Princess Club: Self Control and Graduation

Another Princess Club has come to an end. This last week we talked about the last fruit in Galatians: Self-control. 

1 Peter 5:8

^"Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour."

To illustrate what self-control means, we started with a very fun demonstration...

In this video, who had control? Shannon (the body) or Jessie (the hands)?

Jessie obviously had control. She was the one who decided everything that was happening. Who  has control over your body? Over what you wear? Over your words and actions? Over what you eat and where you go shopping?

You do.

One of the girls said God has control. But does God control your body? Does He make you hit some one of dance? No. That would be manipulation. 

He can influence us. Just like people and family members can influence us.

They can tell us where to go and what to do and what we eat, but as we get older, we have the choice whether or not to follow that person's advice or influence.

So how do we decide what to do and what to wear and make choices for all of the decisions we make every day?

We can ask the Holy Spirit to show us how to control ourselves in the way that we speak, in the way that we act, and in the way that we love each other. We can ask Him how a princess should act and behave. But we still need to decide to obey what he tells us. We are each responsible for our own actions and decisions, whether good or bad.

This was graduation week!! We celebrated what we've learned over the past 8 weeks with a party! The girls enjoyed a tearing into the princess piñata :)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A few months ago I had been given a very generous donation for the Princess Club. If you remember a few months back, I used part of the money to take the girls to the Parque de Diversiones (the theme park). I decided to use the rest of the money to buy each girl her very own Bible.

In each Bible I wrote the girl's name, what her name means, and a Bible verse related to the meaning of her name. The girls were THRILLED beyond words at their very own Bibles.

 

One of the girls from the New Hampshire team had spent time praying for each girl. We took the girls aside one by one and Emily talked to each girl about what she heard the Lord say about each girl. We prayed over every girl and spoke blessing over their lives. What a special day!!!

Please continue to pray with me for these princesses by name (the meaning of their name is in parenthesis)!! From left to right: Nahomy (pleasantness), Julissa (youth consecrated to God), Brithany (from the Britons), Katherin (pure), Nicol (victorious), and Hellen (light)

 

 

Princess Club: The Teen Years

As anyone who has been down here knows, there are a whole ton of dudes that are a part of our fellowship. Pipo, Randall, Kevin, Nanis, Dago, David, Tito, Kliber, Jason, etc., etc. Teams get to know these guys and work alongside them for a variety of projects and ministries. Fewer, though, are the names of the dudettes. 


In the history of the ministry here, when Rodney and Cindy first came to work in Anonos, the teen girls were very much a part of the daily ministry here. They even had their own group that met with a woman, Rosa, once a week. However long before I came down, something happened and the girls were scattered.

Monica and her 2-month-old, Leidy

The teenage girl group here has been relatively untouched. They are a hard group to break into. They keep to themselves and, as with any community, have their pre-established cliques. The majority of them become pregnant between 14- and 16-years-old and become sequestered into the life of motherhood. 


We as a church are working hard to regain the territory that has been lost. Last year I started a teenage Princess Club during their school break. It worked very well and had about 20 girls that were involved. With the return of school, though, it was hard to find a time when everyone could meet. In spite of that, about 5 girls have braved the strange, often smelly frontier that is the male-dominated youth group at Viña Anonos.

In an effort to draw even more girls in, the Manchester team planned an ice cream social. A meet-and-greet with the sole purpose of inviting the girls in. Next week we are going to have a pizza party and have a panel discussion about relationships. The hope is to get these girls connected to one another, to form friendships and a support network, to help them meet Jesus in a new, fresh way, and to break down the barriers that keep them from connecting into the church community. Please join with us in prayer as we reach out and draw in these beautiful princesses. 

Jendry and her son, Neytan

Tutis and Rachel may have gotten a BIT carried away with the whipped cream....

Girls just wanna have fun!!!

Princess Club: Gentleness

"But the fruit of the Spirit is....gentleness."

In the Princess Club we've talked a lot about the words we use on a daily basis. The Bible says that our words have the power of life and death. With our mouths we can bless or curse and the Lord will bless or curse based off of what comes out of us. We can use our mouths to encourage or to make others feel really bad about themselves. 

Proverbs 15:1 says,

"A gentle answer turns away wrath,
    but a harsh word stirs up anger."

Part of the fruit of gentleness comes through with our words. Every time some one asks you to do something or tell you something, you can chose to respond in 1 of 2 ways: with a gentle answer or with a harsh response.

To illustrate this, I took 2 inflated balloons. I had the girls ask me a question. The first time I answered, I answered harshly and violently popped the balloon. I had the girls ask me the same question again, but the second time I snipped the end of the balloon to let the air out gently. Same question, two different responses. I gave the girls each two balloons and let them do the experiment, too. Here's a sneak peak clip into what we did :)

When we were finished popping balloons, we made cards that had little girls on them with mouths that open and shut. In each mouth was the word "suave" or "gentle". The girls thought they looked like chickens, but they had fun decorating them any way!!!!!

