BELIZE 3 - UPDATE 5 (FRIDAY)

12/19/2025

Today the team woke up to a beautiful sunrise and sat out on the lawn to do our morning devos and sip our coffee. At 8 we had a delicious breakfast of cheesy eggs, sausage, watermelon, and toast served with a variety of local jams and butter from the Country Barn. After a quick breakfast we said a brief farewell to our friends at Grace Bible Church bidding them safe travels home. We then hopped on the bus and headed into the village for another morning of fun games where the kids knocked it out of the park in baseball, shot arrows in archery, and made lots of bracelets; ending in Sandra making bracelets up to her elbows. 

We went back to Samuel’s Sanctuary for a yummy lunch of pork chops and pasta salad and hung out in the rainbow gazebo. After waiting for the bus, we got in the trucks for ice cream and our last session of games at the park. We did rotations of archery, kickball, crafts, and snacks; inviting the kids to join us in the evening for s’mores. 

We returned to Samuel’s for dinner then packed our supplies for s’mores and glowsticks to take to the park. We entertained them by playing about eight brief games of freeze catch simultaneously as the kids arrived. We did our final bible drama story from Daniel 6 about Daniel and the lions den; explaining to the kids about Daniel’s faithfulness to God.  After a summary of the story from Matt we set up smores. It started pouring rain and we held a tarp over the fire to keep it/the kids dry. For the final fun activity we passed out glowsticks which the kids loved playing with. We finished the night with prayer in a giant circle around the pavilion. We played some more and said our goodbyes reminding the kids that Jesus loves them. After we cleaned up and everyone left, we headed back to Samuel’s Sanctuary; though sad, full of gratitude and joy for the wonderful week with the kids and for all that God accomplished in the lives of the families in Belize and our team. 

~Ava Jones and Aravis Kirsch