I’m not gonna lie. We were exhausted after last night, so we slept until noon, did some cleaning and then had an awesome Barbeque at Bally and Sheri’s. Those people are awesome! Breanna made homemade apple pie from stuff she bought here. I’m stuffed.
cj
Also on Friday, we had the opportunity to go to the “Savannah” the local ball field and participate in a youth outreach. Students from Caparo, Los Lomas, and several other communities came for a long night of volleyball and football (the kind you play with your feet, not your hands. I think we call it soccer!) I had the unique opportunity of sharing a brief devotional and then we ate. We didn’t get a great count of how many attended, but we had no problem finishing off the 85 hot dogs we had bought. (They were told 1 each, but who knows?
?)
We also did a few odds and end jobs. Andre replaced a toilet and fixed some windows. 
Friday was an immensely busy day for us! We spent the morning and afternoon at the local church here in Caparo painting. The front of the church faces the town was built with these beautiful arches and a front patio. It’s really breathtaking as it overlooks the town. Unfortunately it had never been painted, so the concrete was bare and unsightly. We fixed that. I’ll let you be the judge.
On Thursday, we bought and filled 16 boxes of food to be delivered to people in need. We met a sweet woman named Michelle who is left to raise 5 children while her husband serves in the army. We met a couple who live in nothing more then corrugated metal leaning against posts, no water, no electricity, and no plumbing. We also met Cindy and Radich who live with their children in a 2 room shack on stilts. We were also able to bless the associate pastor of the church who is paid $30US a month. 
I have to share the story of a beautiful Trini woman we met last night. She came and met us at the home we are staying at and wanted to share her story with us. Her name is Pritima and she is of east Indian descent, and although she claimed to have a 24-year-old son, we are convinced she is in her 20′s because she looks so young! As is common, her family practices Hinduism. In fact, her father is a hindu priest (pundit).
She explained that part of the ritual involved in Hinduism requires going to a temple to receive “spirits”. Upon receiving the spirits, the person becomes completely under their control and gains certain powers, like the ability to read minds. Once at the temple, the person is tested to see if they truly have a spirit by being beaten with a heavy knotted rope. Pritima showed her arms free of scars yet explained that she had been beaten many times yet never felt pain nor was injured.
She said that she had met the local pastor here on several occasions and had been given a book on demonic influence (in the last year) written by a Christian author. As she read, 2 things happened. First, she began to experience intense affliction, such as back pain and headaches. Secondly, everything she read was a direct narrative of her experiences in the hindu temple.
The next time she went to the temple, she realized for the first time that the behaviour of those with spirits was ugly and destructive. It wasn’t beautiful as she had been taught or had thought she experienced, it was chaotic. She became more and more frightened and said she looked at one of the practitioners who was under the control of a spirit. He appeared to her as having the head of goat and immediately she cried out for the protection of Jesus’ blood to cover her and save her!
She now is having a ministry to her children and husband as she tries to explain that the spirits are nothing more than the demons that Jesus warned about and delivered people from.
We, as a team, later had a great discussion about how the enemy doesn’t show himself to us like that because he doesn’t need to. Our hearts and minds are captivated by our materialism and as long as we are being led astray like sheep, he’ll continue to use a secularistic, hedonistic culture to enslave us.
cj
We’ve had and exciting and testing first day. We started Wednesday off by taking a tour of Caparo with Andre. He’s related to half the village, so there was alot to see. Some Trini boys spent a half-hour climbing trees to get us some mangos (when I get back, I will show you how you are +supposed+ to eat them!)
It was blistering hot and humid yesterday, so already our metabolisms are being tested. We drank bottle upon bottle of water and some of the team was amazed that they didn’t need to use the restroom all day. I explained that it is being expelled as sweat. They are no longer speaking to me!
We painted/primed a neighborhood home for a couple named Rawlins and Koi. They have 3 sweet children and have enjoyed the team’s company. Andre is putting glass in the bedroom windows today because the kid’s room has none. When it rains hard, the children get drenched. We’ll fix that.
We have plans to paint at the church, deliver food baskets, do some construction work, deliver craft supplies to the orphanage and some other projects. Thanks for praying!
cj
This morning we walked around and got a feel for Caparo and got to meet some of Andre’s relatives. We also got to try some mangos! This afternoon we painted a house that was down the road from the home that we are staying in. Tomorrow we are going to buy a bunch of groceries for our grocery bag project.
