Day 1 of Dental Missions

So we went to Cartago, a suburb of San Jose today and were able to work on 37 patients at our site. Two other groups from our trip went to schools nearby and were able to work with kids who needed extractions. We had a great time working with our patients and we were able to share the Gospel with all of them and 16 people accepted Christ as their savior! I was able to pull many teeth on different patients and we had a great time interacting with the patients in Spanish. I did triage the first part of the day, we had ham sandwiches and some great cookies for lunch, then continued full steam ahead until about 4pm. I was extracting on the last patient and we couldn't get this root out, the visibility was poor without suction, and everyone was waiting. The dentist that came with us was about to glove up and come tackle it, I pushed the elevator in harder and it sunk in, the tooth popped out and we could go home. It was a good end to a long day. We came back- it took about an hour, and we had dinner, threw some frisbee, showers, worship music with a guitar and an improvised djembe (water cooler) for a drum and sang a few songs. Then we split into small groups and discussed the Gospel of Mark. We finally got the internet to work, and now we're getting ready to go to bed. Hope all is well for you today! Please pray for us as we go to our 3 different sites tomorrow that we would be bold as we share the Gospel and that we are able to help many patients in need. Earl, one of the missionaries with ua explained tonight that if you had the cure to cancer, that good news would spread like crazy, not based on who we are but based on what that means. We have something far greater than a cure for cancer, the Gospel is the cure for so many of life's problems and we are blessed to be a part of God's plan to reconcille all people, all nations to Himself. Thanks again for reading and praying for us!












-Richard