Random Nicaragua Pics

Here are some random shots from our week. http://picasaweb.google.com/chris.kear/RandomNicaraguaJulyAugust07

Bible Institute Pics

Here is a look at our week at the Bible Institute. http://picasaweb.google.com/chris.kear/RivasBibleInstituteJulyAugust07

San Juan del Sur Photos

We had a great time in San Juan del Sur. The way that the sun sets over the boats anchored in the cove. The waves were great for boogie boarding and we definitely got our share of it in before heading north. Here are some more shots from our side trip to the beach: http://picasaweb.google.com/chris.kear/SanJuanDelSurAugust07

Some Groups shots

We are home!

Well we made it back home this afternoon. I'll post some more pics and stuff ASAP. Thanks for everything.

Practically home...well in Managua at least

We made it safe and sound to Managua about an hour ago. The electricity just came back on so I am just now making this post. I'll post some pics and more info later.

We had a great day in San Juan del Sur and are heading north again

We had a great day at San Juan del Sur. We just finished off a Subway sandwhich and are about to get on the road back to managua. Thanks for all the prayers. Please pray for this last road trip on the Nicca highways...always exciting.

we are in san juan del sur

The last day of the bible institute went well. everyone is feeling better. thanks for your prayers. we got to san juan del sur this afternoon played and explored a little then watch the sunset over the pacific ocean while we ate dinner. we are going to enjoy the beach in the morning and then head back to managua after lunch.

Wednesday report...

Well we just wrapped up our 3rd day of the institute and it went well. Jeff, Tara, and myself are feeling a little better than we did last night. This afternoon Sickler is feeling "less bad" as only he could put it. Please pray for our health as the enemy attacks us.

Duvall was a champ and taught all morning at the Institute and Becca joined the "teaching team" this afternoon. She did great. We are meeting with the new leaders of the pastor's council this afternoon. It will be a good opportunity to forge new relationships and partners in this mission. From my brief conversations with them I think it is going to be a good change.

Thanks for your support! We love yall.

Tuesday

Tuesday was pretty good. We had 8-10 more people at the institute. The teaching went well. Some of the students have been traveling 2 hours each way to come to the institute each day. Thanks for your prayers. Please pray that we would be able to have a good meeting with the other pastor's council. It seems that for whatever reason they have not been very involved this trip, so we would like to reconnect with them. Also please pray for health of the team as some of us are having "stomach issues". Thanks.

Monday Bible Institute pics

Pics from Sunday and Monday

These first 2 pics are from the hotel lobby in Managua. The next one is Becca at the nursing home when she and Tara took the food leftover from the bible institute lunches to them. The 4th shot is most of the team on the veranda of the Rivas hotel.

A good first day

Our first day at the Bible Institute went well. The rain this morning made prevented some of the pastors that come from another town to attend today. Our numbers were smaller, but those that were there were faithful and diligent. It isn't about numbers. Christ had 12 disciples and look what happened, so if we don't hit 100 this trip it will be OK. I saw lots of familiar faces at the institute and it was good. All the guys did an excellent job teaching. Since we didn't have as many attending today as we thought we would we had food left over at lunch. So Becca, Tara, and Cairo took it to a nursing home here in town. It was a good alternative to it going to waste. The entire team is doing well and seems to be enjoying the trip. We are enjoying the fellowship with our Nicca translators.

Please pray for those traveling to the institute...especially those that had difficulty today. Also for the teaching tomorrow. Thank you for all of your support!

More pictures from Sunday

Here are some more pics from Sunday. The power (and hence the internet) went out during my last post so I didn't get to load all the pics I wanted to this morning. Here are the rest from yesterday.

Pics from Sunday

As you can see in the pictures below we stopped at a volcano on our way to Rivas. It was pretty cool. We met briefly with Pastor Josua last night just to touch base before we bgin the institute today. It was good to see him and his wife again. It sounds like the people are ready and everything is good to go. We are about to have some breakfast in our hotel and then head over to the church. We had our first taste of Nicaraguan winter as we were waking up the morning. Winter in Nicaragua means the rainy season and it cools down to 87 degrees from 90 something. Sickler loves that concept of winter. There was a quick summer shower as we were waking up and now it is gone, but left behind a little cool air. Please be in prayer for the first day of the bible institute as it is always a little interesting. Thanks!

we are in rivas

We just made it to rivas. I am typing as we are waiting to get into our rooms. We stopped by the volcano and the market on the way here. I´ll post more later and hopefully gets some pics from today up.- I just wanted yall to know that we made it here safely.

