There is a prison that is out here and it's actually fairly big. I was surprised to find one out here at all, let alone being so massive. Again, I'm pretty sure I took a picture of it, so go check out my facebook page. There is also a university out here and is it ever massive! The campus spans for probably 50 kilometres. I was amazed when I was first told that that was the university campus. Maybe it would be fun to go to a school that is that large, but I mean, could you imagine if the blueprints for that place said that the cafeteria, with all of it's glorious juice from God's nipple (aka coffee), was placed right in the middle. Sure, super awesome for any building that lies around it, but if you were in a building that was right on the edge of the campus, going that far would be a pain in the ass. Especially if you are like me and want coffee all through out the day. Not that I actually drink that much coffee (it's actually tea right now), but it just goes to show that a campus of that magnitude doesn't seem very logical. But I've never been to university, so don't listen to me. Which means this paragraph is null and void, so don't read it. Sorry I couldn't save you the time.
This next section will be a little more spiritual, so if you don't want to read it, I can't stop you. But I would like to encourage you to read it because you've already made it this far, might as well finish.
So I have always been a christian throughout my entire life, but I've struggled with religion. Religion is something that always brings up great controversy and with good reason. This is why I no longer say that I have a 'religion'. I like to call it a relationship with Jesus Christ. This is having a friendship with someone who I can share absolutely everything with and not be afraid that I will have condemnation or damnation, for that matter. Youth With A Mission (YWAM) believes in exactly the same thing. We had this teacher come out from Chile this past week and my initial thought was, "Oh great, an older guy coming to bring some 'words of wisdom' that I'm not going to listen to or care about." Yet, as the very first lesson came about, it was clear that this wasn't going to be a normal old guy preacher. He really had a love for discovering new things and being completely open to them. He also said some very harsh things that really opened my eyes and I was glad that he had the courage to say them amongst everyone else. I wrote down pretty much everything he said (mainly because the booklet he gave me was in Spanish, so I couldn't understand anything that was in it) and it was all very well thought out.
I also had a conversation with Cody (miss having these awesome conversations with you) about how missionaries will go to a place, do some good work like building a school, but will not have anyway of sustaining it. So I came to this YWAM base thinking that I should maybe try and talk to them about this and see what is going to happen on our outreach (missions trip). Yet they seemed to know that they have to sustain what they create in a third-world country because they have a project in Africa that will be in place for many, many months. So this brought renewal to my heart that my missions trip will not be for naught. That it will have a long lasting purpose.
So! This has been quite a long blog and I don't really want to read it over to make sure that all of my thoughts are in order, so if they aren't, comment and say something so that I can either change it or just not.
