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let me give you details: Costa Rica edition

Hi blog, I live in Costa Rica. Its been about 2 months here and I officially love living overseas. For the past two months I’ve lived in 5 places. Jaco, Costa Rica where I stayed with my entire squad for a month. A small island in the middle of no where Costa Rica for one weekend. A hotel in the heart of San Jose, Costa Rica. Limõn, Costa Rica where my squad split into just the guys for two weeks. And Puerto Vijeo, Costa Rica where I reunited with the whole squad, and stayed for 3ish weeks. 

 

In my ministry in Jaco called Oceans Edge we got the chance to paint light poles around the city, and brighten up the community. But my favorite part of the Oceans Edge ministry was the opportunity to serve the homeless in the community. The first week we got there we had the chance to work in a small gym where homeless gathered and got the chance to play sports with them, color with them, serve them food, and just hang out with them. It was a beautiful opportunity to build friendship with the men around the city and then over the course of the month get to see them on the streets and love on them and pray for them and call them by name. We got to visit the same places everyday and learn people’s names around the city whether it was Heidi, who worked at a juice stand down the street from where we stayed. Or Nelson our night guard who stood watch outside our house every night. It was so cool to make genuine friendships with people in other countries. Jaco was so so good but it was also hard.. 

 

Now for my small island experience…. My last weekend in Jaco was actually not spent in Jaco. Our man mentor Luis the took all of the guys out for a weekend. Luis told us about about taking us out a few weeks in advance and he didn’t have a plan yet but we were all very excited for him to make one. And woah did he make one. Luis told all of us that we will me going to a small island and we will be taken there in a boat. So on Saturday morning all the men got up at 5:30 and piled in our friend Dons minivan who is a surfer hippie who loved on us our entire time in Jaco. He drove us to a town called Parrita about an hour away, with 10 guys cramped in one minivan. We got dropped off at a dock and waited for the arrival of Luis’s new friend. A man he met days prior, and they made an agreement to letting us stay on the island and to give us a ride in his boat to the island. And sure enough Albero pulled through and came chugging on his boat and 6 of us at a time piled in and he took us to this island. On the island we did 24 hours of silence and solitude. During this there is no talking to the other men on the island with me and just time for you and god to chat with each other. There was a ton of super cool moments and, just a space to not talk was really cool as living in community 24/7 leads to a lot of talking most of the time. After our one day of silence and solitude 

 

After our time on the island we headed back to our base in Jaco for one night. Then the next day is we headed out for our next ministry. This was the time we had to say goodbye to the other team leaders on my squad. (The team leaders come for 3 months and are assigned a separate team to lead) There was sone very tough goodbyes and was a pretty emotional day. Thankfully I didn’t have to say goodbye to my team leader for two more days. Then just the men took a bus to the city of San Jose. Once in San Jose we headed to a hotel. This is where our first experience with our new ministry was. We met our ministry host Max. He explained to us that our two nights in San Jose at this hotel that we would be going around the city at night and doing night ministry. It was a very very new experience and being in the city of San Jose was the most I had actually felt like I was out of country. The city of Jaco was very Americanized. There was some very dark moments in the streets, men who were demon possessed , a experience with a man trying to stab another man in front of us, people so deeply broken right in front of us. But it was also a very beautiful experience to try and bring these people some form of light. We got to pray over countless people and give them bibles. After our two nights doing night ministry we had to say goodbye to my team leader Samson and our mens leader Luis. It was hard and definitely some tears shed. Our team leader Samson washed all of the men’s feet and made us all cry as one more act of his love and servant leadership poured out. After saying our goodbyes we hopped on a bus to the city of Limõn, Costa Rica. Here we stayed with the same ministry and they took us to a house full of about 30 men. These men were men that came from the streets of San Jose, most of them ministered to during night ministry. These men were at one point broken hurting men but they found the light. It was so cool to live with all these men in the jungle of Costa Rica.  I don’t speak Spanish very well, and none of the men spoke English very well. But that didn’t stop a single one of them from serving me and my team dinner every night, it didn’t stop them from playing games with us, it didn’t stop them from learning English phrases and shouting them with us. In a place where I should have been serving them, bringing the love of God to them… it was quite the opposite they brought all of this to me. They’ve brought us into their family and loved on us, and it was a blast. 

 

After our two weeks in the city of Limõn with just the men, our whole squad united in the city of Puerto Viejo. 

Our ministry here was at the YWAM base and it was a super cool ministry and there was a ton of opportunities to serve the city and serve the YWAM base. Our first week on the WYAM base we did work on the property. My team the Samsonites were assigned jungle clean up. What’s jungle clean up you might ask? Jungle cleanup is chopping grass with machetes. Yes it was hard and yes I got eaten alive by mosquitoes. But also it was good and me and my team has a ton of good talks in the jungle while smacking away at the grass with our swords. Our second week was the week of Christmas, we got to go into the city and do Evangelism and just make friend within the city and tell people about Jesus. Christmas Eve we went to a small village about 45 minutes away and got to hang out with a bunch of kids the whole day. We played soccer and put them on our shoulders, and served them hotdogs for lunch. It was a blast and one of my favorite ministry days on the race so far, and definitely will be one of the most memorable and different Christmas Eves I will ever have. Our third week we got to do a lot more evangelism in the town and did more jungle clean up. This week was New Years and on New Years we went into the city and blasted worship music on the street corners and had dance parties in the streets. It was so cool and tons of people were joining in and dancing with us. Then after this we went back to our base and started the New Years with worship. It was a beautiful way to kick of the New Year. We ended our time in Puerto Viejo on January 5th and we took a bus to the city of San Jose where the airport is and are taking a flight to Guatemala. My second country! 

3 Comments

  1. I am so inspired by you! I love seeing how brave you are as you walk in who God has made you to be! Love you!!!

  2. Hello Caden,
    Thank you for sharing about Costa Rica – bummer that we did not get to join you in that country. We were so encouraged by the growth that we have seen in all of you men. Guatemala has good things in store for you as God continues to mold you all into His likeness.
    To the King!

  3. I see so much of Jesus in how you see the world, Caden! I’m honored and thankful to know you and serve in the Kingdom alongside of you!

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