About to head south from Managua

We had a good night's sleep and obtained our rental vehicles. Now we are about to head south to Rivas. I think that we will stop at the volcano on the way down there. Cairo's wife Jessica and his son Adam Joshua joined us for breakfast this morning. It was a treat to get to see them.

Everyone seems to be doing well and looking forward to seeing more of Nicaragua than the airport and the hotel across the street from it. Thanks for your prayers.

We are in Managua

Our flight got in here about 20 minutes after 8pm Nicca time. (We are an hour earlier than Arkansas). Cairo and Arlen were waiting for us at the airport and now we are about to crash for the night at our hotel. It was a smooth day of travel. We met up with Jeff at the Houston airport just fine. So we are going to get some rest and then head south tomorrow.

Hanging out at the LR Airport

We are sitting here at gate in Little Rock waiting to board. I think the flight is a little late, but not a problem since we have about a 4 hour layover in Houston. I have to give props to the LR Airport for free WiFi. As I type the plane is pulling up the gate, so I'll shut this machine down. Thanks for the prayers. Please keep them coming.

Pastors Sponsored

Thanks to everyone that joined in and helped make this Bible Institute possible by supporting a pastor for a week. We have all of the pastors sponsored. Thanks for partnering with us in Nicaragua.

July/August Trip Itinerary

Here is our itinerary for the July/August Trip:

Saturday (28th)

• 10:00 am- Arrive LR airport (not Jeff)
• 11:55am- Fly LR to Houston (CO# 2447)
• 1:24pm- Arrive in Houston from LR
• 1:30pm- Jeff Depart LUV to Houston (CO#2374)
• 2:35pm- Jeff arrives in Houston meets up with “the team”
• 5:45pm- Depart Houston for Managua, Nicaragua (CO#1774)
• 8:10pm- Arrive Managua, Nicaragua- greeted by Cairo (head interpreter)
• Spend night at Las Mercerdes Best Western Hotel in Managua (http://bestwestern.worldexecutive.com/directory/nicaragua/managua/hotels/70901.html)

Sunday (29th)

• All 3 interpreters meet us at the hotel
• Get rental cars
• Drive South (2.5 hours to Rivas)
• Stop at volcano national park (tentative)
• Masaya market the best place to get anything “Nicaraguan”
• Sunday late afternoon- Arrive Rivas
• Check into Rivas hotel
• Touch base with leaders of the Rivas Pastors Council

*Note the fact that we are now on “Nicaragua Time”…there are not exact hours listed

Monday (30th)

• Rivas Bible Institute ~8:00am-3:30pm

Tuesday (31st)

• Rivas Bible Institute ~8:00am-3:30pm

Wednesday (1st)

• Rivas Bible Institute ~8:00am-3:30pm

Thursday (2nd)

• Rivas Bible Institute ~8:00am-2:30pm
• Head to San Juan del Sur (before sunset)
• Spend night in hotel in San Juan del Sur
  

Friday (3rd)

• San Juan del Sur beach
• Whatever you want to do in a lazy beach town
• Leave for Managua sometime after lunch
• Spend night at Las Mercedes
  

Saturday (4th)

• 6:50am-Depart Managua for Houston (CO# 1775)
• 11:02am- Arrive in Houston
• Noon- Jeff departs for LUV (CO#2407)
• 1:05pm- Jeff arrives at LUV
• 1:35pm- Depart Houston for LR (CO# 2841)
• 3:04pm- Arrive LR

14.5 pastors sponsored so far

So far we have support for 14.5 pastors. That is a great start but we still need some more help. We are shooting for 100. Just contact myself (chris.kear@gmail.com) or anyone on the team to get involved.

July/August Trip

We are preparing to head back to Rivas July28-August 4th. The team this trip is Dr. Scott Duvall, Dr. Brad Sickler, Jeff Ellsion, Becca Woodall, Chris and Tara Kear. If you would like to sponsor a Nicaraguan pastor for the week of the bible institute for only $20 please let myself or any other the team members know ASAP.

Ways to Pray for the trip:

• Preparation of the lessons
• Safety and smooth travel
• Opening doors for the Nicca pastors to come and absorption of the material
  
• Financial provision for the pastors
• Financial provision for the gringo team
  

Some Photos from the last few days of the trip...