Princess Club: Fruit of the Spirit: Faithfulness

The fruits of the Spirit are well under way!! This week was the fruit of faithfulness (Ana Laura taught last week on goodness and kindness because I was with the teens at the church camp). 

Deuteronomy 7:9

New International Version (NIV)

Know therefore that the Lord your God is God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commandments.

 

Being faithful is like keeping a promise to do something. Have you ever promised to do something? What are some things you've promised to do? Like, "I promise I'll do my homework, just give me five more minutes to play...or, I'll clean my room, just let me watch five more minutes of TV..." We promise not to lie. Not to steal. We promise not to fight with our siblings. Adults make promises, too. Like when they get married, which is a promise to be faithful for their lives.

God also made a big promise to us. All throughout history He made promises to us. Like with Noah. Remember the story of the flood? Once the waters settled down, God promised never to flood the earth again. He sent a rainbow to seal that promise. We are reminded every time we see the rainbow of God's promise and He remembers, too. He promised Abraham and Sarah a baby. He promised Moses he would deliver the Israelites from slavery. 

 

He made a promise to us, too. He promised us eternal life through Jesus. He promises that when we believe and trust in Him, He is faithful to remember His promise to us. He is faithful to forgive and forget our sins when we ask him and he is faithful to call us his princesses!

 

How can we remember his promise to us? By faithfully reading his Word, praying to him, talking to him, loving others, and sharing about him to others.

 

We talked through the verse from Deuteronomy while the girls made bracelets that said "Faithful" on them to remind them of God's promise to them.

Gerrie Morgan, from the Grand Rapids team, taught three days of floral design to the women and teenage girls in the community. With some of the left over flowers, she taught the girls how to make beautiful bouquets. The girls were THRILLED!!!!

 

Princess Club: Fruits of the Spirit

Wow! In looking back this month has been really busy! I realized there are three princess club updates that are lacking! I will clump them into one blog :) Three weeks ago I was unable to lead the princess club, so Ana Laura taught the girls on the fruit of the Spirit of joy. They talked about the differences between being happy and being joyful.

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Last week we talked about the fruit of peace.

What is peace? When do we feel most at peace? Where do you go to get peace?

The Bible tells us that Peace is actually a person. Ephesians 2:14 says that Jesus himself is our peace.

Who else do you know is a peaceful person? Are there people you know who don't have peace? Who are always anxious and worried? How do you feel around people who are stressed all the time versus how you feel around a calm, peaceful person? Jesus is peace, and he is always calm. He knows what to do in every situation, and nothing comes as a surprise to him. 

What can we do when we feel afraid, nervous or worried? We can go straight to Jesus and He can be our peace and give us peace, too. At this point in the lesson, we practiced being at peace by being with Jesus. All the girls laid down on mats and we asked Jesus to come and show us what His peace looks like. The girls listened to hear Jesus talking to them. 

The most common symbol for peace is, of course, the dove. I found a website for making origami doves. Maybe this craft should have gone under the fruit of patience...needless to say, while a few of the doves came out okay, it was definitely a challenge. Mostly because the girls had never done anything like this before and partly because we are still working on following directions.........

  

After the lesson, Lara demonstrated how to be at peace in any situation by promptly falling asleep :)

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This week we talked about the fruit of patience.

Before we started talking, I put a delicious, chocolately, crunchy cookie in front of each girl. I told them that they could eat it right now, or if they waited until we were done with the lesson, I would give them a second cookie. It was their choice, they could have one now, or they could wait and have two.

What is patience? Some times I don't like this fruit very much. It's kind of like a lemon. It's a fruit, but sometimes it tastes a bit sour to me. It means I have to wait for something. Some times I have to wait a long time for something. 

Like my birthday. I love my birthday. It's my favorite day of the year. But it only comes once a year! 

I have to wait and wait and wait for it to come around.

Christmas is like that, too.

Or what about a baby? What if a baby were to be born too early?

It wouldn't be fully developed yet, and that would be bad for it's health.

Think about a gardener. After he plants a fruit tree, he can't go out the next day and expect fruit to be on the tree already. He plants it. Then waters it. Waits for the sun to shine on it. He doesn't give up waiting for the fruit! What happens if the gardener gets mad that there's no fruit within a week? Would he chop down the tree after only a week? 

Some times we need to be patient like the gardener. Some times we get tired of doing good. It's hard to be patient, especially when another person is making us mad or frustrated on purpose. We lose our patience when people do mean things to us. We feel like hitting our brother because he hit us first. We feel like saying something nasty to some one because they called us an ugly word. Some times we feel like giving up or complaining. 

But God doesn't want us to give up, or get tired of waiting. We may get discouraged and feel like things will never change, but God is growing things that we may not be able to see. Every minute of every day He is working to change our hearts.

Adults even get tired of being patient at times. But we can ask God to help us to be patient and wait for change and growth in our lives. We're not very good at being patient on our own. But we can ask the Holy Spirit to teach us how to be patient. After all, if we think about it, God is patient with us, too. 

