Just a little update

The actual one year anniversary of the Majcher's packing up, leaving Austin, TX and heading to the DR is August 19. What a wonderful year full of beautiful memories, challenges, set backs, leaps forward and amazing support both financially and prayerfully. I just wanted to encourage those who haven't yet to read the July post which sums up our year. There are also a few pictures from the summer thrown in. Hope your summer has been productive and restful. May you welcome the fall with anticipation and joy and thank you for taking time to check out our blog and read about what we are doing here in the Dominican Republic


A few things to pray about and highlight:

1. The Makarios School's first day of classes is September 1!! This fall we will be starting a dual language program with our two youngest classes. This is an exciting transition with incredible potential for our students.
   
2. Our family is up to 65% funding--this is a 5% increase since the July posting. YIPPEE.  At this point, we are not supported by any churches--all of our support comes from individuals.  If your church would like to partner us, PLEASE let me know how to proceed with that.
   
3. If YOU would like to financially partner with us and help us start the new school year fully funded, PLEASE visit https://makarios.webconnex.com/missionary today. Choose 'Majcher Family' from the drop down box.
   
4. I am profoundly thankful to be in a place of religious freedom—I have no fear surrounding being a Christian here. Sadly, this reality that is not everyone's. May those of us who are believers carry the gospel as the precious gift it is with the boldness of those young and old who are losing their lives violently for its cause.
   

A flashback and pix from Summer 2014

 A year ago, Ironman (Imani Folkes, a teacher at the Mak School) sent this note to encourage Levi to love his new school.  Thankfully, I don't see that being a problem this year.  :)  Thank you LORD!

 Such a big girl now!  Eighteen months old in this picture and as cute as can be!  Thank you LORD!

 Had some fun visitors this summer.  Jakob and Isaak Megilligan who live in Austin came with their mom, Sharla!  Fun times all around.  Thank you LORD!

 Sam, Levi and me on the last day of summer school.  What a great year!! Thank you LORD!

Sam and Levi in resortsville, Playa Dorada, in Puerto Plata where we ride bikes.  They are posing by a metal guy who is golfing.  We always mention how Grampa would love this golfing guy as Grampa is a golfer himself.  :)  Thank you LORD for wonderful grandparents!!

A Year in the Dominican Republic

We are quickly coming up on one year of living in the DR. We are truly enjoying our time here and continue to be blessed and honored to be a part of such a great ministry! Here are some highlights of our year.


JOE has learned to drive like a Dominican—which means he will surely be arrested for reckless driving once we return to the US. He has been a total trooper about many things like why we don't get city water when we have paid for city water and now we have to pay for a water truck to come to fill our cistern, having a home phone that doesn't actually call Dominican cell phones, but can call US ones, paying $6/gallon for gas, using pretty play money called 'pesos' and having everyone around him speak Spanish This introvert has also been great about living in a missionary community. He has taught Sarah to headbutt when she is off to bed. (This is more of a prayer request than anything else! :))


LAURIE has grown more comfortable with conducting her life in Spanish. She has learned to roll with disciplining kids to planning for the future of the school to thinking through what to do with the school neighbor who believes the bees that are living in her tree, but stinging our people have chosen her and she doesn't want to disappoint them to trying to explain to Joe why we have to call the water truck to having her heart break because her boys don't want to go to 'panish school and then having her heart leap when they start to love it. She has struggled with the fundraising need, but has learned so much in the process. Incidentally, she has also taught Sarah to blow kisses when she is heading to bed!


SAM, in true boy fashion, has enjoyed exploring our house, yard and gate—a gate he fell from and, while he looked like something out of a horror film, had no lasting wounds or scars. Sam also received a hit to the knee from a foul ball during a professional Dominican baseball game. This earned Mama and Sam their first ambulance ride. Again, Sam walked away unscathed.....wish I could say the same for Mama. :) Sam started his educational career this past year and was an extremely reluctant participant initially. He has grown to love his school and Spanish. He even prays at dinnertime in Spanish. Most significantly, Sam accepted Christ this past year and highly enjoys learning about the Bible.


LEVI, in true boy fashion, has enjoyed exploring our house, yard, and gate—a gate he got stuck in as it closed and the sensor didn't sense him. As awful as it was, he walked away unscathed....wish I could say the same for Mama. She may have suffered two or three heart attacks. Levi mastered potty training this year! He also learned to ride a bike with no training wheels! Levi also started his educational career and was an extremely reluctant participant. So much so, Mama had to pray through the idea that it was Mama's dream alone that was making her sweet boys so miserable Thankfully, that lasted only a season and Levi needs no coaxing to get up and get ready for school—even in the summer.


SARAH celebrated her first birthday here on the island. She learned to walk with tile floors as her cushion, sleep under a mosquito net, throw away dead cockroaches, eat rice and beans and say 'hola' as one of her first words. She is quite particular about who she willingly go to. One of the lucky ones is the night watchman at the Mak house, Miguel. She loves that guy much to the frustration of the many people who would love to hold her! She has proven to be a healthy girl aside from the three-day stay in the hospital after a febrile seizure. Thankfully, she has not suffered any long-term effects from that quite scary event.


We are thankful for the work the Lord has given us, the supporters who have sacrificed for us, the beauty we live in, the community He has called us to, the visitors He has blessed us with, the challenges He has weathered with us, and the profound hope He has allowed us to participate in and share with others. He is so good to us.


As always, please consider partnering with us on this eternal endeavor. You may do so at https://makarios.webconnex.com/missionary. We are presently at 60% funding. This does not include what we are raising for the missionary training on which Makarios places high importance.

Grace and peace to all who took the time to read this. Many thanks to you,


Laurie for the Majcher Fam

A Year in the DR

More school? Yes, please!!


