught a couple waves and I was glad I didn't. When I was on top of the waves it looked like looking down from a 2-3 story building. Well I missed a couple waves and relaxed for a second, turned around and saw a monster wave on top of me so I held my breath and went under water. I got tossed around under water for 10 seconds or so and felt like I barely mad it above water in time for another breath. That was the end of the surfing. I was in no mans land. Great experience that I will never forget. Praise the Lord.

Life Here for the locals

A couple people have asked about how Costa Ricans earn a living, how the school system works, and what day to day existence looks like. I am in the Quepos/Manuel Antonio area and tourism probably employs the majority of the people here. From hotels, to souvenirs, restaurants, tours, scuba diving, white water rafting trips, repeling and zip line tours.....are all popular ways to earn a living. There is also palm, coffee, and banana plantations in Costa Rica. Palm oil is huge here...while driving in the country you will see tons and tons of palm plantations. Of course there are common jobs too where people work in stores and there is also a good number who sell fruit, jewelery, and souvenirs on the streets. Public school is free and I believe that it is not unheard of for someone to stop going after 6th grade. I was told that a 6th grade education is equivelent to a 3rd grade education that one would get in the states. Private school is more challenging and also costs more. There are a couple colleges here also. A typical school day is was shorter than the states and they go year round. My friend Jared's wife teaches at a private school -2nd grade...she just had 4 weeks off. One week was because of swine flu;0 She then worked on Monday and Tuesday then off for the rest of the week. I am not exactly sure if this is how it looks on all other levels of school, but I do know that I see kids out of school earlier than at home and also sometimes I see kids and think to myself,"Aren't you supposed to be in school?" Lifestyle here is definetely laid back and I grown folks sitting on there porches at all hours fellowshipping or just sitting there doing whatever. People are generally really nice and will usually say hello or smile. Oh yeah, the guys that work at the beach are cool. There are quite a few different groups that make a living there. They are there from morning to when the sun goes down renting out beach chairs, surf boards-surf lessons, playing soccer with us on Sundays, wave runners, para sailing, canoes, and snorkling gear. They are all really nice guys and also do the life gaurding. I saw one man stuck in a rip tide last Sunday and they all grabbed their boards and went after him....they got him in time.