Santa Barbara - 2

Last week I ventured out on my second catalytic trip to the "nearby" (about 3 hours away by bus) town of Santa Barbara. There is a Vida Estudiantil movement there, that has no staff to guide it - we call that a catalytic ministry. I was fortunate enough to
be accompanied by three excited young gentleman involved in our movement here in Merida - Darwin, Neptali, and Jonas (yes the latter two were those that accompanied me on the
primary visit). I was very blessed to have their companionship as the trip involved 2 bus rides, a transfer in between, and then taking a carrito (some sort of cross between a bus and a taxi) to get to the university (that's just one way....). It was a test for my Spanish, as all three of them speak only Spanish, and none of the students involved in Santa Barbara speak any English either - but it was a good challenge. Needless to say by the end of the day - my brain hurt.
After the extravaganza of traveling there (nearly 4 hours), we arrived in Santa Barbara at the university - UNESUR to a warm welcome from the Professors that work with Vida Estudiantil. We began helping them to set up their weekly meeting. For those of you who don't know - Santa Barbara is REALLY HOT and HUMID. It was a blessing to have the weekly meeting in an air conditioned classroom. We helped them set up decorations as this meeting both a weekly meeting and a birthday celebration for those who had birthdays in January. The meeting kicked off with some worship and a great talk from one of their key students. After which, Neptali, Jonas and I got up front and did some promotion for our Congreso Nacional - PRUEBA DE FUEGO. Last year there was only a very small group of students from UNESUR that were able to make it to the conference, and we would love to see a bigger group join us this year!! We talked with the students about the conference as well as about raising finances to get themselves there (once again, the biggest struggle for students here in VZ). We had a large number of students who signed up for Congreso, trusting the Lord to bring in their finances.
After the meeting we sang happy birthday and shared cake with the students for those who had birthdays in January. We then headed to the dining hall for lunch and had a good time hanging out and getting to know the UNESUR students. I was encouraged to see how the movement is growing at the university.
Also, on our way out, the students took us by to see the Vida Estudiantil mural that was painted at the school (the last time I
was there, it hadn't been painted yet, they were still working on it) !!!!! It's great what a presence their movement has on the campus.
All in all, it was a great trip, despite the long commute in both directions, it was very encouraging to me to see the students from Merida who desire to share with students in Santa Barbara and exciting to see the movement in SB growing and desiring to invest in their movement.
In a few weeks, I will be taking some leadership students from Merida to Santa Barbara to do a seminar type talk to teach the leaders in SB about how to run weekly meetings, as well as what a movement should look like. I'm very excited to see their enthusiasm, and how much these students are willing to "own" their movement.