Yesterday, Monday, 23 June was the first day of six weeks of summer school. The teachers will spend the time reviewing, teaching the last concepts the students will need for the next year's class, combating the heat and cursing the principal who instituted this craziness. Gulp! So, now you have a better idea how to pray for the Makarios staff and kids this summer. Also, we are going to have a full summer of groups and we pray they have a life-changing experience as they invest in the Kingdom by serving with Makarios.


I wanted to just give anyone reading a little feel for what it is like in the everyday for the Majcher's in the DR. There is a lot to share as I try to paint a mental image of our life here. For now I will start with how we get to school.


Usually the boys and I take public transportation to school. This consists of Joe taking us to the entrance of our community at 6:45-ish where we wait for a guagua (van) or a carrito (a four-door vehicle). The trip to the edge of our community involves dodging several things: guys on motorcycles, stray dogs, wandering horses, the occasional cow and, even, one time, a family of pigs....oh, and the potholes. Oh, the myriad of potholes. Once we are at the end, Joe lets us out and we wait. Sam and Levi pick little flowers for their teachers that I am supposed to preserve until the end of our trip. I have not successfully done this in almost a year's time. :/


If we get a guagua then we pay about a dollar for the three of us to get dropped off at one of the streets leading into the town of Montellano. If we take a carrito then we will pay a little over a dollar for the three of us to arrive in Montellano as it turns into the town to pick up other folks. Each vehicle has beyond its limit of people in it. A few times Sam has asked why Dominicans don't like to have so much space around them. We chat on the 15-minute trip there or watch the sun start to peek through the clouds or talk to the folks around us who are always wondering if the boys are twins. It has become a sweet time for the three of us to just be together and pray for the day and take in our surroundings.


Once we pay and hop out, we have a little bit of a walk to school. For normal people this would take, oh, say, about 7 minutes. Sam and Levi manage to drag it out to a solid 15 minutes if permitted. It is just that there are so many interesting things to see and comment on. So many people to greet. We usually arrive at school before 7:30 and often are the ones to open up the main office. The boys like to help me open the windows and Levi likes to sit on the swivel office chair and plow into stuff. Sam usually goes out to the kitchen to greet Odilsia and Monica who cook for the school and give the boys the biggest hugs...and sometimes some bread or mango. :) I get stuff prepared for the day and the boys wait for their friends to come—Mak staff and students alike. Not a bad start to our day!

So, I was cleaning the bathrooms at school one day.....

Who would have thought that cleaning the bathrooms at school would have turned out to be such a powerful experience. First, I was cleaning them since the school was expecting some visitors from the capital who were coming to do a preliminary check in on us in our process to become recognized by the Dominican government as an official school. They are very important people for us. So, everyone was scrambling preparing for their arrival.


The bathrooms are cleaned everyday, but not deeply cleaned. So, there I was sweating in the little bathrooms giving them a clean my Mom herself would have been both surprised and proud. What was sweet about it is was that throughout the the process students and teachers were asking how they could help. We were all in this together. :) I now invite everyone of you to come and check out the cleanliness of our bathrooms!


While I was thinking about inviting these ladies into every part of our school—our records, our kitchen, our yard, each classroom, our planbooks, our bathrooms, I was thinking about if I could invite them or anyone else into the corners and closed places of my heart. Would God be welcomed into those places? I put on heels and lipstick to greet these ladies (those who know me know this is a huge effort on my part—not something I do for just anyone!).....do I do any sort of preparation to welcome God?


Some verses that came to my mind and heart are Psalm 51:10. David asks God to create in him a clean heart. I had to scrub some parts of those toilets...like, really scrub. Some of that grime has been there for a long time. Just like the grime on my heart. Scrub, Father, to make it clean and holy.


If those stains are going to fade, I would need to take captive every thought and make them obedient to Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5). I have always loved how clear it is that this is hard work. Taking something captive is not an easy task—have you ever wrestled with a baby to get a diaper on in the Caribbean with no fan on you? I have and it is a sweat-inducing event. It is that caliber of effort that must be made to keep those thoughts in line.


The thing is that so powerful about thoughts is that, as James so vividly describes in chapter 1, that those thoughts once conceived, grow and then are birthed to sin. As a mom who has birthed a few people, this really brings the idea home of the gravity of letting unhelpful thoughts go wild. Remember, too, that once the idea is birthed it will need diaper changes and then let the wrestling begin!


There are two other ideas that God reminded me of during Operation Clean Up For The Important Ladies. One was that it this not a sprint and the other is that I am not created to do this alone. Nope, I don't have any cute stories about how I have run a marathon, please! I am just saying that it isn't a few minutes of mediation and then I'm good to go. It is a changing of the culture of my own mind and surrendering to Christ and God, in His goodness, has called us into a community to help us in the process.


So, I thank God for the chance to be so reminded of my need to dust out some of the corners of my heart so that I may freely welcome God and others there. Good cleaning takes scrubbing and holy thinking takes wrestling with my thoughts to surrender them to Christ. Not doing this and my thoughts can get out of control and grow into something that is much harder to manage. Also, that the process is long, but not a solo task. God has given me His Holy Spirit, His Word and many wonderful people in my life.


And, for your information, I am about to go for a walk, so maybe in the future, there will be a blog about a marathon....but it may go like this, “So, I have a friend who just finished a marathon.” :)


As always, if you are able to support us in our work here with Makarios, we would be very grateful. We are still looking to be fully supported for next year. If 100 people were to give $25 a month, we would be fully funded. Could you be one of those people? (We would also happily accept one time gifts or monthly gifts of more than $25 also) :) https://makarios.webconnex.com/missionary

Summer is here! Time for mohawks, trips to the zoo in the capital with the Youngs and for screaming around bees!