¡Hola todos! 


Well, the past week has definitely been quite exciting. (I can hardly believe it's only been eight days since that last post... to me, it feels like a month ago)


Sorry for the lack of updates; we're pretty pressed for time here, as we should be. We're certainly getting our money's worth- the LORD has heaps for us to do. 


Wow. I don't even really know where to begin. I'll start with the most recent events and back-track... If that bothers you at all, I recommend starting at the bottom of this post and reading upward. I can't actually guarantee that everything will be in chronological order, forward or backward. If THAT bothers you, I recommend that you read someone else's blog. 


Alright, so. First off, God is wonderful, and I know this particularly because He just miraculously used me to make a very flaming fire in the furnace here."How do you know this was God and not just your own abilities?" you may ask. Well, if you're asking this question, you clearly have never met me. Trust me, folks, the fire I can see burning now was by the hand of our great God, no one else. 


As I sit here in the house of our dear friend Mitch right now, there is a fiesta going on at Pura Vida to celebrate the successful end of the recent Sexuality Seminar for youth (13-20 years) that was held here at the base. It wasn't about sexual orientation, it was about purity- more importantly, they focused on God's love, and how without knowing love, one can't truly understand sex or relationships. While we didn't actually get to be a part of the daily flow of the thing, we did get a lot of opportunities to hang out with the kids who attended. Praise report: our Spanish has improved! It still isn't THAT great, but luckily, love needs no translator. We've all been learning about the true significance of that expression "Actions speak louder than words". It's actually a fact, people. I can attest to this because I've seen it with my own two eyes. I'll have to get to that later, though, because this is a testimony from Monday or Tuesday. Anyway, back to the seminar. So my whole team, excluding myself, obviously, is at this party/barbeque/finale thing right now, hanging out with a ton of really great young people. showing them what Jesus meant when he said the second greatest commandment is love your neighbor. I really love my team here. They're great. Just saying. So, praise God for all those open doors and divine opportunities to speak life and love into these young lives. Woohoo! 


We haven't even gone back in time two hours yet... Like those awful commercials: BUT WAIT! THERE'S MORE! 


We have great news about one of the ladies we've been loving on, too. Not that we love with an agenda or anything, but one of the ways we've been trying to help her out is to get her into a new house. Praise the Lord that He seems to have not only made one very appealing door swing open, but TWO! More praising the Lord- we're looking at helping her to move tomorrow! That's super phenomenal and TOTALLY by the graceful hand of God. We're also looking at how to get the base more involved in ministering to her and her family for after we leave. There's tons of opportunity and blessing here, but where God's doing work, the Enemy is as well. If you'd like to keep all of this in your prayers, it would be greatly appreciated. (Just text the number 6749 to GOD... Hah!)


This morning, we were in charge of organizing something called "Super Sabado" for  bunch of local kids. From what I heard, it went pretty well (I was in the kitchen making lunch today). They told the story of Noah's ark and had the kiddos act it out. One kid was stoked to play God until he found out there were animal parts available. Gotta love those niños(: They also made bracelets with colorful beads to remind themselves of the promise that God made to Noah at the end of the story- extra bonus points if you remember what it is! (Just kidding. If you don't know, you should check out the story, though. You can find it in Genesis chapters 6-9)


--> Side note, real quick: Jonny and Nina just stopped by to see how I'm doing here, all alone and things, and they informed me that a) food has yet to be served at this babrbeque that was allegedly at eight o'clock (it's not ten o'clock... welcome to South America!) b) there's some seriously Holy Spirit fire happening at the cafe- apparently, almost all the kids are crying and getting prayer right now! YEY YEY YEY! God is so great. 


Where were we? Oh, yes. This morning. Before Super Sabado, at breakfast today... Just kidding. We're going back to yesterday now! One day down, seven to go! (Now would be a good time to take a snack break, a bathroom break, an empenada break, maybe take a nap... whatever suits your fancy)


Last night was a night much like every other Friday night since we've arrived... Community meeting! BUT! Last night was a night slightly different from every other Friday, as well. Luke the Australian and I were invited to be a part of last night's worship team! How exiting! It was a bit unnerving, considering everybody else spoke almost exclusively in Spanish, but it was a really great opportunity for God to show up and open the communication. He did. It was great! Really great. It's also so cool to know that we've pretty much been accepted as a part of the base family here. Oh man. I think one of my very favorite things is leading people into the throne room. Yeesh. Incredible. Oo! Here's a fun little side story for some of you readers: You know how when I lead that song "Hosanna" I like to add in the bridge of "The Stand"? (My good friend Sam showed me that nifty addition. It's pretty sweet, I have to say) Well, anyway, we sang that song last night, and it was my job to lead it, partially in Spanish and partially in English. I got to bring some LA worship swag to Chile and throw in that bridge, in Spanish, nonetheless. Super fun(: 




So... It's been a few days since I wrote that^
Jackson started crying and didn't stop for almost an hour.
He's okay now, though, praise the Lord.

There's probably a lot more I could say, but I have to run off to make dinner now, so I'll leave it to your imaginations.

Two more weeks in Chile...

