The Journey Begins!

Hello!

If you are reading this, then you have heard about the great opportunity that God has given me to go back to Costa Rica! I am overjoyed with this opportunity to partner with a missions organization that focuses on building relationships with the people that we will be staying with in Costa Rica. Relationship is what is emphasized most in the immersion program that I will be a part of. They have purposefully not jam packed our days with events and activities so that we will have many opportunities to grow in our relationships with the family that we will be living with. Essentially, they want to give us the space to just do life with the locals and be ambassadors of God's love that way. During our time there, we will also be helping with local schools and churches and various other outreach opportunities. I definitely agree with their approach to missions and am very excited to be a part of something like this. When I happened upon Experience Mission's website, this was one of the things that caught my eye. The other thing was that not only did they offer an immersion trip to a Spanish speaking country, but that it was Costa Rica. If you don't know, Costa Rica has a very special place in my heart as I spent a year of Torchbearers Bible school there. Costa Rica, the people and the language have a very special place in my heart.

After discovering these things on the Experience Mission website, I was very excited and wanted to apply right away for this trip. But I decided to to wait and pray about. I didn't want to jump on board right away, without asking God if that's what He wanted me to do. I prayed about it for about a month, and during that time, I felt peace from God about this trip. I felt peace that He was a good Father who delights to give good gifts to His children. And this was one of those gifts that He was giving me. So I applied and got accepted. Through this process, I have started to understand a little more that God does delight in me and my hopes and dreams are important to Him. He also made it clear that the path that He has for each of us is tailored specifically to our hearts; to our hopes, dreams, and desires.

Now I am taking the next step of stepping out into my community and asking for support. If you are willing, I would love for you the be a part of this journey, before I go to Costa Rica and while I am there. So I just want to encourage you to pray about this and ask God how He would like you to go about it.

You are more than welcome to pray for me. In my blog posts I will list prayer requests as they come up. Specific prayer requests right now are that:
-God will be preparing my heart and my mind for this trip and
-that God will provide the funds for this trip.

If you feel called, you can also support my financially. Please contact me if this is something that is on your heart. And if you have any questions or just want to talk to me about the trip, please feel free!
My email is jayda.hooge@gmail.com