Guam Ladies Retreat

Our Annual Guam Ladies retreat was on Friday, July 17.  (All blogs are behind because of the whole no internet thing.)  This year's theme was Lavender Springs Spa: Where Women Rest in God's Faithfulness.  The Guam ladies needed to have a Friday evening retreat instead of our full day event, so we did our best to squeeze all we could in a few hours.

I worked throughout the week on decorating. I was pretty frustrated the day before when some of my set-up disappeared because some of the tables and chairs were borrowed. (Why take them from what we set up!?) But I eventually got over that.  Mostly.

There's a good possibility everyone just comes for the goodies...

....and food. We had an island themed potluck...chicken, ribs, red rice, kelaguen, fruit.  I was very happy!

Our ladies retreat lessons were in the Psalms.  We started with Psalms of Praise for our first session and  moved to Psalms of Lament for our second session. Our prayer station centered on Wisdom Psalms and we ended by touching on the Psalms of Ascent.  

I think everyone had a good time.  

Night Markets

For years, Guam has had a night market on Wednesday nights at Chamorro Village.  When I lived on island, I didn't get to attend because we had church on Wednesday nights.  But generally in the summer time I get to pop in because mid-week services are usually cancelled because the pastor is often gone.  

In the last year, Guam added a Sunday night market in Tumon.  I popped in the week after the typhoon and really enjoyed it.  No pictures, but I hope to catch it one more time before I leave.

Here are a few pics from Chamorro Village on July 15.  I attended with a Filipino family from church.  We had a great time!  We also went over to watch the fisherman come in for the evening.

 

Spanish Plaza

It's only fitting that every couple of years I go to some of the tourist sites. I know that I did not go last year.  Maybe 2024...if not then 2022.  

I always enjoy going to the Spanish Plaza.  

You've seen these places in previous blogs.  The governors palace from the 1700s until WWII.  Most of the palace was destroyed during the war, but there's still the walls, the chocolate house, band stand, tool shed, and siesta shed.   And of course, there's always a few cannons around.  

I thought Perry was going to give me a lovely picture, but he had shenanigans up his sleeve.  (I might also have a picture stuffed in a cannon as well. Different cannon.) 

Latte stones are foundational Chamorro culture.  The exhibit with Perry is new. Lattes come in all sizes as you can see. 

The Cathedral (Dulce Nobre de Maria Cathedral Basilica) is beautiful. Not sure if I have ever shared pictures. It sits right across the road from the Governors Palace.  It sits where the first Catholic church was built in 1669.  The church stood until the WWII when it was bombed during the Second Battle of Guam. 

Around the Covid era, Guam opened a cultural museum. I have yet to go in...maybe some day.  Maybe tomorrow. (Probably not tomorrow, but you never know.)  The outside of the museum is fairly impressive.

And this wall is the Guam anthem. If you want me to sing it to you, just ask.  (Guam schools started every day with the pledge and singing this song!)

Perry thinks he could take this guy. I'm not so sure.

Perry decided maybe he should get blessed.  (Look, it came from Rome!)

And as long as we're in the area, gotta snap a picture of these!

Sweets

Unfortunately Sweets didn't make it until I got home.  She passed away on July 11.  (Oddly enough, so did our neighbor. It wasn't a good day for our stretch of road.)  I actually didn't think she would make it until I got home. Of course, I was hopeful for another fifteen years, but she really had seemed to go down hill these last few weeks.  

To know Sweets was to love Sweets. She was the best.

She loved snacks (particularly pancakes, popcorn, and peanuts). She loved to stare you down so you would give her snacks. She could communicate with me with her clicks on the floor and specific barks. She learned to open doors to get into the house or off-limit rooms. She loved snow and rides in cars. She loved the crazies coming over (more free food!). She loved catching mice. She loved walks and swimming in the creek.

She hated other animals and English peas.

She had a great 15+ years (and 13 with me). Thanks to the many Sweets sitters over the years.

She will be missed.

This was our last picture taken together not quite two weeks before she died. 

Old Fashioned Tent Meetin'

The sanctuary took in a lot of water.  It always takes in a lot of water in heavy rains--has since I lived here.  But typhoons are worse.  And when there is no power to suck up the water and clean the carpets and it just gets to sit for days....mold city.

Probably the first back up plan would have been to set up chairs in the kitchen area.  But when we were preparing for the youth retreat, we realized the air conditioner wouldn't work. I changed controls. I changed batteries.  I slapped the control a few times (because that works way more than you would think). We tripped the inside breaker. We tripped the outside breaker. Nada. It was not coming on. So the decision to have church under the canopy was made.  (FYI: I was being silly the next day at the end of the youth retreat. I said to the air con, "I command you to come on this instant." I clicked the control, and it came on. Just like that.  But the canopy was set up, church time had already been moved up so it would be cooler, and chairs carried over to the tent site.  Outside church for the win.