From Nicaragua Randoms Pics 3

Here is the rest of the album: http://picasaweb.google.com/chris.kear/NicaraguaRandom3

Home in Arkansas- Safe and Sound

We flew into Little Rock this afternoon safe and sound. The trip went really smoothly. Our flights back from Managua today were good. We had a great trip, the bible institute went wonderfully, the guys did a phenomenal job. God knew what he was doing when he put our team together... I was extremely impressed Seth, Todd, and Josh this week. Thanks for all of your prayers, you are a vital part of this ministry. Thanks again and God bless. I'll try to get some more pictures loaded soon.

We are back in Managua!

We had a great morning in San Juan del Sur and just arrived back in Managua safe and sound.

The Bible Institute has come to conclusion

Well, this week has flown by and we wrapped up the insititute today. As Josh was going through the summary of the story of Israel he was asking the Niccas to fill in the story. They were doing really well. I don´t know about all of the details, but it seemed like that they grasped the overall story. That is great! We had a wonderful time with our brothers and sisters here in Nicaragua. Our fellowship together has been sweet. After we wrapped up this afternoon, Cairo suggested that we go see a beautiful spot on the river near Costa Rica that the local pastors had told him about...so we headed off down the road. the short of it is that we spent and hour each way on some roads could really use improving (!!!) only to come to semi nice river crossing the road. It was nice...but not an hour into the boonies nice, but oh well. You live and learn. We got to see some more of the country. We rolled into San Juan del Sur just as the sun was setting over the cove on the pacific. It was beautiful. We have already noticed something about San Juan del Sur...the gringos- they are all over the place. We have named this place gringo land. I think that Todd was genuinely upset to see other gringos. It was pretty funny to see him getting angry about there being other north americans. We will spend the morning here in this beach town and head to Managua shortly after lunch. Please pray for safe travel. Thank you for your prayers this week! They mean everything to this ministry.

Forth day of teaching complete

We just wrapped up our forth day of teaching in the bible institute. We learned that hot weather is simply the absense of the wind here. One of the young ladies that has been attending came up to us and thanked us for our teaching and told us that it is helping her to understand the bible better. It has helped her to see that the God of the Old Testament is not a mean and cruel god, but instead he offers Israel repeated forgiveness and redemption. That was pretty cool to hear. That is exactly the kind of truth that we are trying to communicate. The students (pastors and laymen) have been contributring good questions to the discussion and seem to be eager to learn. We are looking forward to our last day with them tomorrow. Please continue to lift up the teaching, the pastors, and the relationships being formed. Thanks.
p.s. Bendiciones y dios te bendiga.

Hump day

Wednesday was good. We have good attendance again...we haven't scared them all off yet. Josh came strong with some great illustrations today. I think that they are grasping most of the material. The translators are wonderful (as they have been on my previous trips as well). We truly could not do this without them. They are a vital part of the team and true blessing. Not only do we appreciate their hard work we appreciate their friendship and fellowship. We are having a good time together. I have not laughed this much in a while. After the bible institute we went to a town about 5 miles away on the coast of Lake Nicaragua. They had a nice beach. Seth joined some local boys in a game of soccer in the sand while I took lots of pictures. Todd made a comment the other day about wanting to drive a motorcycle (a popular local form of transportation) to Cairo...well Pastor Philemon got word of this and brought his motorcycle out to the beach and let Todd drive in up and down the sand. It was great. I kept thinking of the movie "The World's Fastest Indian". We found some monkeys in a tree and feed them mangoes. They came and took them right out of our hands. Check out the pics that I posted on my last entry...

Random Rivas photo album 2

Here are some more random photos from the day. http://picasaweb.google.com/chris.kear/Rivas2

Thanks for your prayers

I just wanted to thank you for your continued prayers. We praise God for blessing our trip this far. Please continue to pray for our teaching, the translation, the pastors traveling here each day, the relationships that we are building with the pastors, and that they would grasp the story of Israel and it would enhance their reading and teaching of God's word.

Second day down...

Our second day at the bible institute went well. We have approximately 98 people. All of the teaching went well. Todd taught the Niccas how to play Simon Says in an illustration of obedience. The Rivas Bible Insitute is off to a good start, we are learning taking note of ways that we can improve it further in future trips. The weather has been hot, but tolerable when the wind is blowing. It is supposed to get hotter tomorrow...we'll see how much hotter. The wind is a gift from the Lord though. The team (both gringos and translators) are enjoying each other and having a good time together. We are laughing a lot. Thanks for your prayers.

