Sunday, July 19th - Our last day in Bogota. PART ONE

On Sunday morning, we got up and, after breakfast, took the TransMilenio rapid transit bus to the Iglesia Wesleyana del Norte for the 9:30 service. We walked from the bus stop on a bridge across the highway to the church.





This is the largest Wesleyan Church in the world. They have six services every weekend.


The worship service was great. We were treated as honored guests, sitting on the front row with our friends from the Bible Institute. Their music was very good, contemporary like ours, and we all really enjoyed that part of the worship service.


July 20th is the Colombian Independance day, so the church honored some of it's veterans.


Then they called our team up on stage. Rick West spoke briefly, introducing us, and Steve presented greetings from FCWC and a devotional. Then we led a song, "Open the Eyes of My Heart", which everyone sang, each in their own language...really cool. Nancy has a short, rather rough video clip of this which may appear on her Facebook page at some point.

Pastor Jose' Quintero, our host and friend, was the guest speaker for this service and he delivered a very dynamic message on the subjects of freedom and independance. In particular, he spoke about what it means to experience for eternity the freedom that we have from sin through the resurrection of Jesus. He is an excellent communicator and we were all transfixed by his message. The language barrier could not withstand his passion or the Holy Spirit's power to draw us in.

After the message, prayers, and benedictions, we exited out to a sunny open courtyard which featured...Coffee Wesley!!!

Here we made several new friends. Everyone was so friendly and welcomed us warmly.

Rick encounter some old friends, and these little guys want to make new friends.

After church, we were taken by car and van to a different and very large shopping mall. While there some of us purchased enough Colombian coffee beans to start a small export business. You can speculate as to who it is that might have done that.

Then we went to lunch at one of Pastor Luz Angela's favorite restaurants, The Crepe and Waffle. Okay, so that's not very South American sounding, we all get that, but the food was delicious and we had a great time of fellowship.

Here are various picture of food and friends:









A great time was had by all.

This is the end of Sunday, part one.

Saturday, July 18th

It's Saturday and, contrary to our original plans, the team was back at the school early to work. Originally, this was to be a day off for sight-seeing and playing. But several jobs remained to be completed and everyone was determined to get them done.

For several reasons, our curtain-sewing department, in particular, and was feeling the pressure and were anxious about the success of their mission.

The sheer material was difficult to work with. The sewing machine on loan had some definite functional limitations. The number of windows that needed to be completed, 27, was substantial.

After 3 days of designing, measuring, and cutting, only 3 curtains had been completed. The girls were concerned, to say the least.

And then, Saturday morning, something happened. Something clicked and everything started to fall into place. By early afternoon ALL of the curtains had been sewn and hung!

And there was great rejoicing!

Meanwhile, Ron and Steve finished the tables and they look FANTASTIC, exceeding everyone's expectations:


The office remodel was coming together, too. The walls are finished and the guys were getting the doors hung. The biggest part of this was the sliding door on what was to be Mercy's office. It was designed by Scott and mostly built by him, Billy, and Andres, with occasional help from Ron and Steve, too.






Meanwhile, Barry and Carl had run into some trouble. Most of the computer wiring had been pulled, the router was installed, and the wireless was hooked up. Everything tested out and all of the components seemed to be communicating properly. There was just one problem - the internet didn't work! After several hours of troubleshooting and second-guessing, Carl had eliminated all of the obvious possibilities inside the building (our wiring was good!) and we had to conclude that there must be something wrong with the DSL/telephone line coming into the building, or some issue at the ISP provider's office.

So we had to call in an expert.


This is Camilo. He works for Microsoft here in Bogota, teaching advanced classes in various aspects of networking, online security, system design, and several other advanced areas of information technology. He is a for-real, super-smart, certified computer expert with extensive credentials to prove it. He was also an extraordinarily gracious and patient man and we couldn't have asked for any better help.

Unfotunately, after running his own battery of tests, Camilo couldn't find the problem either...which actually made Carl and Barry feel somewhat better.


