So, as you may know from our previous blog posts, Karen and I went through a very tough patch in our marriage back in 2018 in Peru. Coming out of that, we learned a bunch of stuff and lately have felt called to help other married couples and their families by sharing what we learned. The priest here in Aguada would like us to help out the married couples here with some marriage enrichment seminars. We have been looking into the best way of doing this without stepping on the toes of the current marriage preparation group that is very active here in the parish. Karen and I were presented with the opportunity to do a "dry run" to work out the kinks in English before we have to do one in Spanish. So, we were blessed to have 3 FMC missionary families attend a combined Marriage/Youth weekend retreat at the end of March. The retreat was very blessed for all of the participants and will hopefully strengthen the marriages of the couples that attended as well as the kids that attended the youth portion of the retreat. We were also blessed that the owner of the old doctor's office we are renting also owns a hotel and gave us a very special missionary discount to stay there so that we could all be together for the weekend.
In my usual style, I will add a bunch of photos and provide details in the captions. Enjoy!
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| Here is Karen giving one of the opening talks in a covered BBQ area to stay out of the scorching sun! |
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Anna and a future single missionary named Morgan, ran the youth retreat for the kids which was
full of lots of serious talks with plenty of time for silly games like this one |
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| Meanwhile, Katelyn and one of her friends watched the little kids |
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| We had praise and worship one night and on another night were blessed with a song performed by a new generation of budding musicians!!! |
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| One night we were able to have a dance party thanks to DJ Morgan!!! Each couple got to dance to the song they danced to at their wedding. |
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| In the end, we all took a group photo of the 4 families. |
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| We prayed over one of the families that was leaving to head back to Costa Rica after serving in PR! |
It was a great weekend retreat with a bittersweet ending as we had to say goodbye to two of the families at the end. After I finish writing this blog post I am going to follow up with each of the husbands that attended the retreat as a way to hold each of them accountable to their commitments. Please pray for all of the missionary families in FMC and especially for the married couples.
Peace in Him,
Chris