Random Rivas photo album 1

Here is an album of some random pictures from the last couple of days. http://picasaweb.google.com/chris.kear/Rivas1

The first day of the bible insitute was great

Our first day went great. We had 95 people show up, which is a wonderful turn out for the first day. We began the story of Israel today. Josh, Seth and Todd did an amazing job teaching today. It was a lot of fun to watch them. The people are being responsive and are a pleasure to teach. After we wrapped up the institute for the day we headed out to the shore of Lake Nicaragua which was on 7 kilometers from Costa Rica. It was beautiful. We went to a Chinese restaurant for dinner...it was a cultural overload to try to order Chinese food in spanish.

Please continue to pray as we build relationships with the pastors and for the teaching in the institute.

Pics from Bible Institute day 1

Volcano pics

Our "pre-institute" meeting went great!

We just got back from meeting with the head of the pastors' council, Pastor Joshua. It went great. He said that they are expecting a very good turn out of pastors, so we'll see tomorrow. He also told us that just in the preparation for the institute that it has brought unity amongst the churches of Rivas. That is very cool. We thought that we were coming to teach the OT Story...and God is already using this with unity in the body. Thanks for all of your support.

Please pray for our first day teaching tomorrow. I will be doing an opening explanation of the institute then Josh will kick of the real teaching with an introduction to the Old Testament Story. Then follows me, Seth, and Todd.

Estamos en Rivas (We are in Rivas)

We made it down to Rivas safe and sound. We stopped at an active volcano on the way down. It was smoking up a storm...pretty cool (from the proper distance). We are settling in at the hotel and will be meeting with the head of the pastors' council tonight to take care of any details before we start the institute tomorrow.Thea weather is warm and humid, but the breeze is heavenly. Rivas is a good size town of approximately 60,000. Our hotel is very comfortable, we are blessed.

Please pray for our continued preparation of the lessons we will be teaching as well as communicating effectively across cultural and linguistic barriers. Please pray for the pastors that will be traveling here tomorrow and the rest of the week.

We are in Managua

We made it Nicaragua just fine. Our layover in Houston was a nice chance to get focused on our teaching material and we had some time to read and discuss our lessons together. The flights here were pretty non eventful. We met up with Cairo at the Airport and got across the street to the best western and are settling in for the night. Tomorrow we head south to Rivas. We will stop and the Market and possibly a Volcano that are on our way to Rivas. We will meet up with the head of the Rivas Pastor's Council tomorrow night at 6pm to go over plans for the Institute. Thanks for you prayers and please keep them coming.

Less than 24 hours...

Our flight leaves Little Rock at noon tomorrow. Less than 24 hours and everything is coming together.

4 days until Niacaragua

Thanks for all of the support both through sponsoring a pastor and through your prayers. The material is completed and translated so that is a very big burden lifted and an answer to prayer.

Seth, Todd, Josh, and myself met up in Benton for dinner last night and I think that we are all excited about the trip. My prayer request for today is that you would lift up the teaching and the preparation as we are getting our lessons ready for the Bible Institute.

Prayer Request

Right now if you please pray for the finalizing and translation of the institute material it would be greatly appreciated. Time is growing short...we have faith though.

Support A Pastor Update

As of right now we have 36 pastors sponsored...we are planning on 100 pastors at the Institute. So thanks to everyone that has partnered with us so far and if you haven't yet then please consider doing so...we still need to support 63 more pastors. For more info check out my support a pastor post.

Why this bible institute is different from other short-term mission trips.

As someone that has been on a fair amount of short term mission trips let me tell you how the Nicaragua Bible Institute is different from other short term mission trips. (I am not knocking other short term mission trips...just pointing out something that makes this one different)

Even though we are only in Nicaragua for one week, we are going to be able to build some long term relationships because we have committed to come back twice a year for the next five years. We are really earning the trust of the locals by continually investing in the same place. Just last week I got an email from the pastors in Rivas saying that they were very excited that we were keeping our word (from my scouting trip in October) by coming this March.

Another difference is that we are not coming in as the "missionaries", but as brothers and sisters in Christ to serve the Nicaraguan church. We are not there to evangelize the country... not that we are going to shy from the gospel, but the Nicaraguan believers are more than capable of sharing Christ in their country. It is our desire to equip them to minister to their own countrymen. We happen to have been blessed with an above average amount of Biblical training and want to share our blessings with them. How cool would it be if one of these pastors caught a vision for taking the gospel to the rest of the world and ended up as missionary to some country that as a white American I can't get to like the Arab world?

