
Catherine-singing in the rain 01/31/2010
I just want to take a few minutes and give God the praise that HE deserves for something that, even the non-believers are talking about at our skate outreach in Coban, Guatemala. I want to start out by saying that I have lived and served as a full-time missionary in Guatemala since November of 2001, and have seen God completely take over and intervene in many different situations. Occasionally HE has pushed a rain cloud away, until we finish an outdoor event but nothing equals how HE has orchestrated this year’s rainy season; in terms of our outdoor activities with the local skaters. Coban is located in the edge of a tropical rainforest, so light drizzle with high humidity and early morning fog is a given here. However, there is also a very evident rainy season here between the months of November to February where heavy, all-day rains are expected a couple times a week.
I returned from last year’s Christian skate ministry conference on November the third, all fired up and refocused to continue leading these local, at-risk kids in a lifestyle of following Jesus on a daily basis. We held an average of three weekly, outdoor skate activities for the months of November and December of 2009. We are now in February of 2010 people, and we have yet to have our Masonite covered skateboarding ramps even drizzled on! I am not saying that it hasn’t rained. On days in between the skate activities, it has rained for hours and we have even had several steady two to three day torrential rains. We have held approximately thirty outdoor activities in the last four months including skate sessions, Bible studies and Sunday afternoon events that are four hours long. Even yesterday as I was driving to the school for our 3:00PM Skater Bible Study, I started shaking my head as I hit a patch of light rain. I was noticing the the thickness of the dark clouds covering Coban like a blanket. I wasn’t shaking me head out of doubt; it was because I already knew that God was going to do it, once again! Jose, a regular skater that comes from Santa Cruz about fifteen minutes away, almost got off the bus because it was raining so hard. It rained at my house and reportedly all around the city of Coban. At the school where we were pouring our hearts out to rejected kids, it never rained a drop! As I was finishing up teaching the Bible study, I told them that it doesn’t matter who has turned their backs towards them and rejected them because God loves every one of them so much and you want to know how I know that? I asked them to think about how many times we have held outdoor activities since the beginning of November and not once have we been rained on. Ivan, a hardcore Emo kid in his twenties said, “hey, you know that’s right; we live in Coban; can you believe that?” YES I CAN, PRAISE THE LORD!