Missions Newsletter - June 2021
Chase Marshburn and the College Leadership Ministry Team
A little over a year ago, a team of students from Redeemer College was in Panama City, Panama on a mission trip with Filter of Hope the week of the Birmingham Covid-19 shutdown. The events of this past year for our UAB and Samford students pointed to the realization that our ministry would be unable to take our traditional spring break Filter of Hope trip, something that has been crucial to our ministry for the past number of years. But like our God has reminded us, his church, over and over again this past year, his ways are higher than our ways (Is. 55:8-9), and he is sovereign over all – not even a global pandemic can stop his gospel from going forth to all corners of the world.
Thus, despite the fact that UAB and Samford did not have a spring break this past year, the Lord opened an unexpected door for a Redeemer trip of a smaller group size to travel to the Dominican Republic in May, two weeks after our students finished their finals. There, for six days, our team ministered alongside the Dominican local church and Filter of Hope, splitting time between Dominican and Haitian communities. Our students had opportunity to meet both a physical need of the families we encountered (by installing water filters in a place where clean water is scarce) and a spiritual need (sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ with each household we entered).
Over the course of those six days, our team saw the Lord work in mighty ways. Our students learned to trust in the sovereign work and timing of the Father, to find rest and joy in the simple Gospel of the Son, and the saving, transforming power of the Holy Spirit. Further, we celebrated the salvation of 18 Dominicans and Haitians, experiencing the Lord’s saving work, and seeing how he is moving through his church in the DR. This trip was a time when we truly were able to taste and see the goodness of our God (Ps. 34:8) alongside both members of our local church Redeemer and members of the local church in Latin America. What a joy it was to watch our church’s students fall more deeply in love with their God as they obediently followed the call of the Lord to take his word to all nations!
