Adventures of #COLO14

We are actually known as #teamOBA

[colo14]

Missing Team Oba Today. The time when we took 26 of the same Polaroid pictures and my thighs were burning. 

-HJ

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[colo14]

Returning Back Home

I thought the reunification of SK and NK happened because all the members of the COLO14 were hugging Monica, Daeun, and Haeun like we haven’t seen them since 1950s.

We returned safely back to Cartagena from Arjona. It was a rough car ride but phew, we were glad to be home. We looked rough.

Anyways, after returning we got a bit of rest until we went out to do College Evangelism. After being in the no shower zone for 5 days, I almost feel like we forgot how to dress nice. And I mean, its not like we had nice clothes to begin with. By the 2nd week all of our clothes were smelling like… Idontevenknowhowtodescribe…

We did college ministry Monday and Tuesday. We went to … let me remember and I’ll get back to you. In the meantime, stay tune for pictures.

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"WE ARE COLO14 !!!!!!!!!!"

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This place has so much memories. I miss you Colombia!

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Snipbits from Arjona...

I really miss this place.

[colo14]

Oh Arjona, Arjona, Arjona

This is Jin again. Attempting to update this backdated blog so when our team look back at our adventures we know what went down and how God was so good to us :)

——— From Wednesday to Friday, COLO14 dealt with the intense battle with Palenque. Friday morning, we woke up and with a few hours of sleep we barely got - we cramped into the smallest van ever and went on to Arjona. We were at Arjona, Colombia for 3 days…it was a life changing 3 days for our team.

We first arrived at a church with... AIR CONDITIONING!!! This is so important that I thought I mention it :)

The things we did in Arjona

- House to House evangelism

- Block Party (Spontaneous Worship, Skits, Testimony, and Loving on Colombians)

- Las Magaritas Worship + Service (this hut in this area 0 - which means it's really dangerous!) 

There were healings, manifestation in the spirit, saw the evil spirits leaving the bodies, and more. Let me tell you a quick story - 

Our team heard many horror rumors about Arjona being just this terrible place to be. Well, I guess not terrible but you get my point. It is going to be hard and... just so hard! 

Well, that actually prepared our team for the worst and I am glad it did, actually. Our team went to Las Magaritas located in the zone 1 part of Arjona. I mean, what are roads? The roads are made up of a combination of dirt + rocks + dust? Anyways, if you walk down down the road - you come to a stop with this big 'hut' looking place. Apparently this woman's house and she lives with her daughters and her anorexic dog (even the dogs in Colombia are malnutrition). We did house to house evangelism on Saturday and went back on Sunday for Sunday service/worship.

Well, sorry to bore you with the background story but... this is when the actual thing starts. Our dear Miquel gave his testimony about healing and Dlee gave a message to the people of Arjona. It was really encouraging for me to watch those two men of our group share so openly and vulnerability about how God has changed their lives thru DTS. (And of course, we did our Why skit and did crazy worship... the "get down" only the colo14 team will understand this but my back was about to break from my dance...)

Anyways, afterwards we broke out into 2 groups the "VBS" group and the adults group. The VBS group, did the heart activity - I remember Linda and Juan Carlos carried the cross on that one. Of course, with the support of Julie and Minah.

I was helping out with VBS until I got this massive headache and they advised me to drink some water and sit down... Well, so I did. And... so did the owner (women) of the house. She sat right next to me and honestly, I was so dizzy with the massive headache but something compelled me to talk to her and pray for her... Long story short, all the translators were with the colo14 team and... this woman obviously only spoke Spanish. So with my limited Spanish speaking skills, I asked her prayer request and... I got what she needed but I couldn't actually pray in Spanish so I just simply asked for the Holy Spirit to fall down. And, little did I know that was the wrong prayer to pray... heh heh 

The woman began to manifest in the spiritual realm and begin to get slay by the Holy Spirit. As soon as she got hit by the HS. The guy in the middle of the room that Jen, Jess, and Subie were praying for fell and then afterwards the woman Miguel and Glenisis were praying for fell. And the last woman, I have never seen anyone manifest in the spirit in that way. It took me a couple second to realize it was the evil spirit that was roaming inside of her. She starts vomiting blood and as soon as that happened Dlee and Becca rush to start praying for the lady as well. Everyone began to intercede for that woman and declaring boldly and asking in Jesus Name that all evil be removed from the woman and.. literally after praying for what it feels like 20-30 minutes - she finally began to find peace and the Joy of the Lord just swept her up as she began to declare 'Hallelujah, Hallelujah!' How awesome, huh?

There are so many stories that lie within Arjona. If you really want to know, ask one of us and we can refer back to our journal :)

In the meantime, please stay tuned for pictures.

[colo14]

We are back! More reflection posts to come.

