Day 4, Monday, March 12
Our first of seven schools was on the agenda for today. In Jamaica, schools have a daily Bible devotion time, kinda Sunday School like. We were given this 30 min period in each of the schools we went to. How unlike Canada and the US! Another big difference for us was the discipline and respect that the kids showed us at each school. The first time I went in front of the school children to introduce our group I said “Good morning everyone” and 280 kids responded in unison: “Good morning sir”! I did a double take as I am not used to that in our culture.

Anyway, we were told to expect 15-20 minutes, but were given the full 1/2 hour! This allowed us to do more music with the kids as well as split the kids up amongst our students to share the Gospel with them.

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Students sharing the Gospel with the kids

After the school we went for a very different experience.. a nursing home.

We didn’t spend much time preparing for this type of ministry, but our students did very well. They talked to the patients, read Scripture that was requested, prayed with them and shared in music and testimonies.

We were scheduled to go to two nursing homes that day, but we had about 4 hours between them so our bus driver took us to a nearby beach!

It was really nice to swim in salt water again, and it was a bonus that it was really warm water!

After lounging about for a bit on a small Caribbean beach, we headed off to a second nursing home where we continued our ministry to the seniors.

A challenging day of ministry as we learned more how God can use us. Some of our students felt akward with the kids but loved working with the seniors, while others had the opposite experience. The whole team was very excited about the opportunities we had and the openness of the Jamaican culture to the Gospel. It made us even more excited about the rest of the week!

Day 3, Sunday, March 11

For the morning service we traveled to our bus driver’s church, Independence Hall Baptist Church. Our bus driver is the assistant pastor at this church.

Our students taught the Sunday School classes and were involved in the morning service with music and testimony. Unfortunately, it had rained that morning and most people walk to the church, so attendance was down. In spite of that it was great to fellowship with other believers in another part of the world. Despite being from different countries, we have this one, wonderful thing in common: Jesus Christ.

Some of the kids at the church.

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Students leading the singing.

The service was almost 2 hours long, and not because I am long-winded. They had over an hour of music and Scripture reading before they invited us to share our ministry. It was interesting to see how the services ran in Jamaica.
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In the afternoon we went to Oasis Baptist Church to run their Sunday afternoon youth group program. Like most events, everything ran on J-time (Jamaica time), meaning flexible time. When we showed up there were no kids there at all, but slowly over the next hour more people arrived. One even showed up just as we were leaving..

Anyway, once some people showed up we played some games and sang songs.

Playing Huckle Buckle with our students

My voice was almost shot from speaking louder than the traffic the night before and preaching that morning, and with one more sermon to do that night I asked Frank to share the devotion with the young people. Frank is a missionary with ABWE (the organization we partnered with for this trip) and came along as a facilitator for us. He also was a missionary for many years with Word of Life. We really enjoyed getting to know Frank and ministering with him.

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Late once again for a meal we quickly had supper back at the school and then headed off to our final ministry event for the day. We would be participating in the evening service at Mt. Stewart Baptist Church. Students again lead music, shared a skit and some testimonies, and I preached.

Pastor Moore and I after the service.

At each of the churches we visited on this trip we left a copy of the books The Stranger on the Road to Emmaus and the children’s picture book, The Lamb.


Both these books clearly explain the Gospel without making assumptions of what the reader may already know or not know about the Bible and God. It is our prayer that these churches will use them in their ministries with the people of Jamaica.