From Smitty and Carolyn... (Sunday evening)

Good evening,

"Oh sing to the Lord a new song, sing to the Lord all the earth, sing to the Lord bless His name, tell of His salvation from day to day, declare His glory among the nations, His marvelous works among all the peoples, for great is the Lord and greatly to be praised." Psalm 96:1-4a

After breakfast this morning we boarded the bus and went to church in Antigua. Praising God in a different language, with new melodies is much like the psalm above. We clapped, praised and sang for forty-five minutes-on our feet! We then heard a dynamic message from Malachi 2:17-3:5. To a congregation of numerous people groups the pastor exhorted all of us to personal responsibility to follow hard after God, to make Him our focus AND our lifestyle.

Our lunch at a local restaurant spread out over several hours. This was good time for interacting with our team members and others who joined us. Our team spent the remainder of the afternoon walking in Antigua. Antigua is a very old town with impressive architecture. In spite of intermittent rain, our group walked to the park to get our bearings and then to a local Catholic Church. In Antigua there seems to be a Catholic Church on every other corner. This one contained quite a few life sized statues. Gloria has promised to give us some historical background for that particular church when we debrief later. Continuing on in the rain, we separated into groups to go get coffee and look for Guatemalan crafts to bring home. We arrived back at home just in time for dinner.

The food has been muy sabroso, the sleeping arrangements very comfortable. We are blessed to be here learning more about ourselves and how we can better relate to God.

Debrief from today and tomorrow's schedule will be shared with the team tonight.

"Te proclamare en las Nacions." (I proclaim You in the nations.)

Blessings,
Smitty and Carolyn