[colo14]

Palenque + Arjona… !?!?!?! Peace.

Hola Amigos

Jin reporting news from the past 5 days

Let me first start off with Palenque…

Founded by escaped slaves as a refuge in the seventeenth century - Palenque is a small village of 3.5k Afro-Colombians. Because no one actually looked Colombian, I felt like I was back in Africa.

Side note - The Colombia government doesnt want to do anything with these people. No Colombians comes to visit so imagine how they felt when they saw bunch of Asians rolling in…✌

The house we stayed in greeted us with bats, lizards, spiders, and other friendly bugs.

Palenque was ridiculously hot. The team suffered from heat rash, interesting tan lines, and some got burnt.

What are roads. Roads are basically mud/dirt covered in pig, dog, cat, horse, donkey, cow, chicken poop with a hint of a very sour-y and curd-y smell.

Water is very, very scarce. Water got cut off as soon as we arrived. After two days of buckets of sweat, we had a bucket of water each to complete our 3 minute shower. Again, water is scarce!

… lol we struggled a bit when we first arrived to Planque haha. The spiritual atmosphere is very dark and heavy there. Only 1% are Christians and witchcrafts/Voodoos are performed. BUT…One of our team members, Jess, shared a word from Mister Dahari… “Voodoo is doodoo!” I took alot of comfort from that… haha it just made me laugh and made casting out demons…fun.

In Palenque, we did house to house evangelism, VBS, and prayer walks! I want to write everything that happened but… I promise you just grab one of us when we get back and we will spoil you with awesome stories. But for the meantime…

Praise Alert - we ran into into a boy name Rafael out in the “Plaza” area. He had a really bad cut with sitches and really, really bad swelling. And being led by the Holy Spirit, our team members prayed for the boy and… the SWELLING WENT DOWN. I dont think I am doing a good job of explaining how BAD the damage was on the boy’s feet. IT WAS BAD. And our medics (Miguel, Linda, and Subie) really did an amazing job patching it back up and treating it afterwards. (Oh and Miguel is Michael Choi. He is beginning to look more and more like Miguel here… with the tan and the no shaving… and the worn out clothes)

next, ….VBS was amazing. The body worship, games, and teachings… all so good. Jessica and Julie did an amazing job leading everyone in body worship and Minah shared her testimony. The children, Palenque team, and our #COLO14 team … all of us were really blessed. We danced so much with the kids - dlee is really skinny now. really skinny.

And side note… Jenn, Jess, and Becca are AMAZING with kids. Subie, Linda, Julie attracts all the little cute babies and Minah talks up a conversation with ALL the children. Dlee is known as Señor Fuerte (Mr.Strong) here - super popular… I feel like next future generation men in Colombia are going to be muscular because after seeing Dlee, all the kids started doing pull-ups and push-ups. Miguel attracts all the kids with his guitar skills! And for me, you know, me being me. 

*** And shout out to the previous Daniel DTS Colombia Team, thanks to those guys. The Colombian Team leader, Monica was VERY firm on the NO SOPAS rule (soup)… aka we didnt get sick! hehe thank you ***

And also, I just got out of our team debrief and… man, I can’t begin to explain how thankful I am for an AMAZING team. I am learning so much from each and every one of them. I am extremely humbled. I love my team members. ABBA, I cannot thank you enough for this awesome team. I could have not asked for a better team. Okay, my confession time is over.

Alright, I will have to do another blog entry about Arjona because our team loved, loved, loved, loved, LOVED Arjona. We were so blessed and… I mean I have so many stories to share but internet gets cut off here like…now. Sorry, if my writing is all over the place. TIME CRUNCH. I’ll be uploading pictures from Palenque and Arjona tomorrow. 

We miss you all and thank you for your prayers for the team. We feel it!

Adios amigos!

[colo14]

Going back to school

Buenos all, this is Jess giving you the latest update on team #colo14!

It’s been an amazing time here so far - we’ve been so blessed with good (in the words of DLee, hot hot HOT) weather, amazing food, and opportunities to experience life here in Cartegena.

Today we visited the Universidad de Cartegena through the YWAM student ministry team to meet the students there and share a little bit about ourselves. After an expertly negotiated cab ride to old city Cartegena, we arrived at the Universidad de Cartegena which is housed in an original building from the 1800s. The school is three floors that looks down on a beautiful courtyard where students meet and mingle while waiting for class. Rebecca and Jin shared their moving testimonies that started a dialogue of sharing and prayer that helped us realize that whether you are in the US or Colombia, the struggles and the grace of God remains the same.

We learned beforehand that students are very open to foreigners because they love to practice their English with native speakers and are generally very curious but wow, we were SO blown away by the openness of the students there. Our very own kpop star, Jin, helped us break the ice by performing a riveting solo of amazing grace and I will always love you (move over, Whitney!) in the courtyard. Some of us got to meet a number amazing young people who aspired to be lawyers, journalists etc while others did a prayer walk through the school. We even got to pray for a group of young women and in turn, they asked to pray for us. How amazing is our Father that even in times when we least expect it, he blesses us.

