Day 5: 2025 Dominican Republic
United Through Psalm 27
As we wrapped up our last day at Mission Emanuel, we saw God move in miraculous ways! He united Americans and Dominicans through Psalm 27 and by prayer. We visited Mission Emanuel’s second school and played outside with the kids after we visited their classrooms. They were able to help them practice their English, they asked us questions, and they told us their favorite color, food, fruit, and more! We went back to Mission Emanuel and finished the home builds we were working on this week and had a time of prayer, praying over the homes and the families that would live there.
We had our last VBS with the kids of Mission Emanuel’s on-site school. Our sponsor families got to meet and visit with their sponsor child. Here we learned that although the language barrier made it hard to communicate, there is power in being there and wanting to build relationships. At the end of the day, we had a field day with the kids of Cielo and played all the sports with them: baseball, soccer, volleyball, frisbee, football, etc.
As we debriefed our trip, we thought about the immense change that has happened in us in just 5 days. We have slowed down and have become more patient living in the go-with-the-flow time here. We have seen God soften our hearts and fill them with gratitude and generosity. We have seen God show us ways that He wants to shift our lives in Nashville. We learned that although we have jobs like lawyers, doctors, accountants, etc., those titles don’t really matter unless we’re using them for God’s Kingdom and glory.
Paige gave us the incredible quote by William Law that states, “If you have not chosen the Kingdom of God first, it will in the end make no difference what you have chosen instead.”
We did a follow up home visit and saw God provide a true miracle. Here we visited Giselle again, who is a single mom of 3 kids in a home with very little. When asked for prayer the other day, she only asked for the Lord to draw near to her in her spiritual life and for closeness in her walk with Him. Nothing else. The Mission Emanuel team told us that she would be blessed with receiving all new furniture and appliances today. Earlier that morning one of our team members woke up an hour early to spend time in The Word. She didn’t know what to read so she asked God to lead her to what He wants her to read, and the Lord put on her heart Psalm 27.
She was quickly reminded of Giselle while reading Psalm 27:4 and she knew this Psalm was for her. Psalm 27:4 says, “One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple.” She prayed for a long time only for Giselle and that the Lord would draw near and bless this woman who she never thought she would see again. After arriving at Mission Emanuel, she was shocked to hear that Mission Emanuel would be going back to Giselle’s home to bless her and give her brand new furniture and appliances.
After lunch, a group went back to Giselle’s house to pray over her and help move all her new appliances in. In tears, we prayed Psalm 27 over her, and in tears, she received our prayers. She told us afterwards that God had given Psalm 27 to her many years ago as “her Psalm.” He spoke to her after having her first child, Psalm 27:10 “Though my father and mother forsake me, the Lord will receive me.” Her parents had passed quickly before the birth of her child as a single mom. This was the Psalm the Lord had given her in the past and the Psalm He wanted to remind her of in the present.
After taking all the old furniture out and replacing it with the new, a pile of trash started forming on the street. We were worried about what we were going to do with it when suddenly, a huge yellow garbage truck came out of nowhere and stopped directly in front of us and picked up the trash.
To wrap the night up, we sang Psalm 27 that Brett Taylor and Michelle Raybourn wrote this past summer.
what we observed:
It truly is more blessed to give than to receive
We are all different parts of one body
God is so much bigger than we could ever imagine, and we are so small
HOw we saw god at work today:
God uses our gifts where He places us
God shapes us is by stripping us down
Prayer is real and God is still providing miracles TODAY
prayer requests:
Please pray for 11-year-old Samantha, a Dominican girl in need of miraculous healing for her complex medical complications
For our safety as we travel back home
That God will continue to provide miracles at Mission Emanuel and that we have hearts to know additional needs still exist today
For Mission Emanuel and their ministry and work in Cielo