When I woke up on Sunday, it was pouring. This made me happy because there was a good chance it would be cool (as long as the pouring didn't stick around. Then it would be bad.) Sure enough, it was the most perfect Guam temperature one could get.  

Sure we had to do a little pre-service mopping from the rain.

But service was great!

Bonus: my sermon was about the Holy Spirit.  The Hebrew word for spirit ("ruach") and the Greek word for spirit ("pneuma") translates to wind.  Outdoors with the wind was a perfect sermon illustration

Our perfect Sunday was ruined by Monday.  The tent was found blown so far across the yard (you can see the yard it blew across in the first picture), flipped, and ripped. :(  At least it wasn't in the neighbors yard!

Catch the Wave Guam

It's the 20th Anniversary of Catch the Wave.  Catch the Wave is the youth retreat that I started in 2006 so that kids could have some kind of a camp experience since we can't have camp

Kicking off the retreat was tough. I'm coming off of mega cranky day. Then because of needing to communicate with my students/former students rescuing Sweets to the vet, the vet, my parents about Sweets, I had to keep my phone on.  I barely got over 3 hours of sleep between calls and notifications pinging on my phone.  And I was going to a youth retreat where one has no sleep. AAAAHHHHH

We kicked off the retreat at the church at noon. We enjoyed some lunch together.  During this time I discovered that the kitchen air con stopped working after the storm.  UGH.  After lunch we had a church and parsonage shutter take-down party.  Maybe not-so-much party, but at least the job is done!

Our retreat was held at Garden Villa hotel in Tumon.  I had driven past it a million times and had no idea it was there.  The rooms were super awesome for a retreat. (Not fancy. Just perfect for a bunch of teens.) They had a kitchenette, fridge/freezer, two double beds on one side and two twin beds on the other side with a tv, sitting chairs, and table/chairs in the middle.  Then what I learned after being there about six hours, is the rooms have TWO BATHROOMS!  How amazing is that when you are cramming 7 people in a room?  The girls room is where we had our sessions/games and the boys room is where we had our meals.

This year our retreat title was Catch the Wave: Stand Firm. How does one stand firm?  By putting on the Armor of God, of course.  So in four sessions we covered all the aspects about the Armor of God. 

Session 1: Ephesians 6:10-18; There is a real spiritual war happening, and we are all a part of it. When life gets uncertain, our faith can become shaky. But God wants us to stand firm in Him and His strength, so He has given us His armor to help us in this battle. When we fully rely on God’s power, fully dressed in His armor, we are able to stand and fight!

Session 2: Ephesians 2:1-10; The armor of God is not something that we can work for or earn; it’s God’s gift to those who put their trust in Him. When we believe in Jesus as Lord, He gives us salvation, which we can wear as a helmet, as well as righteousness as a breastplate. These crucial pieces of armor are ours only through Christ’s sacrifice on the cross.

Session 3: John 14:1-14; Spiritual attacks and temptations can happen at any time. In order to be prepared, we must take up the belt of truth and the shield of faith. These pieces of armor are vital tools to help us stand firm and follow God in any and all situations.

Session 4: 2 Timothy 3:14-4:8: Every piece of the armor of God is important and needed. Our one offensive weapon is the sword of the Spirit, which is the Bible. God’s Word and prayer are powerful and help us better understand and put on the shoes of readiness given by the Gospel of peace. Equipped with the whole armor of God, as well as fellow believers around us, we are ready to stay alert and stand firm in our faith.

When we checked in for our rooms, I noticed a few kids in the pool.  We were told it would be three more days before it opened from the storm, but it was OPEN! (My crankiness was turning around.)

We enjoyed Session 1 followed by pizza. (Can you really have a youth event without pizza?  Little Caesar large pizzas are $6, up from $5 from previous years, on Fridays. The line is 1-2 hours long. If you don't do that, pizza is silly expensive. They waited in line for 1 hr 20 min for our pizzas.)  Because of the pool, we got to have a couple of hours of pool, "hot" tub, and water basketball.  We had our second session at 9pm.  Then they played games until midnight.  Me? I got in my bed and dozed...interjecting occasionally or getting up for a snack while they played. I felt bad not playing, but there was just no way. I'm sure my half asleep commentary was more exciting anyway. lol

The boys cooked breakfast.  By boys, probably Ezekiel--the youth leader.  We had an island breakfast of spam, eggs, and rice.  And it was delicious.  I was surprised to see a watermelon because they are always so expensive.  When I asked how much that tiny watermelon cost, the receipt showed almost $17.  

After breakfast and our third session, the kids had about 1.5 hours for more swimming before we checked out!

After check out, we had our fourth session back at the church, followed by leftovers and sandwiches. 

Then because of the typhoon damage to the sanctuary, we sat up the tents/canopy for outdoor service on Sunday.  

Perry and Laura had a great weekend! Hopefully, the teens had a great youth retreat.