This will be our last blog until next Monday as we will be traveling to Palenque and Arjona for the remainder of this week. Please pray for safe traveling, no rain, and God’s spiritual and physical protection for the team, and for the people of Palenque and Arjona that they will be open to us while we are there.

Thanks for walking with us and we’ll talk to you guys next week!

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Jess, Jin and Rebecca with our new friend Kate, an aspiring journalist with a heart of sharing God’s glory and through media.

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Rebecca the Maknae here and its such a great pleasure that you are reading our Journey in Colombia. Literally these first days we felt your prayers. Just coming here the team received so much affirmation. Everyday we’re learning more and more that God is so Good!

To be honest personally i feels like I’m on vacation. I’m eating so well, I’ve been sleeping so well, I’ve been loving children, I’ve been worshiping Our Father with the team everyday. As a team we’ve been getting to enjoy each other and are funny antics. Everyday we have things to be so joyful about. Who wouldn’t want this vacation? lol

We interceded and planned as a team today. We prayed for palenque and arjona, please pray for us intercede us, there is heavy spiritual warfare in these areas of Colombia.

We encountered children in the slums, and man did it break my heart. The roads were broken and dangerous and on an incline. They wore tattered clothing. To see them in this condition its weird because they are so joyful or they seem fine, and yet I live in Nova and complain about trivial things like my room is so small. Here in Colombia my room is big as the Colombians houses. In then end the joy that we shared with them as we worshiped an played is just deeply implanted in my heart.

Man us ladies, we feel so protected, us ladies we’re so open saying Hola to anyone is sight, and approaching people without care. The men are really living as Godly men, being the protector and being a leader when needed and we feel so safe. Today I was walking and skipping and enjoying the slums of Colombia, and then I look back and the two men in our group has these worried protecting look over our group. I feel very safe. Can i say they carry everything for us!! lol :)

One of the best funniest moments for us ladies, was we climbed into a jeep taxi, like the 8 of us plus our friend oscar. Just imagine in the circus 48390248 clowns climbing into a punch buggie, but with no doors. Literally people were taking pictures of us, Asian ladies laughing and clinging to each other for their lives.

There were so many things that happened that i wish i can write more, but these experiences here are things I’ll remember for a long time. #SOBLESSED

We had differences today, but in the end through our Lord and savior. Being with these lovely people I really do learn a lot. I feel like I’m growing spiritually and physically. Instead of loving Christ alone like i did before I’m Loving Christ with a family :)

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DLee has been losing weight the past couple days, because it’s so hot here. #unintentionalweightloss

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Thanks for your prayers. DLee got those pair of pants for ministry time…

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We’ve been shopping everyday for something that we forgot to bring from home… Who said the boys didn’t need to bring long pants??!?!

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Yummy churros and coffee from yesterday’s trip to the mall!

[colo14]

Good morning from Colombia! My name is Daniel Lee and I am honored to have you walk with us in our journey thru Colombia. It is SSSSOOOO HOT here! Yesterday was our first full day of ministry and what an awesome time of worship. We went to a very small local church and had a great time of worship. The culture in Colombia is all men are to wear long pants during any church or organized activity (even in this ridiculous heat). I brought no pants and had to borrow one of the Pastor’s pants. It was not my size -_- but I had to fit into them somehow. But thank God it worked somehow. 

I was given the privilege of giving my testimony, sharing a message to the church, and praying for the members there. It was the first time I gave my testimony outside the US and what a honor it was. We were able to pray for the congregation individually. It was an amazing experience. We saw a lot of reconciliation and spiritual healing. We also saw people regain joy and confidence that they heard God’s voice. Did I mention it is SO hot. By 11am, when church service ended, my shirt was drenched. 

Later in the afternoon we took a journey to the highest place in Cartegena. It is a place called La Popa. It is called La Popa because at the top of this hill, the pope came and prayed and prophesied over the city of Cartegena. There is a church located there. We prayed and sang worship songs there. It was a tough and long uphill climb to the top. It was not an easy walk up the hill. There were some very shady areas on the way. However, we were sent an angel in the form of a police officer that escorted us to the top and back down after our time of worship. Normally, there are no police officers there. We honestly believe it was God’s provision for us. Did I mention it’s SO hot in her. By the time I we got to the top of the hill, my second shirt got soaked in sweat. It was 4pm. 

Other than the heat, everyone is joyful and enthusiastic about doing the Lord’s work here. Please continue to pray for us and walk with us in our time in Colombia. Pictures will be posted soon. Thank you for your love and support.