Ridgewood Bible Church - Friday
Dear Iglesia de Ridgewood—
We hope you enjoy your second game of the week. You must figure out which of the events described below actually happened today!!! Of the ten events described, only one actually happened! The answer is below, along with some other explanatory notes!!!!
(1) The cruise ship to get to the island was broken down, so we all piled into 3 different canoes and paddled through the Caribbean. God enabled us to fend off the hot sun and a few ugly pirates, and we arrived in Olympic record time.
(2) By the time we arrived at the island, five of us had already thrown up.
(3) While snorkeling, Ben Russell was getting bored and decided to do a couple of laps around the island, when all of a sudden, a shark started chasing him. So he sped up, lapped the shark around the island, and snuck up behind it. He jumped up on his back, dunked him all the way under the water, and swam down to the bottom of the ocean where he found a shipwreck. He then tied up the shark with some leftover rope from the mast of the ship. But while the shark was tied up, he kept trying to bite Ben. So Ben looked the shark in the eye and told him to stop, but the shark didn’t. So Ben swam to the surface to catch a quick breath of air (remember, he is only human), and shot back down to the bottom. He then plucked all of the shark’s teeth out one by one. He filled his pockets with the shark’s teeth, untied the rope, and led him to shore on a leash. He then traded all of the shark’s teeth to one of the Dominican shops for one authentic Dominican battery-powered blender, which he gave to the shark, so the shark could still eat. Ben then tapped the shark between the eyes and said “I hope you learned your lesson” and let him go.
(4) While snorkeling, Kristin Buhr noticed something shiny at the bottom of the ocean. She went down to get a better look and realized it was a gold coin. She went to “currency exchange” and learned the coin was valued at $3 million dollars. The Dominican at the counter then informed her that he had actually lost that same gold coin while snorkeling earlier in the week. Kristin gave him his coin back and praised God for using her in the man’s life.
(5) Joyce Wright leaped off of the second deck of our shuttle boat and did a somersault into the ocean over Jen Ragonese.
(6) Jeanie Sandolfini went into debt after buying presents at one of the island shops for all of her grandchildren. She is currently working for the islanders until she sells 1,000 necklaces and can split coconuts with her bare hands.
(7) A Kodiak bear fell off a nearby boat and swam to the island. Luckily, Taylorspeaks “bear.” She taught the bear how to climb palm trees and get coconuts for passing tourists and named the bear “pookie.”
(8) Ben Hand climbed a coconut tree and attempted to parachute down with a towel.
(9) Alex and Felicia went para-sailing and hung by their ankles 800 feet in the air for 2 hours.
(10)We felt bad about hanging out on the beach all day and prayerfully decided to hold a big tent revival. Despite Rich Jennings preaching a little on the Pentecostal side, when he gave the invitation there were 5,000 hands raised, not counting women and children. The Dominicans have since labeled our revival “The Second Pentecost.”
Before giving the answer…some prayer requests…
Tomorrow we are returning to the first village we went to—Los Montones. It has been our favorite village and is also the one in which our missionary couple is investing most of their energy at this time. In the morning we will use some of the money we raised to buy enough groceries to feed 100 families in this village for an entire week! As the adult comes to get their food, we will do an adult program for them. This is big because many of the older adults have not yet shown interest in the church being planted. We will then do a carnival with the kids, a full-blown baseball game with the teens and young adults, and finish with a full mime program for the whole village. Please pray as we are anticipating great things! Jeanie S and Jeff will be sharing testimony in adult program, while Alex, Josh, and Ben H will share testimonies and Rich will preach the gospel in the mime program.
Tomorrow afternoon we are off to Jackie’s House orphanage, a home for daughters of prostitutes. Felicia, Jenny W, and Genie T will be sharing testimonies.
THE ANSWER: #5 actually happened! Joyce leaped 25 feet off the railing on the second deck of the boat into the water (as did many of us). She actually didn’t do a somersault in mid-air, but when she hit the water, a wave swept over her and caused her to somersault of Jen!
OTHER NOTES:
#2—False, although Jen R did on the bumpy bus while trying to write and Sarah T did on the boat. Both are doing exceptionally well now!
#10—False, although we handed out many tracts today and had some rather amazing conversations with people from all over the world. In a rather amazing and almost surreal series of events (details later), Pastor Mike was able to lead a young Italian man (Mauro) and woman (Raffaella) to faith in Christ. We are praising God for that among MANY other things from today!!!! Thank you for praying! Today was also a day of “intentional encouragement” and our team grew closer to each other and the Lord as we creatively and intentionally spurred one another on toward love and good works!!!! Very special stuff!!!!
(PS—we have been trying to send pictures but it isn’t working very well! You’ll just have to wait and continue to use your imagination!)