And only two blog posts so far. Yeesh. You can tell we've been super busy!

God bless!
-Ash

Welcome to Pichilemu!

Hello, there, readers!

This first post is meant to be a quick introduction to Pichilemu, Chile and also an overview of what the ten of us have been doing here for the past ten days. Ready? Here we go!

Pichilemu is a little beach town southwest of Chile's capital, Santiago. When I say little, I really mean it, too- there's one hospital, one community pool, one private school and just a few public ones... Basically, it's a great set up for a group of people to show up and make a big impact. Pichilemu is probably best characterized by its surf/skate culture. There's a ton of need here, which means tons of oportunities to be Jesus to the people of Pichilemu! Mitch Anderson is an incredible man of God who pioneered a YWAM location here, right at the top of a hill overlooking the city. His vision was not for a YWAM bubble here, but for a bridging between the culture of the city and the Kingdom culture of YWAM. With basically no experience, but with a lot of heart and heaps of faith, Mitch built Pura Vida, more commonly known as "la piscina" (the pool). Pura Vida (which translates to "Pure Life") is a community center that features a cyber cafe, weekly dance classes, a work out room, and (of course) the famous Olympic-sized pool. It's right on the edge of the imaginary border between YWAM and the city. Christian Surfers is just one of the ministries hosted out of this incredible place- kids from the neighborhood come on Tuesday and Thursday evenings to hear the word of the Lord and hang out with each other. The best part is, everyone in Pichilemu knows 'the pool'.

Why did I just spiel on about Mitch and YWAM and community and all that? Because, my friends Mitch's ministry and vision have become our ministry and vision for these upcoming four-ish weeks. Before I get too much into that, though, I want to take a second to recognize and introduce our wonderful family:

Jonny and Nina are our noble and fearless leaders. Both of them are from Long Beach, California, USA. I'm not allowed to say how old they are- just know this: they're young enough to be relatable but old enough to be trusted with your children's lives. We really wouldn't be the same without them. Jonny and Nina have an absolutely ADORABLE son named Jackson- he's exactly nine months old today! Woohoo! He's really a joy to have around; he's definitely brightened up a lot of not-so-good days.

Dani is our other leader. She's from Ecuador and has been invaluable here in Chile with her ability to speak both English and Spanish fluently. She's a fantastic young woman of God with a seriously compassionate heart.

Luke is a young lad of 18 from the land down under... Sydney, AUSTRALIA!
19-year-old Ryan is from Southern California, USA.
Pat is also 19; he's from Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
Isaac is 22 from the beautiful city of Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA.

Elisabeth is 20 and from the happiest country on Earth- Denmark!
Sarang, AKA Love, is also 20 and lives in San Francisco, California, USA.
Then there's me, little Ashley, author of this account. I'm 18 and I'm from a little town just north of Portland, Oregon, USA.

Alright, now on to the good stuff!

We're from the YWAM base in Los Angeles- our school started April first, and we've made tons of progress since then. (If you want to know more about that, check out our individual blogs- the links are in the sidebar) We've been here at the Pichilemu base for ten days working with a variety of people, being God's hands and feet left and right.

We're living in the YWAM community, so we do meal preparations and other typical things, but we're also working on a few other things as well: we're helping to build a house for Mitch's son and daughter-in-law and putting together some new lane-lines for the pool here. We also hang around Pura Vida a lot and participate in a lot of their activities, mostly with local kids and youth. We love spending time with the teenagers who come to Christian Surfers- a lot of them hang out at the local skate park as well, so that's been a really fun and familiar ministry opportunity for us whenever we have free time.

We go to the local hospital and help out the Doctors and nurses who are hard at work keeping the citizens of Pichilemu well and whole. We do a lot of cleaning there, especially windows! Apparently though, we've made a big impact: baby Jackson hasn't been fairing so well, and the other night, Jonny and Nina decided to take him to the hospital (remember, there's only one hospital in Pichilemu). First miracle: they forgot their passports, but the man behind the desk let them in anyway, leaving just their names and ages. Second miracle: the doctor who was helping Jackson is the same doctor that Pat helps every week. He was super nice, even trying to speak English so that Nina could understand what was going on. (Don't worry- Dani was there, too, so Nina ended up understanding anyway) Miracle number three: they were getting ready to leave, prescriptions and all (Jackson's doing fine, don't worry. If you really want to know, he has an eye infection and Bronchitis, but it isn't even bad. He's still pretty much his happy self.), when they realized they hadn't paid yet! Dani quickly went back inside to find out how much they owed, but was met with quick opposition.  They said, "You are the people from the pool who come and help us; you don't need to pay anything." We found out later that trips to the emergency room aren't cheap either, so really praise the Lord for that!

We help out these two ladies: (I have no idea how to spell their names) Aidea and Enadina. We basically just go love on them and help them in whatever ways we can.

We also go to the old folk's home and do some stuff there, like entertaining them and doing practical work as well.

Basically, we are always always always busy here.

Whew, that was a LOT of words. Sorry for the essay, y'all. Hopefully there will be more praise reports and less wordiness in the next posts. Expect something about once a week. Lots of love! Feel free to pray for us and the people we're touching here.

-Ash