I Had a Knife Pulled On Me… kind of

What an honor that Jesus counts me worthy to serve Him.

Semana Santa, Holy Week, brings hundreds, maybe thousands of people to Jacó Beach and covid didn’t really slow down tourism this year. Our host knew that God was telling her to seize this opportunity and she unleashed our squad onto the streets.

The squad split into teams and we fought for Heaven to collide with earth in Costa Rica.

Three evenings we stood on this rooftop in the middle of town declaring the Lordship of Jesus and beckoning Holy Spirit fire to fall on our city. All the while, we rotated positions to be boots on the ground meeting folks who were about to make deals with the devil and encouraging fellow believers in the midst of difficult life circumstances. We saw an insane amount of life change this week. Insane.

One of the coolest details is that this is my life. Every day. I GET to ask the Lord what He wants and who He wants and we go after it.

Tuesday, March 30 , 2021

After our daily meeting to discuss the schedule and share how we’d encountered God in the last week, our leadership team gathered to discuss the week ahead per usual. Their meeting concluded more rapidly than was typical for them and the team leaders immediately rounded up their teams to let us know that Hannah had decided to send us out to the streets in the evenings. What is so significant about this is that we have a strict 8:00 pm curfew each night. Jacó, as I’ve mentioned before, has alot going on. I rarely walk from our house to the beach without being asked “Aye bro, you wanna pump some weed?” That’s in plain daylight. At night, the drug and sex industry here really comes to life, so Ocean’s Edge has activated some policies to proactively hold teams accountable when they are under their authority. Because of that, we’d never seen the place after 8:00 pm, but the time was finally coming.

 

Picture credzzz to my friend: Paula Johnson

Wednesday, March 31, 2021 

All of this day we spent resting, praying, and preparing our hearts for what we might encounter this evening. On the World Race, we spend a lot of our ministry time doing ATL, which simply means that we get to ask the Lord where He wants us to go and who He wants us to meet. I mentioned that before in my blog series called “God Only Does Magnificent Work.”

We’d been told that there was a building in the middle-ish of town where we would be based out of. We would gather together here to pray, worship, and seek the Lord before we sent teams onto the streets. Jacó is not too terribly big. There’s actually one strip that runs parallel to the beach where one can find anything they’ll need for their stay in this city, so we set up right in the center.

As I’d been praying throughout the day, the Lord left no room for me to question whether He wanted me to go out and meet people or if He would have me stay at the building to intercede for my squadmates as they put their feet on the ground. I knew that I’d stay and pray for the duration of ministry that night. So did all of the MOMS. Our whole team would be together standing in the gap for our other teams as they navigated the evening on the strip. 

Intercession and it’s importance is one of those things that I have learned so much about since I’ve been on the field. For those that don’t know much about it, allow me to explain a bit. Intercession is defined as the action of intervening on behalf of another. It literally means to stand in the gap. So, in this setting, my team and I were standing between our friends and the schemes of the enemy as they shared the Gospel with people they met on their venture. We were asking the Father to surround them, to hide them, and to protect them.

What a night. Our God powerfully showed up and lives were changed on night one.

Thursday, April 1, 2021

Again, God left no room for theorizing. He told me to intercede. This time I was a bit more upset. I wanted to be out telling people about Jesus. It was maundy Thursday and I was HYPE for people to know what the heck that even means, but He told me not to go. So I stayed at the building while others, including my teammates went out. 

About halfway through the evening, the Holy Spirit in me was excited by a song that I’d been singing in worship and I started to share the Gospel from this rooftop with my friend, Justin, who was down below. Right about that time, Jackie looked to me and asked if I wanted to leave and I knew I had to go. We needed a third person, so I enthusiastically walked past my teammate, Alayna, and said “Come on. We’re going out.” She gathered what she needed and we left. 

