Gracey Goes to El Salvador

When I first left for the mission field, I created Corbin and Charity, two fictional characters who would travel with me around the world to tell people about Jesus. It was created to connect kids to missions, to teach them about giving, the great commission, about other cultures, about all the different ways there are to share Jesus, well, that's what I tell people anyway. The TRUE story is, it was created for 5 little ones that were my nieces and nephews before I had nieces and nephews. Gracey, Austin, Logan, Delaney, and Lawson. We were all having a hard time saying our good byes so this was a way to stay connected. Now the club has several dozen members all over the US, but they were The Originals!  

I've taken Gracey's "Charity" to 8 different countries over the past 5 years, but this summer, Gracey's mama took the real live 12 year old Gracey to El Salvador. I couldn't wait to hear all about it so I asked Gracey to write me a little something about her trip and this is what she said:

     "When I arrived in El Salvador I didn’t feel like I was in another country because we were at kings castle, (a training center for teams and discipleship center for Salvadoreans) BUT when we drove 4 hours outside the city and arrived in the village I figured it out!  We did 4 whole programs that day (a program means we would go into the middle of the street where people live and do dances, dramas, games, then share about Jesus and pray with them) When we got done our leader Shaira said it's not normal to do 4 programs in a row (especially since we were in the hottest part of the country!). It is beautiful there and the view was amazing, but not as amazing as the children! Another cool thing was I met this really nice and pretty girl named Doniela even though we didn’t speak the same language I felt a connection.  When all of this was finished and we went back to kings castle at our good-bye party we were told we reached 2396 people with the Gospel, 500 made decisions to ask God into their heart! We prayed for 177 people who were having problems at home and for 182 sick people,  and we saw 3 miracles! We did 19 programs, so ya, God did a lot in those 19 programs! The last day we all got up at 3:30am and headed for the airport on the bus.  There were a lot of tears as we said good-byes.  When we got home some of us wanted to go back to El Salvador and then some of us were like “THANK YOU JESUS WE ARE BACK AND IN AIR CONDITIONING!!!!!!!!!!!!”  I think I was a little bit of both!"

 

GRACEY

  Some might wonder if 12 years old is too young to go on an overseas mission's trip, so I asked her mama this morning via FaceTime,  "Are you glad you took her?"  Her reply, "Oh yes! It was wonderful!" She also added, "It was soo hot, we slept on the concrete floor of a church, and took cold showers, and ate the local food and I did not hear one complaint from Gracey! And you know she's a high maintenance kid! If it's hot here at home, she's not going outside and she's a very picky eater, but she did not complain one time and ate everything she was served!" So, it looks like there was a 4th miracle on this trip! So evidently 12 years old is a fine time to hop a plane with mom or dad and go tell some people in a different land that Jesus loves them! Thanks Chesney & David for being such great friends, supporters, and parents! Thanks Gracey for sharing your story with us! 

I'm pretty sure this prayer embrace at the church
altar answers my "are you glad you took her?"
question better than words ever could!