Galatians 6:9

 Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

At this point, all of the girls still had their cookies in front of them :) So they each got two!!

We made a "Patience Tree" by blowing green paint/soap bubbles. It took a lot of patience to get the bubbles just right!

The New Life team princesses joined in on the fun!!

 

Princess Club: Fruit of the Spirit

Another round of Princess Club is beginning! After our royal outing to the Parque de Diversiones, what else is in store for the Princesses? This round I decided to teach the girls about growing royal fruit. Not pineapples, mangoes, and bananas, of course, but the fruit of the Spirit. Each week during the next 8 weeks we are going to be talking about the different fruits of the Spirit as found in Galatians 5. This week's fruit: L♥VE!!!!


The girls were a little late coming today...Nahomy was the only one to arrive on time, even a bit early. And I had three teenagers from the Naples team and another woman from another community helping. Blink, blink, blank stares at each other... Fortunately I always have princess coloring books with me while we wait for everyone to come. They're a great ice breaker and de-stressor. As the girls trickled in they each picked a coloring page with their favorite princess... Eric sweeping Ariel off her fins, the Beast swirling Belle around the dance floor, Charming and Cindy at their wedding, Prince smooching Sleeping Beauty awake...etc., etc., etc. Hearts and flowers and bunnies and birdies every where.

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When it came time for the lesson about love, their pictures caught my eye. What is love? What does it look like? Is it only this (Indicating the picture of the swirling and twirling Disney couples)? Is it this (indicating Ariel wrapped up in Eric's arms)? Or is it this (indicating the tea pots and cups and candles serving Belle at the table)? Or this (indicating Belle teaching the Beast how to read and drink from a cup)? Or this (indicating Snow White cleaning the dwarves house)?

What is love? Is it just the mushy, romantic stuff? That's a part of it. But it's so much more. It's serving each other, helping each other out, sharing, and caring for each other. Love is also a person. 1 John says that God is love. If we want to love God, we need to love each other, because God is love. That's how we know that we know God...if we love, too, just like He loved us. When we're in Love, or in God, there is no fear, because He gets rid of all fear. Fear and love cannot be in the same place at the same time.

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We can grow this fruit in our lives by loving each other. 

The Holy Spirit can show us how to love each other 

and love God better.

 

As a reminder for the week, we made Love trees.

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At this point I was really feeling like it was time to see if any of the girls were ready to ask Jesus to come live in their hearts. I explained that we have been talking a lot about being Princesses in God's Kingdom. That it is a free gift to become a princess, but we have to ask Jesus to come be our King and to come live in our hearts and teach and guide us. He Himself wanted to teach each girl how to be a princess. One brave girl raised her hand that she wanted to ask Jesus to be her King!!!!!!!!!!! We prayed together and we all CELEBRATED!!!! Later in the evening another girl from the club came to me and asked if she, too could ask Jesus to come into her heart. What an AMAZING day in the Kingdom of God! The angels were having a major party!!!

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Princess Club: A Royal Day in the Park

Several months ago, if you remember, I posted a princess club blog about a very generous donation from a complete stranger (here's the link to the original blog, in case you want to go back and read it: Radomivity)

So I have been ruminating ever since about how to use this sum of money. All kinds of ideas and adventures popped into my head. Here was a chance to do something extra special with my girls and show them how to be treated like royalty!!! After much though, I decided I wanted to take them to the Parque de Diversiones...it's a theme park about 15 minutes from the house, kind of like a mini 6 Flags. I know most of the girls come from families that would not have the financial resources to explore the park on their own. Man, you should have seen their faces on graduation day from the last club when I told them about going to the Parque. They were THRILLED!! Beyond thrilled. Crazy...like Mentos in a Coke bottle. 


Yesterday was the big day!! We all piled into a van and headed out! What a great day!!! Here are the highlights!!!

Praise the Lord my girls are 8 to 11 years-old!! It meant they were all tall enough 

to ride almost all of the rides!!!

 The park was such an appealing place!!!

 Long lines were worth it!!! 

The girls had a blast on the bumper cars...

 Paddle boat time!!! The girls really did a good job paddling...until the end...

 The Octopus. Also known as the brain shaker. 

We went on so many rides, my glasses just couldn't take it.

 Still looking for my prince. I heard you have to kiss a lot of frogs. No luck here, although he was a rock solid frog!!

YAY, PRINCESSES!!!!!!!!!!

I love my girls!! 

They have taught me so much and I am so proud to

see them grow and learn in their

relationship with the Lord!!!

Ana Laura and her son, Matias!! My faithful co-leader and co-heiress in Christ!!!!

 This was their favorite ride! They went on the roller coaster FIVE TIMES in a row!!! There was no line, so there was no waiting. BEST RIDE of the day!!!

 Unfortunately Julissa was the only one not tall enough to go on the big roller coaster. So she was content to ride the rocket ships FIVE TIMES in a row!!!! My girls are learning so much!! Nicol went with her!!!