For a while, I was confused at why He would let me out, because I wasn’t getting anything. No words, no visions, nothing. Until I remembered that I had been randomly thinking of the color pink all the while that I was praying, so I voiced that to the girls and then I got a vision of a man sitting alone on a bench. He was obviously not in Costa Rica, but I knew that meant something, so I shared that as well. 

I’d only just gotten that info out of my mouth when we walked past a man sitting alone on a pink bench. We kept moving, but I continued to peek back and we made eye contact a few times and he started laughing. Alayna and I prayed for a moment while Jackie was using the bathroom and then I made my way over to him. Immediately, I asked if he spoke english and let him know that God told me to come and talk to him. He put his hand on my shoulder and said “Gracias.” Our conversation led me to understand that He is also a follower of Jesus and that he has been facing some difficult situations, especially with his family. He’d been specifically asking God to increase his faith and he told me that I was the answer to his prayers. His faith was increased and I almost chose not to go to him. I wrestled with whether or not to approach him as we walked by and I’m so thankful that I made the decision to allow God to direct my steps. 

After I prayed with him, the girls came over and we headed out. While we were walking, we noticed a gigantic mural of a sea turtle at the opening of an alleyway, so we popped in for a second to take a better look. The further we meandered into the alley, the more I recognized that this may not be the safest place for us to be. 

I’m not sure how long we’d been there before a man rolled up on his bike and he stopped directly in front of us. He appeared to be adjusting his shorts when he pulled out a long, shiny, silver knife. In the moment, I had no fear, but I knew that I had to protect the girls at all costs, so I began to make conversation. I looked the man in the eyes and I said “How are ya tonight?” What else do you say to a stranger that just pulled a knife out of his pants and was casually waving it close to your face? It didn’t take him long to realize what was going on and he began to apologize. I have no clue what his intentions were, but I don’t think he knew that he’d just pulled a knife on some gringo missionaries. *shoulder shrug* 

That ended the night for us. We made our way back to the building where our friends were and then we wandered back to the base for our 10:00 pm curfew. 

Our God powerfully showed up and lives were changed on night two.

Friday,  April 2, 2021 

Good Friday. 

Our church here, Horizon Church, was holding a service this evening to commemorate the death of our savior. Due to this service, we started ministry at 4:00 pm. I joined two of my pals on their venture to the building in the middle of town to pray for a while, but I brought my guitar. 

When we found out we would be doing street ministry, I envisioned myself leading worship on the street with some of my squadmates, so I planned to do that on this final night, but for prayer time, I simply wanted to sing to Jesus. After a while of singing alone, I went out on a balcony, positioned myself on the ledge with my feet dangling over the edge and I began to sing the only worship song in Spanish that I know, “Gracias” by Maverick City Music. While I was singing, people began to gather below me and were watching and listening from the store across the street. The fact that I was only available for a few minutes not only disappointed me, but the people that had stopped by. My prayer in this is that their hearts were opened by the words of my mouth to create space for the Holy Spirit to work in their lives. 

At the church service, we got to hang with a guy that my teammates met on the street the night before. He literally had plans to make a deal with the devil before they met him and he not only came to our Good Friday celebration, but to our Easter service on Sunday. How COOL!? Check out Lindsey’s blog about “The Night We Canceled the Devil’s Meeting!!!!“

After church, I stood below the building with Jenna and we alternated singing in Spanish and in english and it was cool to chat with some people who’d been sitting in their car directly in front of us. Jenna and I later split up and I went out with Jenn and Lindsey to close out our time in street ministry. We walked and we sang until we came across a sweet man that we’ve seen around town and had a conversation with him for a while. That was all. We made our way home, prayed with the squad and we laid our week to rest. 

Our God powerfully showed up and lives were changed on night three.

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While this week was heavy and very spiritually active, I am honored that Jesus counts me worthy to serve Him. What an honor to be His child and His servant. Something is about to break in this beach town and you can’t convince me otherwise. 

Stay wild, my friends. 

Pura Vida, 

AWM