Prayer Requests

• The Nicaraguan pastors


• The preparation of the course material


• Safe travel


• Financial provision


• Nicaraguan Translators


• Our Team (and our spouses)


• Building a solid foundation for future ministry


• That our teaching would impact the ministry in Nicaragua

Our team is finalized!

We got the word this weekend that Todd Lovell was definitely in on board for the March trip, which completes our four man team (Seth Richardson, Josh Robles, Todd Lovell, and Chris Kear). Praise the Lord for this answer to out prayers.

Fellowship Nicaragua's RSS Feed

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Prayer Requests

We will do our best to post various prayer needs for this ministry as often as possible. Prayer is a powerful thing and we welcome any and all our brothers and sisters in Christ to partner with us in prayer. As of today here are some of the most prominent areas that you can pray for:

• The 4th member of the team, this is still up in the air
• The March bible institute curriculum as we are writing, compiling, and translating the material
• Financial provision both for individual team members and the sponsoring of the pastors
• God preparations in Nicaragua and opening doors for the pastors to come

Thanks for your prayers.

Sponsor a Pastor

The Nicaraguan pastors are usually supported by their congregations and usually live in a "parsonage" attached to the back of their church. In order for them to be able to attend the bible institute for the week we need the help of our brothers and sisters in the United States. For just $20 you can make it possible for a pastor to attend the bible institute. Your $20 provides lunch during the institute and money for transportation to and from the institute.

It is that simple... $20 gets a pastor or church leader a week of biblical training.

Contact me (Chris.kear@gmail.com) if you want to sponsor a pastor. You can send checks payable to Fellowship Church Arkadelphia to 990 Carter Rd. Arkadelphia, AR 71923.

Map of Nicaragua

Financial Support

It actually doesn't cost a whole lot to put on the bible institute (I guess that is kind of a relative statement though). We have done our best to keep the cost as low as possible. Each member of the team is responsible for raising $1,000. The financial support for the Rivas Bible Institute can be sent to Fellowship Church Arkadelpia by mail (Fellowship Church, P.O. Box 1332, Arkadelphia, AR 71923) with Nicaragua in the Memo line or you send a donation via one of the Team Members (Seth Richardson, Josh Robles, or Chris Kear). We make a point to not ask the Nicaraguan pastors to pay anything to attend through the support of the believers in the states. I'll be posting more info soon about how you can sponsor a pastor to attend the bible institute for the week.

Rivas Pastors' Council Leadership

These are the leaders of the pastors' council in Rivas that are partnering with us in the Rivas Bible Institute.

From Nicaragua Oct 06

Nicaragua Bible Institute Vision

The Bible Institute based out of Arkadelphia takes upper classmen Christian Studies students from OBU and to mature believers in the church to Rivas, Nicaragua teach at a Bible Institute twice a year for the next 5 years. The bible institute aims to educate and equip local pastors and church leaders. Over the course of the 5 years the institute will teach through a basic bible college curriculum. This educational opportunity is not officially operating through or as part of the OBU or in any way count towards a degree, but the leaders will learn the very practical and theological truths to better equip them to carry out their ministries. The Curriculum begins with the biblical story of which we will cover the OT story in March and the NT story in August.

Having a commitment no less than 5 years actually increases the effectiveness of the ministry because the locals will see our dedication to them and the area, and therefore trust us much more. So many short term mission trips work with people for a week and never return again. This continued effort of the Bible Institute over 5 years would allow for short term mission trips to have prolonged impact in the lives of the people.

The primary goal is to bring a theological education to those leaders that do not otherwise have the means to acquire one. Another goal of this ministry is to give the students the opportunity to gain experience teaching the same principles that they are spending their time studying in Christian Studies. Students will derive the benefit of fortifying the education they have received by instructing others in their very course of study. They have been afforded a great privilege to study God’s Word at a wonderful institution and this ministry would provide them a means of sharing some of their blessings with those that have not been so fortunate. The Bible Institute will also provide the students a great opportunity to get a taste for both cross cultural ministry and theological education.

We are not attempting to “fund” other ministries in the area, as it would not be possible to support every ministry and/or church that we would come across and would not want to cause division amongst the local believers. Our purpose is not to bring funding, but instead to teach.