reminders.

Once again, I found myself surrounded by Latinos, all speaking rapid Spanish, with only two other gringas (North Americans) in sight. Luckily, they were easy to spot with their red, curly locks.

Once again, I found myself fumbling through my broken spanish and searching for the correct verb, conjugation, sentence structure, and adjective all while trying to decipher at least the main idea of the question being asked to me or the job being asked of me or the Bible verse being read to me.

Once again, I found myself out of comfort zone, knowing very few people (and even less Spanish, it seemed!) as I headed out to serve on the work crew for Costa Rica's Vida Joven Growth Camp.

Once again, I found myself lost in translation over and over and over again and nodding and smiling even when I had no idea what was being said.

Because sometimes, that's all you can do. There is only so many times you can ask someone to repeat the same sentence before you want to crawl under a table and never show your face again.

And then you get those few kind souls who take pity on you and attempt to hold conversations and tell you how sufficient your Spanish is and pretend to understand what the heck you are saying.

But these are the moments. These are the trips. These are the people.

These are the moments where God so tenderly whispers to me: "I will be with you" (Exodus 3:12a).
These are trips that fill my heart and humble me and draw me closer to dependence on Him.
These are the beautiful, loving people that remind me why I moved to Latin America.

Reminders. I need them all the time. How easily I forget.
His grace. My sin.
His love. My unfaithfulness.
His holiness. My wretchedness.
His sovereignty. My attempt to control.
His strength. My weakness.

Forgetfulness has the capability to be our biggest downfall. I think it is my biggest downfall. Well, one of them.

When we forget, we stop trusting. When we stop trusting, we stop depending. When we stop depending, we end up bitter and sad and angry and crying and unsure and messed up.

And so I plead with Jesus: never let me forget. I beg that He would keep sending His grace gifts, the little details of mundane life that make this side of heaven more bearable. Reminder gifts of grace.

And this weekend was one of those gifts. I got the chance to serve around 120 youth of Vida Joven, along side 10 other latino high school students. I got to practice my Spanish every second of every day. I got to wake up at 4 o'clock every morning to get in line for showers with hot water. I got to look out of the dining hall windows, over the mountains and down into the central valley of San Jose. I got to watch the sunrise over the mountains.

What a beautiful mess I'm in. And hoping it never ends!

First night: "Cowboy" themed...and hair nets.

With all the amazing cooks from the weekend!

All of the work crew at the special dinner on the last night.

Four person thumb war...why not?

World Cup Night.

And per the usual, coffee was a must for the weekend.

International Schools Team that was serving at camp.

And, of course, had to celebrate the Forth of July! With watermelon lollipops.