Hi Ladies,

    It is now time to share the wonderful things that God did in the Dominican Republic. Since we were there last year the city put up a wonderful fence for the church and project. It makes the kids and the playground so nice and safe now. The playground and the basketball hoops are in great shape after one year. The church people finished up the front of the church. They did a wonderful job.
    This year there were 27 ladies from Northern New England that went in January for a full week. We were able to get so much accomplished. The first two days we did home visits. We took $30 food baskets to our families of the kids we sponsored from Mission of Mercy. We did the home visits in 4 different groups. It was a real eye opener to all the ladies how these people live and how little they really do have. Before we arrived at the project 2 truck loads of stones had been ordered by the ladies of NNED. While we were gone the other gals put stones all over the playground to make it fresh and safe for all the kids. Later in the day we ordered one more load of stones. It really helps with mud too. It rains some everyday. The rain was much better for this mission trip, we went a little later in Jan as the rainy season was coming to an end. We started priming the 4 classrooms we were going to finish with paint on the inside and out. 5 murals were started. There was a jungle picture, fish one, butterfly with rainbow room, and a music room with music of Jesus Loves Me with heart notes and people worshiping. This is the room that we did a great big heart around a window and every lady on the trip put a hand print around the heart. If you want to see all the pictures here is the web site:    http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http://picasaweb.google.com%2Fnnedmissiontrip09   Click on one of the pictures and many pictures will open up under that lady's name. This is what we worked on for the first 2 days.
    The next day was Sunday. We had a big day planned. We passed out flyers that morning through out the neighborhoods. We were going to do a big service on the playground. We were hoping for many of the neighbors to attend outside thinking that maybe they wouldn't go into a church building. The people came very early, they were excited! We started the service at 10:30. All the seats were full and people standing all around the playground. My guess would be around 300 or more people. The worship team for the church started with a couple songs and a welcome from the Pastor. Then we started our program. The puppet team did 4 different songs through out the morning. There were two mime skits that were wonderfully done. There was the story about the salvation bracelets. The kids loved it. Everyone received a bracelet that we all tied on them. I did a story about our heart being black and how with God's love and goodness our black hearts can become red with Jesus' love and goodness and etc. We had many of the words in Spanish. I had a heart that I turned inside out and kept pulling words out of it in Spanish. We had wonderful interpreters though out the week that traveled and were by our sides. One of our gals from NNED even told a story about "Jesus Loves Me" in Spanish and finished by giving an invitation, so many hands went up it was impossible to count. God was moving and touching lives. What a wonderful opportunity to share Christ's love. We all felt so blessed to be part of this ministry. Sunday afternoon we rested and went site seeing as a group.
    Monday was a very special day. The children that were sponsored by us on the mission trip got to spend a hour with their child. It was such a special morning. It was a fun morning one on one. We limited it to a hour because we had so much work to get done on the 4 rooms. Later in the day after it started to dry out we started to get the primer on the outside the 4 rooms. Plus we repainted the inside of the Sanctuary and started to repaint the outside of the church. We wanted everything to look fresh and new when we left the LeVega project.
    Tuesday eight of the gals stayed at the project to finish up everything that wasn't done. They finished up all the mural frames, painting outside the 4 rooms with a different color around the windows and doors and finished up the outside of the church and scrubbed the bathroom down major. The rest of us went to the Assembly of God church in the ghetto's of LaVega. We painted the inside and outside of that church, painted 6 houses. One house was falling down on 2 sides so some men from the church rebuilt these 2 sides and we painted on the house as fast as they finished a side. This lady had 5 kids and just had the 6th 2 days before. She wanted to protect her baby from the smell and had her somewhere else while the gals painted. Isn't that exciting, a mom tries to protect their baby where ever they live. Her older daughter even helped the ladies paint. It is exciting to see the people wanting to help themselves. When we went to lunch and just left 2 ladies to paint in one area the locals asked if they could paint their house while we eat. There is a whole row of light blue house. It really did help to make the neighborhoods look better.
    Wednesday was the day we did a program with all the kids at NNED's project. We did a AM program for the kids that go to public school in the PM. We also did a program in the PM for the AM public school kids. It was so fun! We started out in the sanctuary giving gifts to all the staff and getting sponsors for 3 kids that didn't has a sponsor. We did songs and stories then we divided the kids up into 5 groups and they rotated from room to room with different workshops. Puppets (that is when they received there puppets that you made), in another room we did nails for girls and foot washing in another with their toes being polished. While the girls did this the boys did sports on the other side of the church and received prizes. The last room was for a story and coloring with stickers. The car port was for the salvation bracelets for the kids to make. Every child received a heart with Spanish word inside of the heart -- Love, Joy, etc. They also got candy at the end of the service. They had a bag of gifts and candy.
    When we left on Wed there was many tears from the kids, staff, all the mission trip team. We accomplished much with God's help and leading. What a joy to serve the Lord where ever we are. Thank you to all the churches that helped with money, puppets, bracelets, hearts and your prayers. Thank you all for being part of this Mission Trip in 2009 to LaVega, Dominican Republic.
    The topping on the mission trip was at the last supper in the Dominican Republic. One of the gals had a real burden that the church needed a well. The only way you can flush a toilet is to throw a bucket of water down the toilet. There is no running water. They have to have the fire department bring water every so many days. I shared her burden about a well being dug. The ladies on the trip raised all the money in just 2 minutes. God's hands were still at work. Before we left all the money was available to the project for a well to be dug. They have already started the well. There are pictures on the web site I gave you earlier in this letter.
God is so good! He is totally awesome!
Blessings,
Bevie Jo Marquardt

ALL Forms for 2009 Home Missions Trip to Waterboro, ME. Please download the 2009 Home Missions Application, Home Missions Pastor, Medical Treatment and Waiver, and Pastor's Recommendation. You won't want to miss out!       1.  2009 Home Missions Application      2.  Home Missions Poster      3.  Medical Treatment and Waiver      4.  Pastor's Recommendation Form

ALL Forms for 2010 DR Trip Please download the 2010 Application, Travel Medical Release, Medical Treatment and Waiver, Pastor's Recommendation, Payment Schedule Poster, and Travelor Information Form for Mission of Mercy. You won't want to miss out!       1.  2010 Application      2.  Travel Medical Release      3.  Medical Treatment and Waiver      4.  Pastor's Recommendation Form      5.  Payment Schedule Poster      6.  Travelor Information Form for Mission of Mercy

 Note about the new e-mails that will come to you free from our National Women’s Ministries Dept.  Just go to their website: http://www.womanstouch.ag.org/ click on right side of the page for the box that says Women’s Ministries Enewsletter.  It’s free, and you can pick just the ones that are of interest to you.  It’s easy and wonderful to receive these inspirational emails instead of junk mail each week.