So, after concluding that it was likely an issue with the telephone company, Carl, Steve, and Barry set out to finish all of the wiring as best we could and trust that the Lord would fix the internet on Tuesday, the next business day. (On Thursday, the 23rd, we received confirmation that the telephone company DID fix the problem and the Institute is online again!!!)


We then packed up all of our tools and headed back to the hotel. We were all going out to supper that evening to celebrate our last day of work at the school! Our hosts were taking us to one of Pastor Jose's favorite restaurants for the best hamborguesa in Colombia. So we got cleaned up quickly and reassembled in the lobby of Hotel Lord.


The restaurant, called El Corral, was in a very large mall in a different section of town. The burgers were truly huge and delicious, and a good time was had by all.

Friday, July 17th

On Friday morning, the day began with Steve leading us all in a devotion about discipleship, drawing the lesson from some of the Old Testament traditions. Afterwards, some of our team shared about how the Lord had lead them to sign up to come on the trip to Bogota:


And then it's back to work. We've got a lot to do and we are starting to feel the pressure...we want to be done before we leave.

Above, Billy and Tina are about to start hanging curtain rods. Everyone thought it would be a good idea to keep Billy away from sharp, pointy objects for a while. Below, Ron is assembling the tables for the classrooms, fitting the removable tops to the frames.



Above, Brittany is measuring the light diffusor material which had to be carefully cut to fit to cover the windows in the classrooms. The purpose of this is to moderate the incoming sunlight, for security, and also to cut down on the distraction factor for the students. Below, Debbie is sewing the hems on the curtains. This, too, was a very big job.




Above, Scott is applying mud to one of the walls that he and Billy built while Steve is checking it out. Even though specific people had certain assignments, we all floated in and out of each other's jobs, helping as needed, sharing tools, offering insight and experience to one another. Below, Carl is working on the wiring in the computer lab. This is a job we wouldn't have even attempted without someone like Carl, who is very knowledgeable about wiring. It was great to witness God using each person's unique gifts, experience, and personalities to complete the work.


Here is a wonderful woman who, like the women in the Old Testament, has a name that matches her personality and spirit, Mercy Macias. She works for the Wesleyan Bible Institute and, as you can see she is bringing us a treat. Every day, all day, up and down six flights of stairs, these sweet ladies kept us fueled with food and lubricated with coffee, juice, and water.


This beautiful smile belongs to Xiomara Macias, and she is Mercy’s niece. She also speaks English very well and never missed an opportunity to encourage us. In English, her name is pronounced “sha-MAR-a”. On this day, she is bringing us this interesting refreshment, a kind of drinkable yogurt made by a Alpina, a big and important company in Bogota that exports a variety of food products all over South America.


Here are some of our other friends, again. Laura Macias, our chief translator, tour guide, Spanish teacher, and helper.

Andres Rodriguez, a tireless worker with a true servant's heart.

Pastor Felix (standing, talking to Ron), and Alberto, another young man with excellent translation skills. He is talking with Scott below and is also a worship leader at his church.

Several times during the week, in the early evening, there would be a class meeting in one of the classrooms and we would always try to be a little quieter about our work. On Friday night, after supper, we received a special surprise. One of the classes, in Apologetics, came upstairs to the top floor so that they could meet us. They thanked us for our efforts and we had a good time mingling and talking with them. They were happy to practice their English skills and we had a good time getting to know some of the folks who we hoped would benefit from our labors.

(Remember, you can click on the photos to view a larger version)

Afterwards, we all went back to work, the students to their classroom and us to our jobs:

And finally, here is a picture of Brittany's tool bag:

She got teased a bit because of it's girly look and color-coordinated tools. All week we called it either "Hannah Montana's Tool Bag" or "the Barbie Tool Bag". However, I think that all of us, at one time or another during our work, found that it held exactly the right tool we needed for whatever task we were doing at the time.

Isn't that just like the way the Lord works?